Friday, May 7, 2010

Heart of the Matter by Emily Giffin

Tessa and her husband Nick are in the middle of their anniversary dinner when Nick gets a page from the hospital where he's a surgeon. A little boy, Charlie, has been badly burned in an accident and will need multiple skin grafts. It should be a normal workday for Nick, but this time is a little different. Charlie's mother is Valerie, a single mom coping with her son's accident as best she can. Against her better judgment, she finds herself falling for her son's doctor, and is surprised when he seems to reciprocate her feelings. Suddenly these three people - Tessa, Nick, and Valerie - become intertwined in life-changing ways.

Total fan alert: Giffin's Something Borrowed is one the very few books I have read more than once. All of her books have been amazing for me, always sucking me in, always left me holding the book close to my chest. This latest book effortlessly met my already high expectations. I was sure I was going to get absorbed in the story, but was still unprepared at just how quickly Giffin made it impossible for me to set the book aside for any length of time.

I liked that this story was a spin-off of Something Borrowed (her older brother is Dex, making Rachel her sister-in-law), and that we even got a brief update how Darcy's doing. Reading about dissolving relationships is hard to do and yet I find myself being unable to turn away from them. Family dramas like this provide readers with something everyone can relate to, be it subtle pieces of advice your Mom gives you, little paranoia's your friends help fuel, or simple everyday relationship worries. Giffin's writing is sincere and brutally realistic. It didn't matter to me who "the bad guy" was in this story, it was hard not to agree with the feelings of everyone involved. And that's what I like most about reading Giffin - she gave me a lump in my throat and made my chest feel tight through the last page, but I wouldn't want it any other way.

Overall Rating: 5 Stars

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