There's nothing wrong with this book - it's a good easy beach read - but in the end it felt a little too clunky and on the nose with the story and left me mostly cold.

I can't help but feel like this was the author's first book. There's a lot of "tell not show" going on.

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Plenty of time to feel as though, as the reader, I could understand each of the characters. Nice mix of people and problems to be resolved...which Pekkanen manages to do successfully. ( )

Usually I'm a big fan of Sarah Pekkanen but this one left me wanting more. I had trouble with a lot of the adultery that took place in this book and thought that the book could have been a lot better without that. I wanted to learn more about some of the characters and feel like they got glossed over a bit with other plots. If this is your first Pekkanen, try some others because this one was not her best work! **I received this book in advance through NetGalley.com and read an uncorrected proof* ( )

Sarah Pekkanen’s The Best of Us is a marvelous novel about friendship. But it is also a journey of self-discovery as each of the women comes to terms with the various challenges facing them as they enjoy a decadent week long vacation in Jamaica. Please click HERE to read my review in its entirety. ( )

Whenever I see a new book by Sarah Pekkanen is coming out I am sure of two things: (1) I will be reading it soon after it comes out and (2) I will love it! There are only a few authors I have come across that seem to be able to actually make me laugh and cry over and over again throughout the story and that can create characters that either feel like they are inside my head, experiencing the same feelings and issues I am, or are people that I wish I was friends with. None are perfect but all feel very real. The characters in The Best of Us are no exception.

When an invitation to celebrate their college friend Dwight's 35th birthday on an all expense paid trip to Jamaica is received, neither Tina, Allie or Savannah can think of a good reason to turn it down. Tina, a mother of four that finds herself exhausted the moment her eyes open every morning, is hoping some relaxation and time alone with her husband, Gio, will allow her to feel like a woman again, not just a mother who is constantly failing everyone. Her best friend, the always optimistic and caring Allie, needs something to take her mind off a devastating revelation regarding her birth father, information that could mean a painful, debilitating future for her and which is making it hard for even her to keep her spirits up. She hasn't been able to confide her worries to her husband, Ryan, and is hoping the trip will clear her head and allow her a week to forget about the future. And their spunky friend, Savannah, is trying her best to get over her husband's infidelity and her possible divorce by making herself even sexier than usual in an attempt to make herself feel desirable again. Maybe a Jamaican fling is just the thing to get her groove back!

When Tina, Gio, Allie, Ryan and Savannah arrive at the airport they are beyond excited to discover they will be traveling on a private plane and that Pauline, Dwight's wife, has spared no expense to make this trip as wonderful as possible for all of them. Every tiny detail has been carefully planned and, while the others find Pauline to be haughty and hard to get to know, she is determined to make sure everyone has a great time. She figures if Dwight, a man who has always seemed on the outside of every other group, is able to have a once in a lifetime birthday with his friends, he might not realize that Pauline, and their marriage, are not all they appear to be.

While this group of old friends celebrate a week in paradise, with endless supplies of gourmet food and the best booze you could hope for, old secrets and desires begin to surface and everyone's carefully constructed facades begin to crumble. By the time a hurricane sweeps through to clear the landscape around them, mistakes have been made, deep seeded truths have been revealed and each of the woman have reevaluated everything they thought about their lives and those of the people around them. With all the uncertainty that swirls around them, even as they board the plane to head back home, it seems one thing is glaringly true for all of them: unless you can be honest with yourself and accept who you really are, you cannot be truly happy or be all you can be for those you love.

I am always shocked at how relatable Sarah Pekkanen's characters are! While I do not agree with all the choices the characters in The Best of Us made I can say that, seeing the situation through their eyes, I am able to at least understand why they made those choices. My favorite character and the one I related to the most was Tina. Being a mother who often feels like I am somehow failing someone no matter what I do (when I'm at work I don't have as much time for my son and husband, when I'm home and doing stuff around the house I am missing out on something my family is doing, God forbid I try to take an hour for myself...it can be exhausting!) and I can completely relate to her feelings of wanting to escape it all and then the guilt that instantly encompasses her. I also felt such kindred spirit when she was incredibly excited to be on vacation with other adults one minute and then instantly home sick for her children the next. I have felt that a number of times and it was usually through Tina that I experienced my weepy moments reading the book. The other tear worthy moments for me revolved around Pauline's storyline involving her disabled sister, Therese, and it really helped explain her more prim, closed off personality.

While so much of the story is heartfelt and tender, there were also plenty of the witty, snarky character moments I have come to love in Ms. Pekkanen's stories and they really helped to level the heavier actions and moments. Savannah is the life of the party and that friend that everyone seems to have, the one that has to always be the center of attention but that you love anyways because she has a big heart. She made a lot of mistakes and seemed to be at the center of every late night drinking binge, but when the reader gets a peek into her battered heart and mind after her husband's infidelity, you just cheer her on in discovering who she really wants to be.

Reading a Sarah Pekkanen novel can be a very cathartic experience: you will laugh, cry, then laugh some more and, by the time you turn the last page, you have not only gone on an adventure with her characters but have gotten the chance to put youself in their shoes and maybe thought a little bit more about what you might be going through at that particular point in time. Set against the idealic paradise of a private villa in Jamaica, The Best of Us is a vacation in a bottle and a chance for every reader to vicariously enjoy the trip while also possibly thinking of how they might react experiencing the same problems as the characters. ( )