Review: Her Best Friend's Lover

for hopeless romantics who enjoy friends to lovers themes @shilohwalker #
Her Best Friend's Lover by Shiloh Walker
My rating: 4.5 of 5 stars

Unrequited love for a woman who grew up abandoned just squeezes my heart painfully. I am a sucker for characters who are admirable and all alone. The desolation and confusion they feel from being unwanted just breaks my heart. Lauren is a self-made woman. She is an artist who is reserved with few friends. Her past is a baseline which makes her so fragile in some ways. I hurt for Lauren and the last twenty-five percent of this book, I wept silently the entire time. This is why I loved the book. Because Ms. Walker invokes such emotion for me. I have never been abandoned. I have felt unwanted by my parents but never to the degree Lauren has felt. So perhaps this is a kind of book that speaks to me more than others.

The conflict in this book is well done. It is a miscommunication and usually these feel too contrived for me and I hate them. Ms. Walker pulls it off so well in this one for me. It is easy to see why it happened and why Lauren did what she did with Dale. Dale is an aggravating character for me. I should hate him and think he doesn't deserve Lauren, but for some reason I can't. Ms. Walkers creates two characters who hurt each other unwittingly and instead of wanting to smack them upside the head, I wince and wish I could help them both. They are both a little lost and a little bruised from life. The chemistry between the two characters is very well done and when they are together, it is magic. The slow simmer to boiling hot is arousing. This story is not about insta-love. It is about learning to bring down walls and trusting someone. And who better to trust, than your best friend? This is recommended for hopeless romantics who enjoy friends to lovers themes.

*provided by NetGalley