Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

This was truly one of the most irritating, sexist, tone-deaf books I've ever read. I saw a few reviews of Giffin's work, saying she delved deeply into relationships and the gray areas between right and wrong. Unfortunately, this novel is only about one thing: a woman who starts an affair with her best friend's fiance. The whole book is them sneaking around, her having to keep up a front with her friend, and her internal monologue justifying, over and over again, what she's doing. I'd be fine to read about a messy relationship situation -- but this isn't messy, it's just repetitive. A zillion times, the narrator thinks, "I can't believe I'm having coffee with [shopping with, hanging out with] my best friend even though I'm sleeping with her boyfriend." We KNOW she's doing that. Move on! There's no tension, just incredible annoyance that she doesn't ask him to leave his girlfriend, or do anything resembling having a backbone. Giffin also goes way, way out of her way to paint the best friend as annoying and selfish, allowing us to (supposedly) feel justified about the cheating. Finally, about four-fifths in, the situation changes and I thought there was hope that this woman would do something other than pine for (and be an always-available bedmate for) a total loser of a guy who refuses to make a choice. But her freedom only lasted a few pages and she got sucked right back into his vortex. Spare yourselves, sisters. Don't read about this doormat whose only goal in life is to wait for a loser of a man to figure out if he likes her more than her friend. It's a repetitive, one-note, frustratingly anti-woman tale of passivity and wishing rather than doing.