In Best Friends Forever, obese, shy Addie is reunited with Valerie, an old neighbor and friend after nearly 15 years of silence. The reunion may not be so welcome, since Valerie made Addie the joke of their high school and shunned her to fit in with the cool crowd. Now, when Valerie suddenly shows up on Addie's doorstep asking for help, the two women are forced to come to grips with their friendship's awkward past and forge a new future. It doesn't help that Valerie, after accidentally hitting the former high school jock, flees town with Addie, thinking that she's a fugitive for murder. It isn't long until police chief Jordan pursues them.
Best Friends Forever is set up in a style reminiscent of Jodi Picoult. The narrator switches between a first person narrator, Addie, and a third person narrator that focuses on Jordan and the more thriller-suspense aspect of the novel. This makes the flow seem a little awkward at times and detracts a little from the wonderful female leads in the novel. While Jordan is an interesting character that has plenty to offer, he simply is less interesting to readers than the lead duo of Addie and Valerie. The novel could have been even better if some of the detail about Jordan was dropped altogether and focused exclusively on the ladies.
Also, readers need to pay close attention to the story since it frequently shifts between past and present events. The flashbacks have purposes and helped to develop the characters perfectly, but sometimes it feels like there is too much emphasis on the past and not enough on the present plot line. Despite this, Best Friends Forever is laid out very much like a movie - much like a Thelma-and-Louise type movie. The movement between scenes feel like something that a director might do with a script, to make the story work for viewers. This makes the novel feel modern and accessible to many readers.
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