The Myth of Me & You.  Finished 3-26-18, 4.25/5 stars, fiction, 312 pages, pub. 2005

The Myth of You and Me captures the intensity of a friendship as well as the real sense of loss that lingers after the end of one. Searingly honest and beautiful, it is a celebration and portrait of a friendship that will appeal to anyone who still feels the absence of that first true friend.  from Goodreads

Sonia shrugs. “You know. She’s not that quirky. She likes mainstream movies. Romance. Action-adventure. She’s not into inner turmoil. She’s one of the most practical people I’ve ever met. It’s like, life is a job. She’s a realist.”

For some reason I felt slightly affronted. I say, “I’m a realist.”

Sonia laughs. “You’re not a realist,” she says. “You’re a dreamer who doesn’t believe in the dream.”   Chapter 17

There’s nothing quite like those first real friendships when you’re young.  Everything is new as you discover the way the world works together, or maybe you don’t quite figure it out but you try and it’s okay because you’ve got each other.  Cameron and Sonia were each other’s touchstone from the  time they met when they were 14.  Through high school and college the two, seeming opposites, stuck together even though they both loved the same boy.  What could possibly tear them apart?  Fast forward a few years and they are living completely different lives, in different states without a word between them until Cameron receives a letter from Sonia and her boss comes up with a plan to reconnect the two.

I loved this book.  Cameron was a bit of a tough nut to crack and as the protagonist in a first person story her distance became the lens from which you saw everything, past and present.  Cameron’s journey to find Sonia was filled with many moments that seemed unrealistic, but as a whole it was satisfying.  I was rooting for them and for a happy ending for Cameron, which I feared couldn’t happen because I wasn’t sure that she wanted to be happy.

I met the author at a book talk at my library back in 2011.  I loved the book she was on tour for, so I’m not sure why I waited so long to read this one.  Husband and Wife really spoke to me as a new mother and this one left me missing my childhood friends and wanting to reach out to them.

I just love this cover, don’t you?