Best Friends

Martha Moody's national bestseller—a compassionate and tender novel about best friends from college. A testament to the power of female friendship. When Clare Mann arrives at Oberlin in 1973, she’s never met anyone like Sally Rose. Rich and beautiful, Sally is utterly foreign to a middle-class, Midwestern Protestant like Clare—and utterly fascinating. The fascination only grows when Sally brings her home to L.A. Mr. Rose—charismatic, charming, and owner of a profitable business shrouded in secrey—is nearly as compelling a figure to Clare as he is to his own daughter. California seems like paradise after winters in Ohio. And Clare begins to look forward desperately to these visits, to carefree rides in Sally’s Kharmann Ghia and lazy poolside days. As the years pass, Clare becomes a doctor and Sally a lawyer, always remaining roommates at heart, a plane ride or phone call away. Marriages and divorces and births and deaths do not separate them. But secrets might—for as Clare watches, the Rose family begins to self-destruct before her eyes. And the things she knows are the kinds of things that no one wants to tell a best friend. This "terrific novel" (Redbook) is about the biography of a friendship between two women was a big summer word-of-mouth success. "You'll definitely see elements of yourself and your girlfriends in this terrific novel," is how Redbook described Best Friends-which may explain why this first novel from an unknown author has been quietly building to a surprising hardcover success. It's the kind of book that is shared among friends, an instantly familiar and emotionally immediate story of two women who become college roommates, confidantes, and friends for life. Clare, from a working-class Protestant family, has never met anyone like Sally: wealthy, pretty, and Jewish, barely emancipated from her close-knit Los Angeles family. Over the decades, Clare is drawn deeper into the circle of Sally's family-until she uncovers the kind of secret that no one wants to tell a best friend. Moody's first novel examines the dynamics of friendship between two very different women. Meeting as college roommates, the girls are surprised to learn that, despite their many differences, the two form a bond that will last a lifetime "You'll definitely see elements of yourself and your girlfriends in this terrific novel," is how Redbook described Best Friends-which may explain why this first novel from an unknown author has been quietly building to a surprising hardcover success. It's the kind of book that is shared among friends, an instantly familiar and emotionally immediate story of two women who become college roommates, confidantes, and friends for life.Clare, from a working-class Protestant family, has never met anyone like Sally: wealthy, pretty, and Jewish, barely emancipated from her close-knit Los Angeles family. Over the decades, Clare is drawn deeper into the circle of Sally's family-until she uncovers the kind of secret that no one wants to tell a best friend."A valentine to the staying power of women's friendships." (Cleveland Plain Dealer)"She captures the feel of things, the complexity of human lives, and the ability of time to expose and to heal." (Josephine... Two very different women, Clare Mann and Sally Rose, meet as roomates at Oberlin College in 1973 and forge a lasting frinedship