Search - Beaches

Having seen the movie Beaches more times than I can count, I was looking forward to the book. I am therefore sorry to say that I didn’t like it that much.
The basic story stays the same: Cee Cee Bloom and Bertie White (Hillary in the movie) form an unlikely friendship when they are 10 and & 7 years old (respectively). Through many years and personal hardships they remain friends, until a tragic illness brings them together.

What didn’t I like about this book? Cee Cee Bloom is not a very nice person in this book, and I found it hard to really care for her. In the movie Bette Midler gives her a clear vulnerability that wasn’t apparent in the book. It also seemed to me that the author had Bette specifically in mind while writing the story, as if it were already a screenplay in her head. The character of Bertie was whiny and sad. I wanted more than once to say: Come on woman get on with your life!!, but it never seemed to happen. The clichéd fate of one of the male characters was kind of ‘been there done that’ and I expected more from the author.
Nevertheless, because of fond movie memories the book scored extra points, that’s why it gets a high 3***.

A touching story of friendship between two very different women. A funny and heartbreaking novel. Perfect for your next beach vacation!

I'd seen the movie before -- multiple times, in fact -- but I had never read the book. It was really good! I was immediately drawn in to the world of the novel; despite the fact that I already knew the basic outline of the story (if not all the details -- they changed quite a bit from what I remember from the movie), I found this book to be a compulsive page-turner. Cee Cee Bloom is a wonderful character to read about, loud-mouthed, brash, insanely talented, insecure, and just really good-hearted underneath it all. I found Bertie to be less compelling -- the most interesting thing about her was her death (okay...that was harsh. True, but harsh) -- but still a good, strong, EveryWoman-type character, who kept the story moving forward. A great depiction of a true friendship.

The book has far more richness than the movie, even though the movie was very well cast.
great picture of the power of an unlikely friendship.