This is subtitled A Novel of Friendship, and it did nicely capture the ebb and flow of a new relationship as it develops between two women in middle-age where both are emotionally damaged and one is passive aggressive and the other has the patience of Job. The characters have interesting cultural backgrounds - both Swedish, one having immigrated from Pinochet's Chile. To be honest books about food and gardening bore me, or I would have given this another star.
I'm a little torn on this one. I generally liked it, but I felt there were some loose ends after finishing the book that made me wonder if I missed something or if the writer just got lazy at the end. I found the friendship between these women to be a bit alien, I guess they kept coming back to each other for a reason but it didn't seem like a deep friendship in the way I'm used to friendship. Both women had a great deal of baggage, which I think made it hard for them to let themselves go and trust each other. It was interesting and written reasonably well, but for some reason I feel like I didn't get as much as I expected from it.
