The Recipe Club: A Tale of Food and Friendship by Andrea Israel & Nancy Garfinkel

Lilly and Val have been friends their whole lives.

Yet the story starts with an e-mail where you soon learn that they have not talked to each other in over two decades.

Although you are initially introduced to Val and Lilly in the 21st century, you quickly jump to their first letters and the start of their Recipe Club some thirty years earlier when they are young girls. Although the story is told in epistolary fashion - I found it quite unique and entertaining to read it this way. Through their letters and e-mails you learn of Valerie and Lilly's friendship, their parents, school and how each girl grows up to be the woman you first encounter at the beginning of the story. You are taken through a young girl's insecurities, to first sexual encounters, college, drugs, dreams of being famous, etc., and through it all there is a recipe that somehow coincides and goes perfectly with whatever situation or mood they are in.

I loved all the little details - from the doodling on the corners, to the different fonts, titles and colored papers used for the recipes. I love the signatures at the bottom of each letter (ValPal; Lillypad) - just by that you could tell how each girl was growing up as they slowly change throughout the course of the book.

I will forewarn that since it is basically a compilation of e-mails and letters, you are only privy to their lives as they write about it - you only get glimpses as to what happens between each letter, and that includes the times when the girls are together, unless they write about it you don't truly know what goes on. But in the end it really worked for me. I found it engrossing andI couldn't help but want to read more and more in order to get to the heart of their strife.

It is a heartwarming tale of two girls that you can only hope can overcome their differences and make it through stronger in the end. It is a story about friendship, love, loss, forgiveness and hope. This is feel-good chick-lit that I can definitely recommend.

This book was provided for review by FSB Associates.