4.5 Stars Source: Library
Brief Synopsis: Helen is a physics professor at MIT. She's a little socially awkward and ridiculously smart. Charlie, her best friend since childhood, now lives in LA and writes screenplays. She has one of those larger than life type of personalities, and yet she and Helen fit together seamlessly. Life, however, is never easy, especially with high pressure jobs, kids, and other obligations and soon the two drift apart. But when Charlie suddenly dies, Helen finds herself questioning their relationship, as well as taking a deeper look into herself.
Thoughts: There is much to unpack with this story. It was billed as a kind of ghost story, as Helen seems to be getting messages from Charlie after her death, but that plot line is really just a smidge of the story. To me, this story is about friendship and some of the passages describing what it's like to have that kind of deep relationship with another human was just beautiful. Since my copy was a library book, I ended up taking pictures of some of the passages because I wanted to remember how deeply they resonated with me. Here's one passage:
"It was a level of intimacy that I'd never reached with another woman, not back then or once we became adults. I think that with most of our friends we choose how much of ourselves to reveal, and with a very select few it feels as if there is no choice."
So yes, this book deals with a ton of science, lots of talk about black holes, LIGO chirps (Google it), quantum physics and the like, but it's really just backstory. Helen, for all her big brain, is still human and still has to deal with her grief and suffering. I found her process for finding some sort of resolution and peace to be quite moving.
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