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Emily Giffin's first novel, SOMETHING BORROWED, focused on Rachel, a sweet but average-looking single lawyer who, on her thirtieth birthday, finds herself falling in love with Dex, the fiancé of her best friend, Darcy. As Rachel and Dex carried on their affair under Darcy's nose, Giffin managed to gain readers' sympathy for her protagonist by showing Rachel and Dex's genuine love for each other and by painting Darcy as a first-class pain in the rear. Self-centered, shallow and shortsighted, Darcy is thoroughly unlikable, especially when readers discover that Darcy has been carrying on an affair of her own with one of Dex's groomsmen.
Because Darcy is such an unsympathetic character in SOMETHING BORROWED, Giffin's approach to the novel's sequel, SOMETHING BLUE, is pretty gutsy; instead of focusing on appealing underdog Rachel, Giffin's sophomore effort centers on Darcy, who is as selfish and unlovable as ever. The very first words of Darcy's narration --- "I was born beautiful" --- should give you a good sense of Darcy's narrative style and opinion of herself.
At the novel's opening, Darcy, pregnant following her pre-nuptial fling, must cope with calling off her picture-perfect wedding and breaking the news of her broken engagement and her less-than-perfect pregnancy to all her family and friends. Along the way she manages to annoy and alienate almost everyone, until she finds herself almost totally alone. Finally, she turns to her childhood friend Ethan, now living in London. Darcy has always dismissed Ethan before --- after he dared to turn her down back in fifth grade, she concluded he must be gay --- but now, he is the closest thing to a friend she has left.
Newly settled in London, Darcy continues her narcissistic, materialistic lifestyle without regard to her pregnancy, until she suffers a rude awakening and sets out a self-improvement plan that may not only benefit her unborn child but also finally enable Darcy to think about someone other than herself. Can Darcy get her act together and --- just maybe --- discover true love along the way?
It is a credit to Emily Giffin's writing skills that, with SOMETHING BLUE, she manages to fashion a novel whose central character is thoroughly unappealing (at least for the first 200 pages) but whose charming plot and witty writing style still make readers want to find out what happens next. Chances are, too, that by the time Darcy realizes the error of her ways, readers --- in spite of themselves --- also will be rooting for things to turn out well for the anti-heroine.
--- Reviewed by Norah Piehl
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