The Boy Next Door

These two offer a kind of `guarantee' of an enjoyable romantic read, while managing to avoid the rose-tinted outlook usually favored by romantic novelists, and keeping an unusually dark element to their characters stories. This is a fun read but not as good as `We are Family' which, in my opinion, is their best book by far and, once you've read that (which is a lot darker than anything else they've written), all their other novels are immediately reduced to four stars.

Without a doubt - Josie Lloyd and Emlyn Rees know how to do the "HE SAID / SHE SAID" thing. They hit a home run with "Come Together" and "Come Again" - and without a doubt .... "The Boy Next Door" is a good follow-up to their major success. True - it's not better than their previous work (that would take a lot) but it's a really nice try. This childhood love story of Mickey and Fred is really sweet and refreshing. Mickey and Fred grew up next to each other and experienced all their first together. They thought nothing would ever bring them apart. Well ---- cut to 15 years later and they aren't even "friends" anymore. Of course - circumstances bring them back together and that's when the fun starts. This is a warm and charming love story that really lets you into the minds of both main characters, and you have the good fortune to have them written by each member of the opposite sex. Nice follow-up effort for these two great and talented writers. Cheers!

Mickey is divorced, has a young son and runs a flower shop. Fred is getting married soon.But fate throws them together and everything changes.Up to their mid-teens, Mickey and Fred lived next door to each other. They were the best of friends - knew everything about each other. They were getting closer every day and knew their lives would be spent together.But all that changed when with no warning, Fred and his mother disappeared and Mickey was left without a word.Written by a husband and wife and told in alternating chapters, this is a good book on friendship, love and second chances.

Growing up, as next door neighbors in early 1980s Rushton, England, Mickey and Fred were best friends doing everything together sort of Siamese twins. They expected their friendship to go years beyond their first cigarette and kiss to their last dying breath. However, the death of his father intercedes and the duo is separated as Fred and his family moves away.Fifteen years later both are ignorant that the other also resides in London. The divorced Mickey raises a son by herself while managing a flower shop. Fred is a marketing manager for an Internet news site. He is engaged, but keeps asking "is that all there is"? That is until he accidentally runs into Mickey. With his wedding one month away, Fred wonders if he loves Mickey or just nostalgic over seeing his best bud from the happiest period in his life?THE BOY NEXT DOOR uses the technique of alternating first person perspectives (between Fred and Mickey) that Josie Lloyd and Emlyn Rees are so adept at making work. The "He thinks, She thinks" story line focuses on the angst of the understandable lead characters with flashbacks to their idyllic childhood and the abrupt end of their personal Eden. Though his fiancee Rebecca is not much of a rival as she is too selfish to matter to Fred or readers, this novel will motivate readers to seek previous books from this dynamic duo (COME TOGETHER) while wondering what Josie wrote and what Emlyn wrote.Harriet Klausner