The Things We Do To Our Friends by Heather Darwent
Edinburgh, Scotland: a moody city of labyrinthine alleyways, oppressive fog, and buried history—the ultimate destination for someone with something to hide. Perfect for Clare, then, who arrives utterly alone and yearning to reinvent herself. And what better place to conceal the secrets of her past than at the university in the heart of the fabled, cobblestoned Old Town?
When Clare meets Tabitha, a charismatic, beautiful, and intimidatingly rich girl from her art history class, she knows she’s destined to become friends with her and her exclusive circle: raffish Samuel, shrewd Ava, and pragmatic Imogen. She is immediately drawn into their libertine world of sophisticated dinner parties and summers in France. The new life she always envisioned for herself has seemingly begun. But as Clare starts to realize just what her friends are capable of, it’s already too late—because they’ve taken the plunge. They’re so close to attaining everything they want, and there’s no going back.
Reimagining the classic themes of obsession and ambition with an original and sinister edge, The Things We Do to Our Friends is a seductive thriller about the toxic battle between those who have and those who covet, between the desire to truly belong and the danger of being truly known.
Review:
The synopsis of this book really intrigued me. I like books where the outsider meets a group of friends who welcomes them into their fold and then they realize that maybe they have gotten themselves into something a little too deep. That’s what I thought I was going to get, but it didn’t quite deliver what I was expecting.
Our main character is Clare who at 16 was kicked out of the house and disowned by her parents. Whatever it was that she did was enough to make them send her to live with her grandmother and never want to see her again. I’m always confused when this happens in a book. It’s one thing for grandparents to take in a kid because their parents are inept, or addicts or whatever, but it’s a completely different story when the kid is a major hellion and you send them to live with their grandparent? Why would you do that? Were you also a horrible teenager and you figured they were able to set you straight so you’ll send your kid to them so they can set them straight, too?
Anyway – we spend most of the book trying to figure out what it was that Clare did. She’s plenty paranoid that her new friends might find out – or maybe know what she did and could potentially blackmail her with this info.
I really like the premise, and I liked that Clare always seemed just slightly unhinged. What bothered me about the book was the slow pace. The only way I can describe it is, once when I was 14 or so, I came to Oregon to visit my cousin. We were riding back to Idaho with a family friend of her parents when 3 hours into a 6 hour trip, the transmission in the truck we were in went out. We couldn’t go over 40 miles an hour. It basically took us twice as long to get back to Idaho. We knew we were eventually going to get there, but it took forever. That’s what this book felt like.
I also felt like we were going in one direction and then all of the sudden we went in a different direction and then before you know it, you’re back on the original path.
Despite the frustrating and uneven pace, the characters are all complex and broken (which I love) and I liked where we ended up, I just wish the ride to get there had been smoother.
