Good Luck with That

Emerson, Georgia and Marley became best friends as teenagers at a weight-loss camp. Years later, Emerson dies, and she leaves her two friends a last request: that they face the fears they still carry as adults.

For Marley, that means coming to terms with survivor's guilt over the death of her twin sister. The guilt has kept her from seeing that a real chance at romance sits right in front of her. Georgia has spent years trying to satisfy the unreasonable standards set by her mother and her brother. Her ex-husband has been offering her love, and she has to learn to accept it.

This is contemporary women's fiction that centers on body image and self-acceptance, with humor running alongside the grief. The focus stays on female friendship and on the two surviving women, each working through her own fear while still missing the friend who set the task.

As Marley and Georgia grow stronger, the point of Emerson's request comes into focus: she wanted them to love themselves. The tone is warm and emotionally open, with romance as one thread among several rather than the whole plot.