REVIEW: When Serendipity Strikes – Hermione Lee

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Introverted, friendless, and aloof, Heather Laurence loves being alone and wallowing in her imagination. She meets Stacy Warren, a girl who changes her life, in a speech contest one day. Stacy is everything Heather isn’t—extroverted, enthusiastic, and talkative. A series of coincidences form a camaraderie between the two girls, and their friendship becomes invincible. As each other’s best friend, nothing can destroy their bond—not even the shocking secret about their families that leaves them both reeling. When an accident ruptures their peaceful lives, Stacy is forced to confront the aftermath alone. Only then will she realize how much Heather has brought her and find her inner strength to carry on with life.

Heather Laurence is an eleventh grader whose passion is writing and whose life would forever change when she meets Stacy Warren. Heather and Stacy were part of a speech competition and they both won first place, it was the beginning of a friendship that would take two totally different girls into each other’s world.

Heather is an introvert and does not like being around people or talking. She likes to be alone, that was until she became friends with Stacy who surrounds herself with friends but never leaves Heather out. Heather for the first time shares her stories and her feelings with someone that she doesn’t do with her own family.

Heather’s home life is sad, she has an older sister who can do no wrong and a younger brother who is the shining star. Her parents barely acknowledge her, and her sister and brother show no love or respect for her all the things she gets from Stacy. Heather knows she comes with a lot of baggage, she’s sensitive, overthinks things and keeps walls up around her, it was Stacy who changed all that and accepts her for the way she is.

A childhood friend of Heather’s Josh likes her, but Heather doesn’t want love or a relationship and knows that Stacy likes him, so she becomes a matchmaker and sets Josh and Stacy up for a date that ends up a relationship built on love. She only wants to make
Stacy happy knowing she would never pursue Josh thinking Heather likes him, no sacrifice is too great.

Stacy believes she and Heather are soulmates, not in a romantic way but in a way that they will be friends for life. They spend every day together and Stacy’s parents welcome her into their life. Then at a teacher parent conference everything changes when something from the past pits Heather’s parents against Stacy’s parents jeopardizing Stacy and her friendship.

This meeting brings to the forefront information that the girls were never aware of. Heather will not allow her mother to keep her from Stacy and fights back, but it does cause friction.

This was such a beautiful story and an emotional one and I couldn’t help loving Heather and Stacy. I don’t want to reveal anything else but this book although YA is a book I would recommend to any adult.