Kelly's Review of There’s Cake in My Future by Kim Gruenenfelder

Written in the first person from the perspectives of three best friends, There’s Cake in My Future by Kim Gruenenfelder is a fun and pseudo-realistic picture of the life of a thirty-something woman living in Los Angeles.

Nicole, a bride-to-be, is unsure about being a stepmother to her NBA coach fiancé’s two young daughters. When she accidentally pulls the wrong cake charm at her bridal shower, her anxiety only increases. Out of work and already feeling lost and resentful of her new stay-at-home mom status, Nicole’s honeymoon turned “familymoon” is the icing on the cake (pun intended).

Seema is an art gallery director who has been harboring a category 5 crush on her best guy friend and artist, Scott, who is her exact opposite in every way. She hopes for the chili pepper cake charm to take their relationship to the next level. Seema’s quest to turn a friendship into “something more” involves plenty of misread signals and all-too-familiar awkward moments.

Melissa is an impatient girlfriend waiting for her boyfriend of six years, Fred, to finally pop the question. Expecting to pull the engagement ring cake charm, Melissa is less than thrilled with the charm she actually ends up with. Little does she know that the charm will turn out to be exactly what she needs.

The novel begins at Nicole’s wedding, but then flashes back to the events leading up to the big day. This style, combined with the switching of first-person narrative from chapter to chapter was confusing at first. However, each character is easy to relate to, possesses definitive strengths and weaknesses and has a fairly distinct voice.

Kim Gruenenfelder lives in Los Angeles with her husband and son. Her debut novel, A Total Waste of Makeup, has been published in six languages and eight international editions to date. In addition to her three published novels, A Total Waste of Makeup, Misery Loves Cabernet and There’s Cake In My Future, she has written feature films, episodic teleplays and two stage plays. You can contact her through her web site, www.kimgruenenfelder.com, as well as on Facebook and Twitter.