Becky's Great Book Reviews The Shampoo Effect by Jenny Jackson

The Shampoo Effect by Jenny Jackson is a wonderfully written, accessible drama, much like her first novel Pineapple Street . The propulsive plot and the relatable characters (this time focusing on a tightly-knit friend group) come together to make this book unputdownable.

Caroline comes to smalltown Greenhead, Maine for a writing fellowship. She meets Van and falls for him, and is inevitably pulled into his friend group. This group of thirty-somethings go way back to high school, and have the inside jokes and old stories to prove it. Caroline feels intrusive and this feeling intensifies when Van learns he has impregnated one of those old friends. In spite of this happening before Caroline met Van, the situation creates complications to say the least.

Jenny Jackson rotates points of view through all of the characters, keeping readers on their toes as each person's own story fleshes out. Jackson writes with great wit and smart humor, especially about the absurdities of parenthood. Her strong similes add heft, like when one of the characters is broaching a sensitive topic with her friend and thinks of the friend as "a bottle of seltzer that has been dropped on the pavement that needs to be opened up slowly and carefully."

This deep, but laugh-out-loud novel, replete with good romance, has the depth and drama to suck one in from page one. The Shampoo Effect gets a Must Read from me.