Beaches: Iris Rainer Dart

his book was much better than the movie adaptation. The book starts with a famous singer, Cee Cee rehearsing when she gets a call from a longtime friend saying she needs to see her. Cee Cee walks out of the rehearsal not positive she heard her friend correctly. As she makes her way to see "Bertie" she thinks back to how they met and the story weaves in and out between the past and present. They were both at the beach 30 years prior when Bertie had lost her mom and was wandering around crying. Cee Cee was a child performer who happened to have an audition right after meeting Bertie and Bertie watched Cee Cee lose the audition to another little girl because Cee Cee's mom had been bragging about the audition. The girls become pen pals and 10 years later end up living in the same town and working for the same theater, Bertie would do the costumes, Cee Cee acted. Bertie sleeps with the theater producer, whom Cee Cee later marries. Cee Cee's mom dies and the girls separate again. Bertie ends up marrying a cold, well to do lawyer and is miserable. Once they divorce she finds out she is pregnant. Cee Cee shows up again and starts dating Bert's doctor. The girls go their own way again after Cee Cee gets a call from her agent and leaves Bertie to tell the news to the Doctor. Present day- Bertie is dying of ovarian cancer and wanted to see Cee Cee once more to say goodbye and that she was talented. Cee Cee, still selfish, says goodbye and heads to the airport to get back home and finish rehearsals. When she gets to the airport the realization that this is the end hits her and she heads back and nurses Bertie until death. Cee Cee makes sure Bertie's daughter, Nina, says good-bye and then finds she was left as the guardian for Nina in Bertie's will.