When this was pitched to me as a good fit for fans of “Friends and Strangers” by J. Courtney Sullivan, I was immediately on board. That’s one of my favorite books!

In “The Favor,” two women from very different economic classes meet — and one offers to be a surrogate for the other.

The comparison to “Friends and Strangers” was a good one, and I enjoyed this exploration of how class can affect female friendships. I was really impressed by the dialogue and writing — this was an engaging book I flew through. I enjoyed the writing and would absolutely pick up the author’s work in the future.

Adele Griffin with another hit! This was a perfect blend of what it means to be family, friendship and infertility in the backdrop of the big city.

This thought provoking book will be one that I recommend. Thank you NetGalley and SourceBooks Landmark for the opportunity to read this book via eARC early.

When Nora meets Evelyn she is immediately enamored by her. She is thrilled with the idea of being friends with the rich and outgoing Evelyn, Evelyn lives a lavish lifestyle and brings Nora and her husband into the fold. With Nora dealing with devastating infertility issues, Evelyn decides she wants to be Nora's surrogate. 

This book deals with some serious subject matter. Nora and her husband have struggled with infertility for years. They are seeing everyone in their life have children and it is devastating that they cannot build their family in the way they want. When Evelyn comes into their life, things begin to fall into place. 

Evelyn is such an intoxicating character. She breezes into Nora's life and she brings such richness..yet Nora feels like she is on borrowed time with Evelyn. She feels like more of an employee to Evelyn than a true friend at times. 

This is a unique look at friendship and doing "selfless" things for others. 

I really enjoyed this book. I was expecting things to go in a completely different direction so this book really surprised me. I really liked how the author handled the issue of infertility. 

I alternated between the ebook and audio and loved every minute of it. It is very thought provoking and would be a very interesting book club book.

This is a lovely story about Nora, a woman struggling with infertility, and Evelyn, who becomes her gestational surrogate. Nora and Evelyn meet in a rather unconventional way, when Evelyn goes on a crazy shopping spree in the vintage shop where Nora works. Their relationship develops as Nora begins to source clothing for Evelyn and style her for events. Nora and her husband Jacob are struggling financially, and Evelyn's offer of surrogacy allows them to have a baby when they were otherwise running out of options. The struggle comes when Evelyn continues to live life her way - traveling constantly and making some choices Nora and Jacob would prefer she didn't.

The book was quite a slow burn and even the climax was not that shocking or unpredictable. The relationship between Nora and Evelyn did not ever sit right (I believe this was intended). I know that Nora and Jacob were desperate and saw the surrogacy as their only option, and that forced them to make some poor decisions, but it frustrated me the whole book. There was one twist at the end I wasn't expecting, but it just seemed thrown in there and a bit out of character.

3.5 stars for this book in the end - very good writing but wanted a little more to the story itself.

trigger warning: please read up on triggers before continuing to read this review or hop into the book. (infertility)

i came in expecting not to like this book…. but i enjoyed it a lot. i enjoyed reading about friendships and trials. i haven’t read a book like that in a while. i’ll admit it was a bit slow for my typical reads but i pushed through. evelyn was such a hoot! she seems cold hearted but under all the antics, there’s such a warm lady. a story of friendship, honesty, and forgiveness.

Nora Hammond runs a little high end vintage second hand store, She has a great life with her husband, but life is not perfect. She has been trying to conceive and not having luck, and they have a tiny apartment and quite a bit of debt.

One day, Evelyn Eliott, a wealthy heiress, comes into the shop looking for something to purchase and ends up spending a lot of money. The two women form an instant connection, and soon Nora is invited to exciting parties with Evelyn. When Evelyn discovers Nora's financial difficulties, she offers to pay Nora to procure vintage clothing for her and be her stylist.

As the friendship develops, Evelyn offers to become a surrogate for Nora. Things become a little strange with their relationship after the pregnancy happens and there is a strain on the relationship.

This is a wonderful story about friendship, but also the need to set boundaries, I highly recommend this book!

The Favor is a story about unlikely friendships, unconditional love, found family, fertility struggles, and surrogacy.

The relationship between Nora and Evelyn has a power imbalance and a favor from the title (becoming a surrogate mother) tips the scale even further.

While I didn't like the character of Evelyn, I can visualize her so well b/c of the writing!

This book really just took me for a ride. I loved the build up, the character development, and the writing. I would definitely read more from this author!

Nora loves pairing rare finds for her clients, working at a high-end boutique. When socialite Evelyn enters the boutique, Nora’s life is turned upside down. They hit it off and Nora becomes her stylist. A new friendship forms and tests the boundaries of their lives.

This is definitely a contemporary fiction of friendships that can form from the most unlikely pair. I mean who doesn’t want to have a socialite all the sudden want to be your friend for life. And she wants to help in all aspects, even that if helping Nora have a baby.

The story was unique yet eloquently written. How different people can come and change us. I loved the characters and friendship and trials.

This is such a good book.
A woman/couple who want a baby so bad they end up in horrible debt. A socialite who decides to carry a baby for them. What could possibly go wrong.

Well written and keeps you turning the pages. Nice characters for the most part. There is always that one that makes you want to pull your hair out. Right?

Thank you #NetGalley and #SourcebookLandmark for this ARC.

4 big stars

The Favor was and enjoyable and engaging read, I found myself unable to put the book down. The author did an great job of handling sensitive subjects. It is very well written, and the author is able to connect you with most of the characters. Some of the characters were a little hard to related to and were a bit unlikable. Thank you to NetGalley and the Publisher for an ARC.

I started this one not knowing much about it and was immediately hooked. The storyline was fast but also detailed and made you feel like you were a part of the story. I was just as entranced with Evelyn as Nora was. I finished in one sitting because I had to know how this story played out.

The Favor is a story of family and love, and the various ways and make-ups that we can see them in our very own lives. It is sweet and sincere and at its roots demonstrates that those two, family and love, in no way must be traditional and can be found in a wide variety of actions and environments.
Adele Griffin creates characters that flew off the pages and I felt as if I was learning more and more about them as the pages continued. They were all so real, and I believe it made the novel better off.
The story itself was widely developed as a narrative!

4.5 ⭐️s. Really well written and the story sucked me in. I identified quite a bit with Nora - while not infertile, we struggled to get pregnant and had 2 miscarriages so I get the whole emotional rollercoaster and struggle around other new parents she felt.

I thought the character development was great and there was so much anxiety I felt for Nora during so much of it, making me want to know what was next. The disparity between Nora/Jacob and Evelyn was well done and the tension conveyed perfectly, and while the friendship was a little dysfunctional, it was a great story about grace, generosity and forgiveness.

While there were things in the book I wish went differently, the imperfection of the story felt authentic. Overall I enjoyed this one a lot.

Thanks to Netgalley for the advanced copy of this book. All opinions are mine.

Thank you to NetGalley, publisher and author, for the free copy of this book in exchange for my honest opinion. The story was overall entertaining. I liked the description of the vintage merchandise especially the elegant clothes. What I did not like was, Evelyn's character. It kept reminding me of Elle Woods for some reason.

Thanks to Sourcebooks Landmark Publishers & NetGalley for a digital advance reader's copy. All comments and opinions are my own.

This book checked some of my favorite boxes – fashion, friendship, and an ending with a surprise twist.

The novel begins with the definition of “Favor – An act of kindness beyond what is due or usual. Friendly regard shown toward another, especially by a superior.”

Author Adelle Griffin incorporated the concept of “a favor” and then surprised me. The premise sounds predictable, with one girlfriend offering to carry a baby for her friend who can’t conceive. So that’s the favor, yet the friendship is a bit unusual, as is Evelyn, one half of the friendship who sweeps into Nora’s life in an overwhelming and overbearing way.

When I read the book’s description: “At I'll Have Seconds, a high-end fairytale vintage dress shop in Manhattan, Nora Hammond loves nothing better than pairing a rare find with the perfect client.” There was no question I was going to read this book.

It’s a story of the haves and the have-nots – wealth vs. debt, children (pregnancy vs. infertility), employment and more. It’s a story of girlfriends, trust, and honesty. It’s an unexpected yet heartwarming story of family and forgiveness.

I highly recommend this extremely readable novel!

A couple of days after I started reading Adele Griffin’s The Favor, I attended a production of Federico García Lorca’s 1934 play Yerma. The title character is a young wife who is desperate to have a baby; while the other women in her village are getting pregnant and delivering healthy children, Yerma can’t seem to conceive. The years go by, and Yerma (which is the feminine form of yermo, meaning “barren” or “wasteland” in Spanish) still does not have her much-longed-for child. Things ultimately do not end well for her.

The Favor is a lot less bleak than Yerma, but the parallels still struck me as I was watching the play. In rural Spain in the 1930s, there wasn’t much a woman could do but pray. In New York in the 2020s, there are other options. Nora Hammond and her husband Jacob are deeply in debt after rounds of unsuccessful fertility treatments. Then one evening, a wealthy, glamorous woman named Evelyn swoops into I’ll Have Seconds, the chic vintage shop where Nora works, and buys several thousand dollars’ worth of clothing. Nora and Evelyn hit it off, and the two become friends… of a sort. Evelyn begins to pay Nora to help style her for society affairs and even do some personal assistant-like tasks. But the two women seem to genuinely enjoy each other’s company, despite the somewhat transactional nature of their relationship. Suspicious Jacob, however, isn’t a big fan of socializing with Evelyn and her husband Henry.

When Evelyn offers to serve as a surrogate for Nora and Jacob, it seems too good to be true. Why would a one percenter with multiple homes make such an offer to a couple who can barely afford their fourth-floor walk-up? As it turns out, Evelyn does have her own motivations, and they aren’t entirely altruistic. But this is a modern women’s fiction novel, not a tragedy like Yerma, so I was pretty sure things would work out in the end. Still, The Favor did make me question whether two people from such different worlds can ever truly be friends; when Jacob and Nora are summoned to Evelyn’s family manse to meet her parents, it’s so palpably uncomfortable that I found myself desperately hoping they’d just get the hell out of there. The Favor is willing to directly confront class differences in modern American life, and it’s not always a pretty sight.

4.25ish stars

I don’t really know why, but I initially assumed this book would be a quick and rather fluffy read. It had more depth and complexity than I had anticipated, and while it could still be considered so-called “chick lit,” it was a bit of a layered story about friendship, motherhood, and love (with less of an emphasis on the romantic variety). It had me feeling a bit tense at tones, but over all, I quite enjoyed the story.

A beautiful and touching novel exploring the bonds of female friendships. When Nora meets Evelyn, she is swept up in Evelyn's socialite status and money. Yet at the same time, she also feels a tight bond with Evelyn that quickly becomes precious to her. However, there is always an unspoken imbalance between the two women in that Nora and her husband come from humble backgrounds whereas Nora has big trust fund money.

When Evelyn offers to become a surrogate for Nora and her husband, their friendship will be tried in ways neither of them was prepared for. The two opposite worlds that they live in quickly become obvious. It's a well written story about the impact of many issues facing women today. Nora has struggled with infertility while Evelyn has no problem getting pregnant and carrying a child. Nora is struggling financially while Evelyn has more money than she can ever spend. Nora wants to safeguard her fetus but it's being incubated in Evelyn's womb leaving Nora feeling helpless at times. In so many ways, it seemed Evelyn always had the majority of power in their relationship. Yet as the story progresses, you do see the negative sides to Evelyn's life as well. Things aren't always as glorious as they appear.

Overall, I really enjoyed this book and felt that watching the evolution of Nora and Evelyn's friendship was well described and felt realistic.

AUDIOBOOK REVIEW: The audio was really enjoyable. It pulled me into the story and the narration of the voices felt spot on. 4 stars

Thank you to NetGalley for these early copies of both the audiobook and ebook. I chose to review them both and the opinions contained within are my own.

i really enjoyed this one!!! lots of drama between a rich lady and main character who is in debt and struggling with fertility. her new rich friend offers to be a surrogate and drama ensues.... great book!!!!