The Best Man is the first in Kristan Higgins’s new Blue Heron series.  Faith Holland has come home after leaving town three years ago on her wedding day … alone, after her wedding didn’t happen.  Levi Cooper was best man and the one who nudged her fiancé into jilting her at the altar.  Now she’s back and Levi is the police chief, still best friend to her ex-fiancé, and as infuriating (and attractive) as ever.  The more time they spend together, the more good things Faith discovers about Levi.  But she’s finding it very hard to forget that he’s the reason her wedding didn’t happen.  Can they confront the past and move on?  Maybe try for another wedding, this time together?

I love Kristan Higgins’s books and was super excited to hear that she was starting a new series.  I’ve had this advanced copy for a few weeks and had to resist reading it right away.  I wanted to wait until closer to the publish date but it was very hard.  Her books are always emotion-filled: packed with witty dialogue, memorable characters, and poignant story lines.  They make me laugh one moment and then have me in tears the next.

In The Best Man, both Faith and Levi touched my heart.  Even though their backgrounds are different – Faith’s family has owned a vineyard for generations and Levi grew up in a trailer park on the wrong side of town – both lost a parent at a very young age:  Levi’s father walked out on his family when Levi was in the third grade and Faith’s mother died in a car accident (with Faith in the car) when she was in the sixth grade.  Faith’s survivor’s guilt weighs heavily on her and Levi has to deal with his abandonment issues, along with the stigma of growing up poor.  Watching both of them come to terms with their past, where they are now and where they want to go was very satisfying.

If you’ve never read a Kristan Higgins book, The Best Man is a great place to start.   It’ll be the beginning of a long and happy relationship.