''You learn from watching and doing,'' one of the women tells her. ``Don't worry about making mistakes. You can always start over again.''

This hopeful, comforting novel is a testament to the power of taking chances and starting fresh and a reminder that life can bring joy after sorrow.

•  I'm So Happy for You. Lucinda Rosenfeld. Back Bay. 288 pages. $13.99 in paper.

BFFs get a lot of ink, but frenemies are catching up. Wendy Murman is the predictable (read: boring) foil to her dramatic pal, Daphne Uberoff. The two are in their 30s and have been friends since college, a remarkable feat given how much they seem to dislike each other.

``With each passing year, Daphne seemed to grow needier. Wendy felt increasingly responsible for her mental and emotional well-being. She cared for Daphne; she also hated the idea of missing some fresh drama in Daphne's life.''

Daphne lives in Manhattan and hardly ever works, while Wendy, an editor for a left-wing magazine, lives in Brooklyn (boring!) with her husband, who has quit his job to write a screenplay. She is determined to become pregnant, despite not seeming to like kids all that much. Amid Wendy's carefully plotted efforts to conceive, Daphne suddenly finds her own life coming together. She breaks off with her married paramour, meets a federal prosecutor and settles down into her own life in Brooklyn, with more success in the fertility arena.

We're never clear why the women have formed a friendship or even if it's as tight as Wendy assumes. Her fascination with Daphne borders on creepy, and the novel sometimes feels oppressively dark, relying too heavily on uninteresting e-mails and the word ''meanwhile'' to move things forward until the plot suddenly verges into soap opera territory. Ultimately, the story goes to show that jealousy, narcissism and judgment are ugly traits -- in life and in fiction.

Hannah Sampson is a Miami Herald staff writer.

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