“I'll be there for you
(When the rain starts to pour)
I'll be there for you
(Like I've been there before)
I'll be there for you
('Cause you're there for me too)”

When you hear that, you don’t think of The Rembrandts. You think of “Friends” -- Monica, Ross, Chandler, Joey, Rachel, and Phoebe goofing around in a fountain in the dark. My daughter didn’t even realize it was a song outside of the “Friends” theme or that it had a second verse until we started watching the series on Netflix and I pulled up the song on iTunes. We were probably in season 7 when I was scrolling through NetGalley and saw the title “I’ll Be There for You” by Kelsey Miller with a picture of the coffee house couch on the cover. I didn’t need to read the tagline: The One about Friends. I immediately knew what this book was about, and I wanted to read it.

I am not typically a reader of non-fiction. I can count on one hand the number of biographies I have read -- two about Elton John, one about Arthur Ashe. I also recently read “The Glass Castle” by Jeannette Walls because a good friend recommended it. I can’t remember any others that I read because I *wanted* to read them. I started reading this just before we watched the “Friends” series finale (yes, we were binge watching to get from season 7 to 10 that quickly), and it made me want to watch the whole series again...but not for the reasons you would think.

There were some things in the book that I already knew (the contract negotiations, Lisa Kudrow’s real-life pregnancy during her on-screen pregnancy, etc.). There were many things I didn’t know, so it was fun to learn them. The book begins with the story of how Marta Kauffman and David Crane met and started working together and how “Friends” came to be. It tells the story of the cast, where they were in their careers when they auditioned, and talks about the magic of their ensemble. There is basically a chapter for every season and then it ends with a chapter about a lawsuit no one knew anything about that might have ended differently had the #MeToo movement started sooner.

I liked the book for the memories it brought back. I DO remember when my friends were my family. When “Friends” was in its prime, I was living in an apartment building with my best friend in the same building two floors below, and we became friends with the woman who lived on the floor between us. We were like the characters in “Friends” in that we ate together, we watched television together, we laughed together, and we cried together. As cliche as that sounds, it was true. We were each other’s day-to-day connections. In the book, the author mentions when “Survivor” first aired on CBS opposite “Friends,” and I remember watching that first season with my friends as well (thank goodness we had VCRs!) In that respect, I can agree that’s one of the reasons “Friends” was so popular and beloved as a series.

What I didn’t like is that this could have gone into so much more detail and people would read it. If the show is as popular today as the author indicates, then she could have and should have done so much more. One chapter for each season didn’t scratch the surface of everything that went on with this show. And I would have liked to hear more from the stars themselves, but it sounds like they had a favorite author even when the show was on and probably weren’t interested in talking to this author (if she even reached out). I just don’t know how you do a “retrospective” without hours and hours of interviews with the cast.

It also felt like this was intended to be less of a retrospective and more of a way to cash in on the show's continuing popularity while bashing the show for being homophobic and non-diverse. THAT is what makes me want to watch the series again, to see if there’s something I missed, because when I think about “Friends,” I don’t feel like it’s homophobic. And while the main cast is (*gasp*) all white, many of the shows on television in that time were either all white or all black. We can’t put a show that aired 20 years ago up against the standards we hold for society today. Times change...and that’s a good thing. It doesn’t mean we berate the past.

To the author’s point, people didn’t watch “Friends” because it was a statement on the times we lived in. They didn’t even talk about 9/11 on the show, and it was based in Manhattan! People watched “Friends” because it was funny, and it was a way to escape. They watched it because they could relate to being a single 20-something who spent all their time outside of work with their friends. And they still watch it today because it’s funny, and they’re reminded of the time in their life when they were 20-something and hanging out with their friends.

I give this book 4 stars for the memories, but I give it 2 stars for not enough retrospection and too much judgment. I can see fans of the show going extremely negative or ridiculously positive on this one. But I can see non-fans of the show saying that this is why they never liked it to begin with. I won’t say skip it because I wanted to read it, but know going in why you’re reading it.

Thanks to NetGalley and Harlequin/Hanover Square Press for a free copy in exchange for an honest and unbiased review.