The Perfect Man -Review

A month or so ago, PChad & I attended a wedding & had 5 hours to kill b/w the ceremony & the reception.  Since we had a babysitter at our house, we couldn’t go back to pick up our books, so we headed to the local bookstore to buy a few magazines before we headed to Starbucks.  The only magazines that I could find that I was interested in were around the $11 mark, so I thought that I might as well look for a book, since I was sure I could find one for about the same price.

I’m a bargain shopper, & I always want to get the most for my money, so I looked for a good thick book, so I wouldn’t run out of things to read.  One of the things I look for when I’m in a hurry, is a book that is priced in British Pounds.  I figure that if the book is good enough to be imported, it has to be pretty good.  I found “The Perfect Man” by Sheila O’Flanagan, & it fit all the above criteria, so I bought it.

The main character of the book is a lawyer turned author, who wrote a book called “The Perfect Man”.  She ends up taking a job to be the keynote speaker on a Valentine’s cruise, & brings her sister along as her personal assistant.  Since she is the author of a romance book, everyone seems to think she is a total romantic, which couldn’t be further from the truth.  Both she & her sister have be unlucky in love.  The story begins as the sisters board the ship, & meet other guests, bringing more characters into the story.  As the story unfolds, we find that many of the characters have troubled pasts, leading them to be cautious about love & letting others get close to them.

Even though this is a romance novel, I was pleased to discover that the 1 or 2 brief love scenes were very tastefully done, & they did not detract from the rest of the story in any way.

This book has seen me through the 5 hour wedding wait, a flight to Alberta, 90 minutes of being abandoned in a ski lodge, a flight back to PEI, & all the moments between.  At 600 pages, I never had to worry about finishing the book, until last week.  At the end I really, really wanted to find out what happens, so I wanted to finish it, but I also wasn’t ready to be done the book, since it was such a good story, but finish it I did, & if the rest of Sheila O’Flanagan’s books are 1/2 as good, I think I may have found a new favourite author!