I put this aside at the 10% mark even though it's very well written. Actually, I put it aside because it's so well written.

Katie Brenner's need to reshape herself until she fits into the perfect London Life that she knows should be hers once she's earned it, was too raw for me to find it amusing. She's like Cinderella's step-sister, ready to cut off her toe to fit the glass slipper if it will win her her charmed life. 

The London that Sophie Kinsella summons up is vivid and believable. It brought back to me all the reasons I loved and hated in the five years I spent living in London. The excitement of being in one of the world's iconic cities, so often seen in movies that, like Katie, I could easily imagine myself to be on a film-set. The misery of commuting on the Tube, crammed together with people determined to pretend to ignore one another while fighting for every inch of space. I remember watching the pedestrian traffic flood over London Bridge and hearing Elliot's poem in my head:

Unreal City
Under the brown fog of a winter dawn,
A crowd flowed over London Bridge, so many,
I had not thought death had undone so many.
Sighs, short and infrequent, were exhaled,
And each man fixed his eyes before his feet.

Sophie Kinsella gives this a more humorous tone but still captures the purgatory that is the London commute.

Then the is the creative agency that Katie works in. The way Sophie Kinsella described it brought back to me all the meetings I've had with marketing people who pushed 'creativity' as a reason why what they were recommending didn't have to make any sense.

All of that was in the first hour of an eleven-hour book. I hope life gets better for Katie and that she leave the insanity of London and the Chimera of its perfection far behind but it touches too many sore points in my own history for me to want to travel along with her.

If you're up for the journey, I recommend the audiobook version. Fiona Hardingham does a wonderful job with the narration. Click on the SoundCloud link below to hear a sample.

Please note that I received this book via NetGalley. This did not affect my rating or review. 

Nothing really to say except this is not a "thriller" in my sense of the word or genre. We do have a mystery (that did not shock me when we get to the reveal) about why one character killed herself. Other than that, the book I thought did a solid job showing how women see themselves and others and how so many people can think that their life or marriage is perfect when it's not. I liked the two sisters/characters (Clare and Eileen). I also felt very sad for Clare. It definitely leaves you wondering about what things would have looked like had she chosen differently and or just accepted things when she was in high school. 

"Her Perfect Life" follows harried mother, Eileen. Eileen is happily married, but feels a bit overwhelmed with her life and her three children. Her husband barely seems around to help her, but she counts herself lucky compared to her sister, Clare. Eileen is jealous of Clare and it seems as if the two sisters are slightly estranged. When Eileen gets a phone call from her sister Clare's husband Simon, he informs her that Clare has killed herself. Eileen and Simon struggle with what was so bad in Clare's life that would have her kill herself. The book jumps back and forth between Eileen, Simon, and Clare and we get chapters showing Clare 2 years before her death all the way to 20 years before her death. Eileen and Simon for the most part are in the present day with I think just 1 or 2 chapters showing Simon before.

I really liked all of the characters. You feel sad for everyone by the time you are done with the book. Clare for not trusting those around her. Eileen for realizing that what she thought was true about a lot of things, was not. Simon for realizing he never knew his life.

The writing was very good. The characters all have distinct voices. Clare as a teen's voice is different than her voice set 2 years before her death which makes sense. She is the only one we get to see change over the course of years which I think made sense. 

The setting of the book moves between California and Colorado. The setting of Clare and Simon's house felt fragile and it makes sense considering what you find via the book about Simon and Clare.

The ending leaves things on a hopeful note though which I liked. 

My Friday reads are the following two books:

Happy May the 1st!

And we are about to end 7 weeks in lockdown (some of us anyway).

Hope you have some books to get you through the weekend.

My books are:

A Week at the Shore, Her Perfect Life, and A Touch of Gold. 

Basic Info

Format: Hardback
Pages/Length: 439pgs
Genre: Chick Lit; Romance
Reason For Reading: It's Sophie Kinsella, nuf said.

At A Glance

Love Triangle/Insta Love/Obsession?: Tad insta love, but not crazy.
Cliff Hanger: No
Triggers: No
Rating: 4.5 stars

Score Sheet
All out of ten

Cover: 8
Plot: 7
Characters: 7
World Building: 7
Flow: 9
Series Congruity: n/a
Writing: 7
Ending: 7

Total: 7.5/10

In Depth

Best Part: Glamping, Farmer Mike, and getting revenge on the mean girls!
Worst Part: The ending was too quick!
Thoughts Had: Oh i want to live in London, but in a yurt.

Conclusion

Continuing the Series: n/a
Recommending: Of course

Short Review: Sophie Kinsella almost never lets me down. I'm actually thinking about rereading the Shopaholic series next month. I really liked the MC Katie, Cat i didn't like so much. I just wanted Demeter to be knocked down some pegs real quick, but later on, not so much. The whole "romance" bit thou, not believable to me, yah they f**ked a few times, but it felt so much more like a fling then what it turned out to be. The ending was too quick for my liking, the building up was so great and the details were there, but then it was like 15pgs of ending, like this book is huge, you could have given more to that other than just (view spoiler) Overall a good book by one of my fav authors.

Misc.

Book Boyfriend: None, the guy she falls for is too nonchalant for my liking.
Best Friend Material: Katie!