| Title: | The Perfect Match | |
|---|---|---|
| Author: | Kristan Higgins | |
| Publisher | Harlequin | |
| Publication Date: | October 29, 2013 | |
| Publisher's Description | What if the perfect match is a perfect surprise? Honor Holland has just been unceremoniously rejected by her lifelong crush. And now—a mere three weeks later—Mr. Perfect is engaged to her best friend. But resilient, reliable Honor is going to pick herself up, dust herself off and get back out there…or she would if dating in Manningsport, New York, population 715, wasn't easier said than done. Charming, handsome British professor Tom Barlow just wants to do right by his unofficial stepson, Charlie, but his visa is about to expire. Now Tom must either get a green card or leave the States—and leave Charlie behind. In a moment of impulsiveness, Honor agrees to help Tom with a marriage of convenience—and make her ex jealous in the process. But juggling a fiancé, hiding out from her former best friend and managing her job at the family vineyard isn't easy. And as sparks start to fly between Honor and Tom, they might discover that their pretend relationship is far too perfect to be anything but true love… |
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| My Rating | *** | |
I really enjoyed some of Ms. Higgins’ earlier works, although some of her more recent books haven’t worked for me. I’m not sure what I was expecting from The Perfect Match, but the immediate desire to cringe wasn’t it. I found the first part of this book so excruciating to read that it actually made me a little angry. How could Honor be so dense when it came to Brogan? I had trouble believing that a woman this smart and capable could so wildly misjudge a relationship. I had to put this book down for a while, until my sympathetic embarrassment faded. I was near my mother when I read the dinner scene, and my litany of, “Oh my god, no. Oh, no no no no no. Oh, Honor!” made her ask me what was happening in the book. Nothing pleasant, I can assure you.
Once I got over feeling like my face would never again cool down, I continued to read this book and was genuinely drawn to most of the characters. Goggy and Pop’s relationship kept me in stitches. Honor’s other relatives were strange but obviously loved her a lot. Brogan was mostly lacking in personality, and I felt that his character needed to be better defined. What was this man’s appeal? Hotness is great, but we weren’t given much evidence of his other awesome qualities, and certainly nothing that would explain a love that spanned half of Honor’s life. Tom, on the other hand, was a multifaceted delight, and his relationship with Charlie was one of the book’s highlights for me.
Although this is not my favorite of Ms. Higgins’ books (that would be either The Next Best Thing or Too Good to Be True, depending on my mood that day), I certainly enjoyed it more than I did The Best Man.
