Review of Perfect by Harry Kraus, MD
Giving away 2 copies of this with my "Kitchn Sink Giveaway." Drawing to be held on June 29. To enter, go to this link: http://creativetree.typepad.com/treeswingreading/2008/06/wacky-list-of-g.html
Description:
Wendi Stratford's job as an accident reconstructionist is just one more enviable reflection of her ideal life. She's got it all-perfect career, perfect looks, perfect husband, perfect home, perfect faith. There's just one problem: it's all a sham, right down to her bleached-blonde hair.
So Wendi hatches an impulsive and exhilarating plan to break free of the lie she's been living-only to watch her hopes die in a terrible accident. But as she sifts through the wreckage, Wendi comes to a shocking conclusion. This was no accident.
The quest is on to learn the truth, but the truth could be deadly. And now someone is leaving Wendi clues at accident scenes, clues that could lead her straight into a killer's hands. With her life on the line, Wendi must find strength in a faith that until now had been merely an accessory to her storybook life.
My Review:
I couldn't put this book down! It was suspenseful and emotional and grabbed my attention for the very beginning! I think all of us can relate to feeling "fake" sometimes and the desire to break free from our "perfect little images" and be real. I know I can. There are definately times where I put on a "show" to make it look like I have it all together when inside I am afraid and tired and lonely. Wendi has to put on a "show" to a level where it makes her feel like it is killing her to be so pefect all the time. She has lived as the perfect pastor's daughter and the perfect surgeon's wife. She keeps her husband's world perfect with the right clothes, the right meals, perfect order in his home, etc. What he doesn't know is that she has decided to break free and run away to Jamaica.
But before she can follow through with her plans to run away, something horrible happens that prevents her from going. So she is back to pretending her world is perfect. Wrestling with guilt over past mistakes and present ones. Wrapping herself in blame and shame and feeling that God is disappointed with her. She has no concept of grace. Her world begins to unravel as strange events begin to occur around her.
But it is in the unravelling of her life that she finally finds the answers she's been looking for.
A terrific book that spoke to my heart and my own longings to drop the masks and live with freedom in God's love. So not only was it a good suspense and story, it was a story that packed in a powerful message of grace.
