Perfect

The cover of this book is beautiful and I have been eagerly anticipating Rachel Joyce's next novel, so I was really happy when I got a preview from Transworld Publishers on Netgalley.

The book starts in 1972 when 2 seconds were added to time in order to balance clock time with the movement of the earth. Bryon, James clever friend has informed him of this and Bryon has done nothing but worry about how they can possibly add 2 seconds of extra time.
Then Bryon's mother makes a devastating mistake whilst driving him and his sister Lucy to school. Bryon's perfect world is shattered. Could the two seconds of extra time be to blame?

The story alternates between then with Bryon and James; and now, with a man called Jim in his fifties. I was confused at first as to how Jim fit into the story as I just could not see a link.

Jim suffers from mental illness and has to say 'Hello' to everything when he gets home and he uses duct tape to seal the doors otherwise bad things will happen.


I really wanted to enjoy this novel, I really did. Rachel's debut 'The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry' was so incredible, I just thought Perfect was going to be amazing. But sadly I just did not get on with this novel.


Rachel still writes incredibly well and gets across the raw emotion of each of the characters, but I just think that this story was far too sad for me.

I still think that other people will like this novel, it just wasn't for me. I will still be eager to read her third novel.

I do not want to give this novel a rating out of ten, as I don't think it's a true reflection of the novel. The book was well written, it just wasn't my kind of story.