This Perfect World Paperback – 16 Jan 2014

I loved this book was frustrated by it at the same time.Laura and James have the perfect marriage, two perfect children, the perfect house and the perfect friends, or so it seems to someone on the outside. However, within the marriage Laura is unhappy and starts to realise how futile her life is, spending days having coffees with other middle class mothers and competing to make the best costumes for her children’s book day at school.One day, Laura gets a phone call from Mrs Partridge, the mother of a child Laura used to reletnlessly bully during school. Mrs Partridge is ringing to tell Laura that her daughter has had a mental breakdown and in a psychiatric hospital and she wants Laura and James’ help to get her out.Laura has to face the past that she wants to keep hidden and begins to realise how one small thing can have devastating consequences years later.Laura is a puzzling character. She is ultimately flawed, as we all are, but is strangely likable and I found myself sympathising with her most of the time. As she went on a journey of self-discovery and realisation I began to warm to her even more. I disliked the character of James intensely. He was everything a husband and father should not be.The issues raised in this book surrounding mental health were confusing. I didn’t like the way it was portrayed much but then I don’t know whether this was the purpose of the book, to challenge the way that we view mental health. Everything seemed to be resolved far too easily with no mention of how Heddy (the daughter of Mrs Partridge) recieved help from psychiatrists or the like. The way Laura spoke to her too about being selfish by self harming with a son to look after really angered me…..self harming is not something you chose to do because you just feel like it. Self harming is an incredibly complex problem and cannot be solved by someone telling you to pull yourself together……anyway, I’ll get off my mental health high horse!!The plot was very addictive even though it felt like not a lot actually happened. The majority of the chapters were just in-depth views of Laura’s seemingly perfect life and dinner parties with only the last third of the book really moving the pace along and bringing the slightly anticlimactic ‘resolution’.I will be extremely interested to hear what other people make of this book and I wouldn’t shy away from reading it. I read this in less than a day, it’s quite a short read (about 300 pages) so would be worth giving a go.An interesting look at how the past can really come back to haunt you no matter how hard you try to run away from it.

If you are looking for a cosy aga saga this book probably isn't for you. The subject of bullying isn't tackled a lot in popular fiction - especially not from the viewpoint of the bully - and this book also covers usually taboo subjects such as self harm and mental illness. On the surface Laura lives a 'shiny happy people' existence in her sheltered suburb with her rich successful husband and her equally successful friends but she carries some dark secrets from her past - the worst of which is probably the relentless way in which she bullied a former classmate. A phone call from the past threatens her cosy lifestyle and from then on the novel delves into ever darker and darker places as Laura realises her 'perfect' life is anything but.I can't say that it was an easy read but I found it utterly compelling from the first page to the last. The childhood Laura was exactly the sort of girl I would have hated had I been unfortunate enough to have her as a classmate, but as the novel progressed I found myself feeling a sort of grudging sympathy with her. In a way she is the victim of her own success at fitting in - even her husband really doesn't care about her inner self, only that she continues to project the image of a perfect wife - and none of her friends seem to care about anything other than surface appearances. Only her relationship with her children is real.This book isn't aimed at young adults but I'm sure a lot of teenage girls could benefit from reading it as it shows how far reaching the consequences of their behaviour can be ...

I read this straight after the author's other book, 'The Child Inside'. The main character of this book, Laura, is a mother who has always been in the in-crowd - both at school and now in the circle of local mums. Appearance and popularity are everything to her at the start of the book, but we are skilfully led towards her epiphany, when she realises how shallow and unpleasant she has been. The main character of 'The Child Inside' is a mother who is always on the outside looking mournfully in, feeling shut out from the charmed existence she imagines the in-crowd live. I love this contrast of two novels written from both sides of the fence.Aside from this dimension, I was also gripped by the unfolding horrors of her bullying of Heddy, who she can't seem to escape either in childhood or in adulthood. I agree with other reviewers that Heddy was a bit of a cliche of a bullied child - lumpen, doughy, unexpressive - but I didn't mind this because the focus was on Laura's view of her rather than Heddy herself and what Heddy thought and felt. For me, this was a new viewpoint on bullying - insight into the perpetrator's mind rather than the victim: the revulsion Laura feels for Heddy is constant and palpable, dripping off the page. As someone who was bullied at school myself, I found Laura's dawning realisation of how hideously she has behaved quite satisfying. And the twist at the end came as a complete surprise, adding new layers to the book as a whole. A completely absorbing read.