Customer Reviews

Almost Perfect (Fool's Gold, Book 2)

5 star:		(11)
4 star:		(9)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(9)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

I have to agree with "readsalot", I got half way thru this book and wondered why Liz would even want this guy! Liz is really great---kind, caring,almost too good.
Ethan, on the other hand, thinks primarily about himself and his own needs and wants. Liz nails it when she says that he has only ever loved his own family. If you read the first in this series, "Chasing Perfect" then you'll know that he didn't speak to his best friend Josh for 10 years because Josh became the champion cyclist that Ethan wanted to be and couldn't because of an injury. Then he trashes Liz who he supposedly loves; greets her when she returns to Fool's Gold as though nothing had ever happened; blames HER because he didn't know about his son (inspite of the fact that she had proof that she tried to tell him twice), then trashes her to her own son. This is a love story? I was so frustrated and angry at the end I had to remind myself that this was only a work of fiction. Unless you have masochistic tendencies don't waste your time or money on this would be romance.

I usually really like Susan Mallery's books but this one left me tired and bored. The hero was a jerk. It was predictable that Liz would move to Fool's Gold. Why? Ethan didn't deserve her. It seemed that Liz was doing all the compromising. All the parts of people stopping Liz on the street and berating her for how she supposedly treated Ethan were not only unbelievable but sounded really just stupid. I hope the next book in the series is better. I may have to think about buying the book at full price and wait for the discount.

Unfortunately, this book had everything I despise in a romance novel. Firstly, too many children in a romance novel! Plot line is based heavily around kids, her (secret) baby, and her 2 nieces, that she never knew about until she ends up taking care of them.

Next, a hero who's not worthy of this title. Furthermore, a hero who never grovel enough or redeem themselves in a satisfactory manner by the end. Here is a guy, who tells all his buddies in front of the heroine(the secret girlfriend he supposedly loved) is a slut, and doesnt know her when teased about them. Heartbroken, she runs away only to returns 3 weeks later to tell him she's pregnant, but finds him in bed with one of her tormentor from high school. Of course, this makes her run away again, to return 5 years later to try telling him about the baby. This time she finds out he married another girl (which we later find out because he got her pregnant too, what a nice guy). And not once did he go after the heroine to apologize or to get her back. We're lead to believe its because he was young. Strictly speaking for myself, I just plainly felt he didn't love her at all. Ever. Even towards the end, right before the big corny HEA scene.

Lastly, I hate main characters who are authors in books and make the whole book what being a writer is all about. Heroine in this book is an author and its very thoroughly discussed here, which bored me to tears. She is ridiculously glorified as some hotshot author, who has a stalker, and even had some college scholarship named after her. I am guessing this is someone's ridiculously gloried dream.

This book disappointed me because when I read a romance novel, I expect to see true love, soul mates, some incredible love that only happens once, if lucky twice in a life time. However, in this book, I never felt the hero loved the heroine, and if in fact he did love her, it was your very average, everyday, plain joe, realistically boring love. Who wants to read about that...This is suppose to be a escapist story, isnt it?

Susan Mallery brings her readers back to her small town of Fool's Gold, California where love is almost never perfect. Readers will be charmed and delighted to be reacquainted with old friends and two town sweethearts resurrecting that old love.

I'm always partial to hidden children themes in my romance stories. I can understand and relate because such incidents do happen in real life but for the most part, there is a part of that wonders what would make a woman not share that she is having a child wit a man. In Almost Perfect by Susan Mallery, Liz Sutton, the heroine does make two attempts to tell Ethan Hendrix that he is the father of her son, Tyler.

Liz an Ethan was secret lovers years ago. The people of the town labeled her a whore because of her mother's promiscuous behavior and associated Liz with it. Only Ethan knew that he was her first of everything. After hearing him deny their affair to all of their friends, Liz leaves only to find she is pregnant. She makes the decision to tell Ethan but he was in bed with another woman. Years later, another attempt was made but Ethan never knew about it because his dead wife had hid the truth from him. Now Liz is back in town after receiving an email from a fourteen year old, claiming to be her niece. Two small girls were abandoned in Fool's Gold and Liz returned to help them. The only problem is now she has to confront Ethan about the Tyler's identity.
I really love Susan Mallery's stories. They are just plain fun and light. Having the pleasure of reading the first story in the series, I was delighted to read this book and I was rather pleased. I loved Liz. She was a strong character who dealt with the town's criticism way better than I would have. I found myself proud that she was a big time author showing them all of what she had accomplished.

Ethan on the other hand, was the most fickle hero that I've read about. The whole Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde routine he pulled throughout the book was so tiring. There were moments where I wanted someone to take something and smack him upside the head and then there were the moments where he was sweet and nice. I did understand that his family's name was important in the town, so he did not want to be associated with anything negative but come on. I definitely could relate to Liz not trusting Ethan because of his inconsistent behavior. Even Denise, Ethan's mother, was somewhat cold in the beginning but eventually she became a likeable character and realized her son's idiotic tendencies.

The kids were also a very important element of the book. The email that Melissa sent to Liz in the beginning tore at my heart and I opened up to them immediately, which I can say is hard since sometimes kids distract in a story to me. Of course, I was more than happy to read about the rest of the people in the town. Girl's night was still prevalent and entertaining. Pia and Liz learned to let go of the past (Pia use to torment Liz in high school) and forge friendships. There were brief glimpses of Josh's outcome with Charity (the H/H from the 1st story) and a very sad departure of another friend.

Overall, I laughed, I got teary-eyed, I cheered all the way to the end. I can't wait to see what will happen next Fool's Gold.

OMG! I was crying over all the hurtful things Liz went thru but it was great how she could bounce back and survive. The "hero", Ethan, was an A**. He definitely did not deserve her. He was not a nice guy. The only thing he had going for him was his looks. Ethan was very shallow and everything was someone else's fault. Never his. (even though most of the problems were his fault)

I actually would have given this book just one star except it is by one of my all-time favorite authors, Susan Mallery. I've read all of her books before this one including the first book of the Fool's Gold trilogy so I was surprised to find how much I disliked Ethan, the hero of this story.

First of all, Ethan is just weak. He runs to his mom to whine about everything and he treats Liz horribly throughout most of the book, and he probably says "I'm sorry" throughout most of his dialogue, but yet the reader is supposed to be sympathic to this guy. I wished Liz would've dumped Ethan for somebody else. Not only did he deny his love for Liz when he was in college to his buddies, he also told his own mother that he didn't care about Liz when he was an adult. He does nothing to endear himself to her afterwards.

The ending just comes too late in the book to give Liz (and us readers) time to forgive Ethan for his crappy behavior.

Susan Mallery disappointed me. I'll read Pia's story in book 3 since an author can't please everybody. I hope it's better.

Do not buy. I will send you my copy!! This book totally ticked me off. Until the last few pages, Ethan reminded a wet wipe. He had 11 years to apologize for his mistakes and to try and apologize but does not even make one single half-hearted attempt. And he is the wounded party??? The author wants the reader to feel that both parties have culpability but on this I heartily disagree. He lost me right at the start of the story and then compounds the rest of the book with his shenanigans. I actually checked the copyright date because I thought this book must have been originally written in the 80s because it had that old style romance feel where the women stand by their men no matter what flies in their face.

I usually am a very easy to satisfy reader. I read novels to unwind and relax, but this one got me really stressed out. REALLY. I kept expecting the time of redemption to come, but it never came. In my opinion, Heros can be forgiven for almost eanything, but not before they suffer a little to prove the reader he is genuinely sorry and in love, etc... This one is basically like this: 'Hero" is a jerk because he is immature, then he is a jerk because he is mad, then he is a jerk because he cannot turn back time, then he is a jerk because he HAS TO DO THE RIGHT THING, and finally, he is a jerk because he actually is forgiven by accident (his plan was only to inform the city part of the blame was his, but after all the crap he put Liz trough he was not capable of 1 great gesture!) I love flawed characters, but this one is not flawed, and he is very far away of being almost perfect, he is simply a jerk.

This book had a lot of things going for it. I liked the heroine, her son was realistic, the kick-off for the plot regarding her nieces being left alone after their father was sentenced to prison was interesting.

And then there was the supposed hero of the piece. I suppose my main beef with Mallery's Ethan Hendrix was that there never enough from his point of view, and without his point of view I just didn't feel connected to his character. The physical attraction between Ethan and Liz was very evident, but I suppose I couldn't figure out why she'd be bothered with him. She spent the book in a town surrounded by people who accosted her and were downright vicious and Ethan didn't get around to defending her until the end of the book, and by then I'm not sure anything he would have said would have been worth it.

Like the first book in the series, Chasing Perfect, the book was carried by the charm of the heroine, but even that book was propped up by the second half. Almost Perfect never really got going, in my opinion, and Ethan and Liz seemed to get together at end simply because Mallery decided it was time.

I couldn't find myself rating it any higher than a C, and if I hadn't been able to finish it it might have been lower. This book exemplified one of the characteristics that I like least about romance novels -- it depended on a physical attraction to depict love and then told me the characters loved one another without any evidence in the first 200 or so pages to explain it.

"LIZ SUTTON HAD ALWAYS KNOWN the past would come back and bite her in the butt--she just hadn't known it was going to happen today." (Almost Perfect, Susan Mallery)

Liz left Fool's Gold, California long ago and never planned to return. That all changes with one e-mail. As a New York Times Bestselling suspense author, Liz gets crazy fan letters all the time. But this one is different. When a niece she didn't know she had writes and asks for her help, Liz drops everything and heads out even though it means returning to the one place that never accepted her.

Ethan Hendrix was born into one of the town's founding families and because of this he was raised to believe he had to act accordingly. Dating the daughter of the woman with the worst reputation in town wasn't allowed, even though he couldn't stay away from her. When his friends confront him about his secret relationship, he denies it and ends up losing more than the girl he professed in private to love. Twelve years later, she's back and so is the eleven year old son he never knew he had. After having lost a wife and child during childbirth, Ethan is bound and determined he isn't going to lose his son again. Thus ensues a series of misguided attempts to do the right thing. Will his lack of tact and understanding leave him more alone than ever?

~~~

Fool's Gold, California is definitely a place I want to visit. I first experienced this fictitious town way before hearing about the books. I don't know how I got the link but as soon as I looked at this really cool web site featuring Fool's Gold, I immediately added all four books to my Amazon wish list.

Almost Perfect is the second book in the series and features one of the characters Susan Mallery introduced in Chasing Perfect. Although I didn't always like Ethan, I could understand some of the reasons behind why he did what he did. I loved Liz and the strength she projected to the world. Not many women would blindly dive into the responsibilities of adding her 14 and 11 year old nieces to her family without freaking out. The way she handles Ethan and his overbearing tactics to see their son made me admire her, but the way she handles the biddy bodies around town made me want to nominate her for sainthood.

There are some mixed reviews on this book because of some of the things the hero does. I personally felt the author did an amazing job of giving her readers a true-to-life character that was not perfect; and honestly, he reacted to some of Liz's decisions in the same type of manner that most real-life guys would have done given this same situation.

In the end, Ethan and the town redeem themselves and Ms. Mallery left me wanting to know more about the citizens of Fool's Gold.