Imperfect Bliss: A Novel [Hardcover]

Susan Fales-Hill (Author)

Book Description

Release date: July 3, 2012

Reality TV—Jane Austen Style

Meet the Harcourts of Chevy Chase, Maryland. A respectable middle-class, middle-age, mixed-race couple, Harold and Forsythia have four eminently marriageable daughters—or so their mother believes. Forsythia named her girls after Windsor royals in the hopes that one day each would find her true prince. But princes are far from the mind of their second-born daughter, Elizabeth (AKA Bliss), who, in the aftermath of a messy divorce, has moved back home and thrown herself into earning her PhD. All that changes when a Bachelorette-style reality television show called The Virgin takes Bliss’s younger sister Diana as its star. Though she fights it at first, Bliss can’t help but be drawn into the romantic drama that ensues, forcing her to reconsider everything she thought she knew about love, her family, and herself. Fresh and engaging, Imperfect Bliss is a wickedly funny take on the ways that courtship and love have changed—even as they’ve stayed the same.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Fales-Hill channels Jane Austen in a bawdy sendup of today’s landed gentry...but the hilarious hijinks of the Harcourts hide more poignant truths about these strong-willed women. She whips an old-fashioned comedy of manners into a stylish, sharp-edged satire." (Publishers Weekly)

"Chick lit with an intellectual streak." (Library Journal)

“Convincingly updates Pride and Prejudice for the twenty-first century …the novel’s strength is Bliss, a complicated, thoughtful woman—a feminist raising a princess-obsessed daughter, and a very funny narrator. Issues of racial and economic prejudice add depth to the Austenesque social commentary.” (Booklist)

"Imperfect Bliss is the perfect summer read. Susan Fales-Hill, a magnificent storyteller, has written a poignant and piquant comedy of manners that will make Jane Austen fans swoon. Delicious!" (Adrianna Trigiani bestselling author of The Shoemaker's Wife)

“Imperfect Bliss is a hoot! Featuring a heroine who becomes entangled in the nutty world of reality TV, it's a fast, fun read.” (Sarah Pekkanen author of These Girls)

"If Candace Bushnell and Zadie Smith had a literary love child, the result would be Imperfect Bliss." (Keli Goff author of The GQ Candidate)

"Imperfect Bliss's romantic heroine ultimately finds her epiphany in a journey through family discord, reality TV productions, and a candlelight dinner for two...this is reading as alluring as the best French perfume." (André Leon Talley, Editor at Large,Vogue)

“A chick lit masterpiece that leaves Jackie Collins in the dust.” (New York Post)

“Frank and funny…A wise and wicked peek into the overstuffed closets and medicine cabinets of New York’s contemporary gilded set.” (Essence)

“A sassy summer beach read.” (Vogue)

About the Author

Susan Fales-Hill is the author of One Flight Up and the acclaimed memoir, Always Wear Joy. A contributing editor at Essence, her writing has also appeared in Vogue, Town & Country, and Travel & Leisure. She lives in New York City.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 304 pages
• Publisher: Atria Books (July 3, 2012)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1451623828
• ISBN-13: 978-1451623826
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.4 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (63 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #675,720 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 9 people found the following review helpful

1.0 out of 5 stars If ignorance is bliss, I'd be happier if I'd never read this July 9, 2012

By Agnes O'Neil VINE™ VOICE

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Vine™ Review (What's this?)

Here is what I recommend. Don't read the jacket cover praise. Do download a sample on your Kindle. If you don't have a Kindle, go to the library or the bookstore and open the book to any page, any page at all, and read just one sentence. Once you've read that, you'll understand why I gave it only one star, which is the minimum.

I doubt I can find the correct words to describe the writing, which is so full of predictable clichés and cringe-worthy sentences that it's hard to see past it to the plot line. Calling this "reality TV - Jane Austen style" impugns Austen. To paraphrase Jane, it is a truth universally acknowledged, that a bad chick lit book will include vapid characters, overwrought feelings, and overblown prose. To wit, there are 9, count 'em, NINE dedications before the book even starts.

Sheesh. I've read better writing on the side of a bus.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful

1.0 out of 5 stars Terrible writing & Awful plot April 8, 2013

By D. Quinn

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Vine™ Review (What's this?)

Obviously, after reading the product description, I was expecting a fun, light read - despite the Jane Austen references in the description, I knew I was not about to find a serious novel. I did, however, expect to be entertained. In fact the opposite was true. From the moment I began reading, I was desperately hoping for the end to come quickly. Sad clichés and sexist stereotypes abound in this hideous story about a bi-racial family, hovering in the middle-class while desperately seeking ascension to some sort of 'nobility' while the ridiculous matriarch attempts to marry off her three questionably-eligible daughters. The characters are at best unconvincing, and at worst demeaning and offensive caricatures of already unappealing people. Don't waste your time on this one - even the editor clearly didn't want to bother, as the book is full of major typographical and consistency errors. Read some actual Jane Austen instead! If zero stars were possible, I would have used that rating - instead, a sad one star.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful

2.0 out of 5 stars Essentially unreadable February 22, 2013

By Just_Karen VINE™ VOICE

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Vine™ Review (What's this?)

All right, I do have to take issue with the reviewers who didn't see the Austen parallels. They are indeed here; an insufferable, social climbing mother, a passive aggressive father, too many daughters, and a take on the class system (such as we have here in America, based on celebrity and/or money). But Austen's writing is hilarious without being cruel. This book is so broadly drawn, it is nearly unreadable. It seems a waste of what is a clear ability to craft a plot and a set of characters. I actually felt bludgeoned by the broad, crass tone of this book. No one was real enough for me to care about them, which took the book into the range of satire, and such harsh satire that I was wincing. And is it really all women's fault when their men cheat? Really? Seriously?

So my advice is simple: skip it. Go read Emma, instead.