Customer Reviews

The Perfect Life (Women of Faith Fiction)

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This book was a great choice for the Women of Faith Fiction series! The characters were not contrived, there was nothing predictable about their responses and I learned a LOT about how much God's forgiveness cost Him. I am inspired to use these lessons in my own marriage.

The Perfect Life by Robin Lee Hatcher is the story of Katherine Clarkson and her storybook life. Her husband Brad, who runs a charitable organization, is the perfect husband. Both of her adult daughters are pregnant, and the world is full of hope for this Bible-reading church-going woman. Until a former employee of Brad's accuses him of mismanaging the company's money AND having an affair with her. Katherine's world quickly collapses around her as she tries to both face and shut out the accusations against him. Her faith isn't as strong as she thought it was, not in God or her husband.Hatcher always writes books with powerfully sympathetic characters, and Katherine is no exception. Even as she shuts out her family, you can't help but grieve at the loss of the life she thought she had. Many Christians stumble in their faith when it comes to facing real crisis; I know I still do. And this book is a great reminder about why we need to trust and lean only on God, because everyone else is ultimately human. The resolution is true to life and not tied up in a neat bow as many books try to do. Life has rough edges, and Hatcher isn't afraid to use them to show the glory of love of God.

This book was well written and so many people could relate to the characters and what they were going through and how they dealt with it. The book addressed issues like trust, honesty with yourself and letting go of past hurts. Learning to trust in God and listening to him and his guidence in your life. I couldn't put the book down. Great Book!
Cheri

The Perfect Life is a drama involving a woman's crash into the reality of the fallen world. Even more difficult is the fact that she faces the brutal truth that Christianity is not a promise of the sweet life. Her struggle to survive, accept and overcome her rude awakening, winds through the novel and is told through both first person and supporting third-person characters.

The drama unfolds a lot like the story of Job with much inner soul-searching and lamenting on the part of Katherine.

Those who avoid novels with a lot of introspection may struggle with the slower moving format of a woman devastated and her plunge into self-preservation.

However, sticking with the story and following the heart-breaking progress from broken dreams to hope is very much worth the trip.

(More like 4.5 stars)
The Perfect Life had a riveting beginning. I was dying to know what had actually happened. Then it looked like the mystery was over and I wasn't sure I wanted to finish the story. However, I decided to give it a chance and am glad I did because the story didn't shake out the way it seemed like it would at first. It's very hard to sustain tension and genuine spiritual struggles in a novel about marriage relationships without it getting annoying for the reader due to the harping and bitterness that tends to develop within a storyline where trust is broken in marriage. However, the author does a fabulous job with this novel and not once did I want to slap the heroine, as is often the case. The tension in The Perfect Life was realistically done and believable. The spiritual arc was fabulous and extremely honest. In short, I loved this story and highly recommend it, especially for couples who have discovered a lack of trust in their relationship.

The Perfect Life

I hated this book. I also really liked it and realize the reasons that I hated it were the reasons why a story like this is so important to read. If you have read any of my reviews before you have heard me say that this kind of Christian fiction is not my cup of tea. I'll take it in, but I don't have to like it. Reading this book, I remembered how I felt when I listened to A Slender Threaduthor"> Tracie Peterson by Tracie Peterson. It's close to real life and life hurts sometimes, most of the time. First off my problems with this book, then my likes... The first thirty chapters are a complete depression and drag. I started this book last night, read a little during the day, and finished it tonight. The entire day, I was depressed. Nothing was right, everything was wrong. No particular reason it just was. Katherine faces things that she had never really let herself think through fully before and is ill-equipt to deal with them and basically her body just shuts down. I know how that is, and I don't like it. Lastly, after going downhill further and further for thirty some odd chapters, Katherine finally seeks counsel with God to talk things through. Then before you know it the book is over and that's that things are finished before you have time to process anything and like or hate the outcome. But as I said... I also liked the book. This is my first Robin Lee Hatcher book experience and she is a fabulous author. The way that she brings you in and out of different characters' heads throughout the entire story is creative and works wonders with comprehension and empathy. When Katherine starts to really delve within herself to figure out what she is fighting and faces a harsh reality it is of things that she does not want, but needs to know and acknowledge. I think that these things can really open the door to healing when need-be. Hatcher touches on a topic that many people wouldn't touch because it is too difficult and hurts too much.

This book did put me in a funk because it is painful, but that also goes to show how well Hatcher wrote. She was able to make you understand her characters and bring them to life in you. I do not think that in one weekend everything can be hunky-dorey again, but I do think that a door to healing can be opened if you let it. I would really say that this book is something that someone should read if they are hurting and doubting God's trust, existence, or having human trust issues. But this book should be read with the warning that I was given before I first read the scriptural book of Job. You have to read the whole thing. If you read parts of it, you might like it, you might benefit, but probably will only become angry. If you read the whole thing, you will learn things about yourself that you didn't want to know nor see, but you will be a hugely better person because of it and will sincerely benefit.

I had a bit of a problem connecting with the main character, Katherine Clarkson. Her she is supposidly head-over-heels in love with her husband, in a perfect marriage, having a perfect life, but when the very first thing comes along and disrupts it ... she falters and questions her husband????? I just don't understand that ... I guess I am looking at it from a woman that has been married for 40 years this year to a man that I am head-over-heels in love with ... and I know that I would believe him. Heartbroken over the accusations ... of course ... but actually not believe him .. that is a whole different thing! You stand by your man ... if you truly love him ... you either belive him or not! It was a good book ... just had trouble connecting with her ... felt more connection with the younger daughter ... was ticked off with the older daughter ... I can't imagine either one of our adult children questioning their father's integrity ... but who knows ... maybe some people just live different lives than we do. Yes, I live in the real world ... but we are true to each other ... our belief's are sound! Thank heaven's that is what has held our marriage together during the difficult times (health, children struggles, parent's dying, financial, etc. but you have to work at a marriage ... shock that is what makes it work ...whether you have been married a year or 40-50 years or more!

Made me really appreciate my marriage and my husband and children!

Robin Lee Hatcher has never once disappointed me. Her books are always page-turners, always full of great characters, always meaningful and worthwhile. This is among the best and really hit me where I live. It's rare that I can say I took something away from the story that will always be a part of me, but that's the case with The Perfect Life. Excellent novel.

The Perfect Life by Robin Lee Hatcher, copyright 2008, published by Thomas Nelson, is 298 pages of inspiration for couples whose daily lives are interrupted with roadblocks that threaten to derail a marriage right off the tracks. Katherine Clarkson is living her dream life, married to a well-respected handsome man with two grown daughters preparing to make her a grandmother. She has great friends, a good life, and a wonderful ministry. She has it all--until a reporter and a former coworker of her husband's spread rumors and gossip.

Her husband, Brad, has been a loving husband and great father and well respected in the church and community. He started as a construction worker and put his heart and soul into his own ministry to help people who couldn't afford to own their own homes. After selling his construction business, he poured his money and spirit into In Step until accusations of an affair with a former employee and financial impropriety shatter his world and his marriage.

Katherine has spent her life reassuring other women, but now her own words are of little comfort to her. Her perfect life has turned to chaos, and it consumes her until she takes a few days for herself in the mountains. She strives to survive her loss of what she thought was the perfect life and to regain her ability to trust her God and her husband again. One daughter thinks she should divorce her cheating husband; the other stands by her father and thinks he's innocent. What will Katherine decide? The thought runs through her head that if he cheated, the Bible gives her a pass. Her future seems to hinge on that little two-letter word IF, such a big word for one so small.

How can she rebuild her life? She been a homemaker and has no resume history to find a job.
Robin Lee Hatcher has authored over 50 novels and won awards including the Christy for Whispers from Yesterday, a novel I'd love to read. Library Journal named Catching Katie one of the best books of 2004.

You will not be able to read this book and not be changed in some way. I cried as Katherine's 'perfect world' crumbled around her in one crisis after another. Then I wanted to shake her till her teeth rattled. Cried some more, wanted to shake or slap a few other people, while rooting for the four key people involved. Katherine, her husband, Brad, and their two daughters, Hayley and Emma. And one other person I wanted to rip off her face. But I won't go there.

Many of us, as Christians, or what we believe ourselves to be, know how to walk the walk and talk the talk. But how deep does it go? How will our faith hold out? Will it sustain? What about trusting? We're GOOD Christians, right? So why do bad things happen to good people?

Katherine wants to know, too, Why doesn't God just make everything go away and put things back the way they were? It's a long, painful, lonely and torturous path she follows to find the answers. By herself and for herself.

Funny thing, when I finished this book somewhere around 2:30 in the morning, I was smiling. I felt good! Because what Katherine learned helped me, too. Strengthened my faith and trust in The Only One Who has all the answers. The Only One Who can help us find our way. All we have to do is listen, then follow, trusting.

Brava, Robin Lee Hatcher. This is one book I'm keeping!