Geri Reads's Reviews > Mr. Perfect

5 (Still) Perfect Stars!!

Re-read time June 19 to 21 2013.

Still perfect after all this time. I've reread this book more than I could count and it never fails to make me laugh, cry and swoon. This book is what made me a fan of Linda Howard's writing. This was Linda Howard at her peak writing form; witty, fun, hilarious and terrifying at the same time.

Mr. Perfect is a story about four friends and their idea of Mr. Perfect. The fours friends understood, of course, that Mr. Perfect doesn't really exist in real life but that didn't stop them from making the Mr. Perfect list. It was supposed to stay between them but one thing led to another and suddenly, the ladies find themselves as the newest national sensation. Worst of all, they also attracted the attention of a very disturb and sinister mind who will stop at nothing to hurt them. As to who and why he'd want to hurt them, well, I say, you must read the book because I'm not spoiling anything. :D

Why I love this book...

We're all familiar with that book where the heroine meets the hero and it was viola! Instant attraction, lust and even love at first sight. And then we get a heroine who keeps saying in her head, "He's so gorgeous," or "he's the most beautiful man I've ever met," or "he's perfect I wanna devour him." That plus the gushing and clenching their girly parts.

This book doesn't have that. You'd get the exact opposite. First of all, Jaine (that's our female MC) thinks that Sam (our male MC) is foul-tempered drunk and a world-class jerk. No ifs and buts about it. She wasn't a bit attracted to him. In fact she contemplated on boiling her fingers because it touched him. :D

All she knew was that he was a rough-looking character, and he didn’t seem to hold down a regular job. At best, he was a drunk, and drunks could be mean and destructive. At worst, he was involved in illegal stuff, which added dangerous to the list. He was a big, muscular guy, with dark hair cut so short he almost looked like a skinhead. Every time she had seen him, he looked as if he hadn’t shaved in two or three days. Add that to the bloodshot eyes and bad temper, and she came up with drunk.

It was downright hilarious the moment they "officially" met too. And boy, was Jaine ever wrong about her first impression of the guy.

“I haven’t had any sleep, any breakfast, or any coffee. I’d better leave before I hurt you.”

He nodded. “That’s a good idea. I’d hate to have to arrest you.”

She stared at him, taken aback. “What?”

“I’m a cop,” he said, then turned and walked back into his house. Jaine stared after him, shocked. A cop?

“Well, fuck,” she said.

See, what I mean? That was just refreshing to me. I always find it fascinating when a romance author tries to subvert a well known trope, in this case the insta-attraction or insta-lust trope, and give us something different.

Of course, this dislike turned into something a lot more pleasant when Jaine saw Sam in his birthday suit outside her kitchen window. Jaine's inner monologue in that one was seriously funny and seriously hot. I swear reading that part made me wish, I had a hunky neighbor I could perv on. LH described Sam's nakedness and Jaine's reaction to it in way that make you laugh and turn you on at the same time.

What then happened wasn’t her fault. She was standing at the sink rinsing out her cup when the kitchen light in the house across the way flicked on and Sam walked into view. She stopped breathing. Her lungs seized, and she stopped breathing. “Sweet baby Jesus,” she croaked, and managed to inhale.

She was seeing more of Sam than she had ever thought she would; everything, in fact. He stood in front of the refrigerator, stark naked. She barely had time to admire his buns before he took a bottle of orange juice from the fridge, twisting off the top and tilting it to his mouth as he turned around. She forgot all about his buns. He was more impressive coming – no pun intended – than he was going, and that was saying something, because his butt was severely cute. The man was hung.

In spite of that encounter, they didn't immediately jump into bed and have sex. They had to work out some issues first, plus the fact there was a killer on the loose after Jaine and her friends. But when they did? YOWZA! LH writes some of the best love scenes around. She's not overly descriptive. There's almost like a brusque quality to the way she writes these scenes that does something your imagination. And for someone with a very active imagination like moi, this was just perfect for me.

Sam Donovan, or as Jaine referred to him as the jerk, was a wonderfully swoony character. He is alpha without being too over the top and the jerk is funny. He can totally match Jaine in the wit department. Plus, he ain't that bad looking either. Oh, who am I kidding? Sam is gorgeous in a totally manly way and most of all, he's got the right equipment.

“I tracked it down on the Web. It was funny stuff – Ms. C.” She gaped at him. “How did you know?” she demanded.
He snorted. “Like I wouldn’t recognize your smart-ass mouth even in print. ‘Anything over eight is strictly for show-and-tell’,” he quoted at her.
“I might have known you’d remember only the sex stuff.”
“Sex is much on my mind these days. And just for the record – I don’t have anything for show-and-tell.”
If he didn’t, he hadn’t missed it by much, Jaine thought, remembering with great fondness how he had looked in profile.
He continued, “I’m just happy I’m not in the point-and-laugh category.”

The story was seamlessly told in multiple POVs, with Jaine having the most of them. We also get to be inside the mind of the killer and let me tell you, it was creepy as hell and very disturbing. I have to warn you though, there is much sadness that happened in this book. I won't elaborate anything more than that but this book isn't all hearts and rainbows. But it does have an HEA.

Overall, very solid and pretty much unforgettable story from Linda Howard. Definitely worth the five stars!