She thought they wanted her baby. But they won’t stop there.
Roz is young, penniless and pregnant. All she wants is to be the perfect mother to her child, but the more she thinks about her own chaotic upbringing, the more certain she is that the best life for her baby is as far away as possible from her hometown in Ireland.
Determined to do the right thing, Roz joins an elite adoption service … elite adoption service and can’t believe her luck. Within days she is jetting to New York to meet a celebrity power couple desperate for a child of their own. Sheridan and Daniel are wealthy and glamorous—everything Roz isn’t. Her baby will never go hungry, and will have every opportunity for the perfect life. But soon after Roz moves into their plush basement suite, she starts to suspect that something darker lurks beneath the glossy surface of their home.
When Roz discovers she isn’t the first person to move in with the couple, and that the previous woman has never been seen since, alarm bells start ringing. As the clock ticks down to her due date, Roz realises her unborn baby may be the only thing keeping her alive, and that despite her best intentions, she has walked them both into the perfect nightmare…
more
Roz, 24, shares a flat with her long time friend Dympra in Ireland. Roz was raised by an alcoholic single mother with whom she has little contact. She has little money and life is difficult for her. After a night of drinking, Roz finds herself pregnant and she cannot tell Dympra who the father is.
Roz knows she cannot keep her baby and wants the best future for it. She has found a site where wealthy people who want to adopt babies, share their backgrounds and photos. She will live with them and they will cover her expenses along with paying her a good sum when the baby is born.
Sheridan and Daniel are a wealthy and successful show business couple. Sheridan grew up as a child star so it is ingrained in her. They are the parents of Leo, age 4. They want another baby, preferable a little girl, but as Sheridan is 44-years-old they want to adopt.
Sheridan and Daniel put their profiles on the baby site and immediately they and Roz click. Roz agrees to go to New York and live with them. It’s the perfect scenario. What could go wrong?
What a tense book that keeps the reader’s attention and compels them to keep turning those pages. I was taken by the incredible plot that the author crafted and the numerous characters that made up the story. This is a really good book and thriller readers especially will want to read it soon.
Copy provided by NetGalley in exchange for a fair and honest review.
Fantastic book! I was hooked from page one and had a hard time putting this book down. In Dublin, two young women, Rosalind (Roz) and Dympna share a room, work together doing housekeeping in a local hotel and have been best friends for years. Roz confides in Dympna that she is pregnant as the result of a one-night stand but she refuses to divulge who the father is. Roz searches the internet and finds Miracle Moms, an organization that helps expectant moms, who cannot keep their babies, find a suitable family for adoption. Roz settles on a family that sounds perfect and soon she is flying to New York to await the delivery of her baby and her big payoff from the parents. The prospective parents are rich and famous actors. Sound too good to be true??? It certainly was and there are lots of different angles this story takes before the surprise ending. Thank you NetGalley and Thomas & Mercer for the ARC of this scary unpredictable page-turner in exchange for an honest review. I highly recommend this book to anyone who loves a real thrilling thriller.
A gripping story from start to finish. A young and scared pregnant girl gets caught in the web of a manipulative celebrity couple. What seems too good too good to be true in fact turns out to be so. The story is nail biting and edgy as the neurosis of the couple is revealed. There are many secrets being kept by several characters which will be unexpected when revealed to the reader. The characters are well done and the plot is superb. It is a balanced mix of a psychological thriller and a drama.
The Perfect Mother by Caroline Mitchell
Roz realizes she is pregnant after a one night stand. Knowing her mother had not been the best role model, not having much income and still needing to finish school she leans toward adoption as a way to provide her child with the perfect mother. So, she looks and finds a site that promises wealthy intelligent well off people she can meet that might be interested. After making her choice she leaves her best friend Dympna behind and heads off to New York to meet the prospective parents. Sure, some warning bells go off in her mind (big ones went off in MY mind) and she should have listened to her gut…but she didn’t. And, if she had listened and run this story would have never gotten off the ground.
With each chapter more is revealed about the powerful couple in show business and the more that I learned the more worried I became. I had a good idea what would happen and wasn’t surprised by the plotting and pace but was surprised by one twist that had me scratching my head as I had not tweaked to the fact that one person’s fantasies were as dark or darker than an other’s.
What I liked:
* Roz never gave up even when a bit of Stockholm syndrome seemed to set in she was hopeful she and her baby would get out alive…well…most of the time she was.
* The twist I did not see coming
* Dympna: Roz’s best friend who never gave up on finding her
* The creep-factor and chill the story provided – I wrote down that one person was psychotic and later thought more than one actually was.
* The way it played with my (and Roz’s) mind
* The resolution at the end
What I did not like:
* The power couple – Sheridan and Daniel
* The fact that not all of the bad guys were punished
* Seeing just how warped and cruel and sick some people can be
Thank you to NetGalley, Amazon Publishing, UK and Book on the Bright Side Publicity for the ARC – This is my honest review.
4 Stars
The book opens with a young pregnant woman fighting for her life. Roz Foley, fatherless and a mother who was an alcoholic, is having a baby. But who’s baby? Even her best friend Dympna doesn’t know. Nobody knows. The lifestyles of these two girls couldn’t be further apart. Dympna with her trendy parents: Father a police officer and mother an event planner. But they are inseparable. A bond of sisterhood that cannot be broken. But will Roz’s secret drive a wedge between them?
Roz has her own reasons for not keeping her child and answers an ad for an adoption site in America. Plunged into the US glamour scene via Celeb Goss Magazine, we meet the couple who are desperate for a second child. Blonde bombshell Sheridan Sinclair (44) and Daniel Watson (38). A couple hoping for a quiet life are bombarded with paparazzi. It’s touch and go if they can keep their private life out of the papers. Daniel, on the other hand, is generally good natured and has oodles of compassion. But is he too busy on set, and is seen to be public property. Is he eye candy or is there more to Daniel than meets the eye.
Hollywood starlet Sheridan Smith is the most interesting character for me. Even her staff stand to attention. She is curiously frail, but at the same time equipped with an excessive sense of self-importance. But throw in a serious lack of empathy and you get a ticking time bomb. There is the manic side to her and the depressing side. To be honest, she made my skin crawl. Taming Daniel with a new baby belonging to a complete stranger is a risk. But Sheridan is a risk-taker and she’s not about to be upstaged by other hot-blooded Hollywood starlets. I love the mention of Daniel appearing in a blockbuster movie called ‘Murder Game’ — which also happens to be a book written by the author.
As Roz embarks on her adventure to America, the tension begins to escalate. Her baby is going to the best possible couple and — according to an article in Celeb Goss Magazine — a luxury apartment equipped with a doctor’s surgery and served by the best OBGYN in NY. Somehow, you can hear the ‘but’ a mile away and questions begin to arise when another girl is reported missing with similar circumstances. When Roz is given quarters in a basement without windows, the overall mood darkens. But that’s not all. She is kept on a strict diet, and a routine that would make me chew my fingernails down to the quick. She is chaperoned everywhere because she’s precious to Sheridan; a walking incubator.
This is a story to savour. Although I read it in a day (YES! It’s that un-put-downable) you need to take in the detail. The plot is complex and the characters are fascinating and well thought out. Mitchell is skilful in cutting through the layers to get to the darkest planes of her characters’ minds. This book is cunning, unpredictable, subtly layered and populated by characters so deliciously immoral they’re hard to part with. Five fat stars for another brilliant book!
Caroline Mitchell is quickly becoming one of my favorite To-Read authors. The Perfect Mother is a stand alone psychological thriller and it is fabulous! The beginning grabs hold and the tension builds increasingly all the way to the end. It is realistically written and one could imagine this happening – now that is scary!
The Perfect Mother
by Caroline Mitchell
Pub Date: Jan. 14 , 2020
367 pages
4
Description:
She thought they wanted her baby. But they won’t stop there.Roz is young, penniless and pregnant. All she wants is to be the perfect mother to her child, but the more she thinks about her own chaotic upbringing, the more certain she is that the best life for her baby is as far away as possible from her hometown in Ireland.Determined to do the right thing, Roz joins an elite adoption service and can’t believe her luck. Within days she is jetting to New York to meet a celebrity power couple desperate for a child of their own. Sheridan and Daniel are wealthy and glamorous—everything Roz isn’t. Her baby will never go hungry, and will have every opportunity for the perfect life. But soon after Roz moves into their plush basement suite, she starts to suspect that something darker lurks beneath the glossy surface of their home.When Roz discovers she isn’t the first person to move in with the couple, and that the previous woman has never been seen since, alarm bells start ringing. As the clock ticks down to her due date, Roz realises her unborn baby may be the only thing keeping her alive, and that despite her best intentions, she has walked them both into the perfect nightmare…
MY REVIEW
The Perfect Mother is a 309 page masterpiece with many twists.
This is my first time reading a book by this author. This fast paced, heart racing, suspense filled, mystery ,crime psychological thriller will have you quickly flipping the pages. It is full of twists and turns. It is very well written and each character is really well developed. I felt like I was right there with them during every part of the story. It was so good i didn’t want it to end. The Perfect mother is a gripping psychological thriller that had me glued to the pages. Caroline Mitchell drew me in so much that I refused to put this book down until I read the last page. I started and finished this book all in one day.That’s how good it was. I really could not put it down ! I absolutely love love loved it !!!!This is one book you will not want to miss. It Caught my attention from the very first page and i could not turn the pages fast enough. I read mystery,crime & psychological thrillers all the time and this one kept shocking me right to the end.I thoroughly enjoyed this different twist the author spun with this story. The only faught I had with this story is it takes place in both Dublin and New York City . When the author switched to New York she often used words we don’t use here in the US. And in the beginning of the book before Roz finds out the real name of the diamond couple adoptive mom she calls her Sheridan . Thoes things aside it was a really great book. I highly recommend getting this book. You can pre order this book on Amazon for just $4.99 and it will be auto-delivered to your Kindle on January 14, 2020. Many thanks to the Publisher , the Author , and NetGalley for a ARC copy of this book in exchange for my honest review. I was not required to write a positive review nor was I compensated in any other way. All opinions I have expressed are my own. If you would like to follow my reviews please do so at my facebook page Joyce Stewart Reviews or my facebook reading group Stewart’s Book Reviews Book Club.
About the Author
A former police detective, Caroline Mitchell now writes full-time. She has worked in CID and has also specialised in roles dealing with vulnerable victims—high-risk victims of domestic abuse and serious sexual offences. The mental strength shown by the victims of these crimes is a constant source of inspiration to her, and Mitchell combines their tenacity with her knowledge of police procedure to create tense psychological thrillers. Originally from Ireland, she now lives in a pretty village on the coast of Essex with her husband and two children.
#ThePerfectMother
#CarolineMitchell
This is an addicting psychological thriller!
Roz thought she was doing the best thing for her unborn child, but it all went wrong when she answered an online ad and told NO ONE her plans!
Wow!
Talk about terror, fear, anxiety and horror while trying to calmly sit and read! Amazing!
You will read until you find out how this novel ends and it will NOT be the way you think or thought.
My first Caroline Mitchell book, but definitely not my last.
Great book.