A disturbing and shocking debut novel of psychological suspense about a recently widowed mother, her young son, and the lengths she’ll go to in order to keep him safe. When Tess Clarke wakes up in the hospital the day after her son Jamie’s eighth birthday, she’s sure of these things: She’s been stabbed, her son is missing, her brother-in-law and her grief counselor are involved. But no one is … But no one is listening to her.
After her husband, Mark, died suddenly in a terrible accident a few months earlier, the only thing keeping Tess together is Jamie. As they struggle to make sense of their new life without Mark, they find joy in brief moments of normalcy like walking to school and watching television together. Life is hard without Mark, but Tess has Jamie, and that’s what matters.
But there in the hospital, confused and surrounded by people who won’t listen, Tess’s world falls apart. To save her son, she must piece together what happened between Mark’s death and Jamie’s birthday, but the truth might just be too much for her to bear.
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This book was engrossing, heartbreaking and compelling. I made the mistake of starting it at 9:00PM and 200 bleary eyed pages later I could barely lay it down.
That being said, I don’t know if this is so much a thriller as a deep dive on grief and letting go.
Tess is lost in the days after her husband is killed in a commercial plane crash caused by pilot suicide, leaving her to raise 8 year old Jamie alone. Like a phoenix from the ashes comes Shelley, a social worker who seems too good to be true…because she is.
Chilling, harrowing, haunting.
The story begins with words very similar to a popular novel that left the ending open to interpretation. Unlike that novel, this one does come together at the end. However, unless you have been living under a rock and reading other than psychological genres, the plot is obvious from very early on, leaving the remainder of the book slow and grinding. This is not a bad book, it just was not creative enough for me.
“The Perfect Son” by Lauren North
I’m thrilled that I was selected by NetGalley to read and review “The Perfect Son” by Lauren North!
“A captivating start that stays strong! “The Perfect Son” is an unpredictable, on the edge of your seat read! You’ll love every minute-even when you don’t!”-Green Gables Book Reviews
Imagine waking up in the hospital. Your husband died a few months ago in a terrible accident. You’ve been stabbed. Your 8-year-old son is missing. No one will listen to you.
You know who is behind his disappearance and your stabbing. Your brother in law and your grief counselor are to blame. No one will listen to you. Where is your son? Where is Jamie?
That’s the start of Lauren North’s fabulous new book, “The Perfect Son”.
Jamie and Tess have slowly been rebuilding their world since Tess’s husband, Mark, died suddenly in an accident a few months ago. Jamie has been the only reason for Tess to get up in the morning and try to get through each day. They have been connecting with each other slowly through small moments, like walks to and from school and watching TV together.
When grief counselor Shelley enters their life, there’s a glimmer of hope. Jamie and Tess both like Shelley and she brings positive energy to their grey world. But, Tess starts to wonder why Shelly is really there to help her.
Brother in law, Ian, seems like he wants to help. But, Tess just can’t trust him. Why does he keep hounding her? She doesn’t know the answers to the questions he keeps asking. Why can’t he leave her and Jamie alone?
Then, a few months later, Tess is in the hospital, stabbed-and Jamie is gone.
A great book! 5 stars!
File Size: 2636 KB
Print Length: 367 pages
Page Numbers Source ISBN: 1984803840
Publisher: Berkley (August 13, 2019)
Publication Date: August 13, 2019
Sold by: Penguin Group (USA) LLC
Language: English
ASIN: B07KNSM9PM
Best book I’ve read in a long time. Highly recommend!
Good easy read that moves along at a nice pace.
Great read.
I thought it was gripping and well-crafted.
Well written. Certainly not what I expected! Enjoyed!!
Tess thought that she and her husband, Mark, and their son, Jamie, were living an almost perfect life. Tess’s entire life was changed in an instant when she was told that the plane Mark was on had crashed. Overtaken by grief, Tess tries to get through each day, almost forming a cocoon around her and Jamie. Gradually, she stops interacting with others. Her mother hires a grief counselor named Shelley to help her heal. Her brother-in-law, Ian, tells Tess that Mark owes him a substantial amount of money and is impatiently wanting to be paid back. Tess becomes close to Shelley and their friendship helps Tess and Jamie start to heal. On Jamie’s eighth birthday, Tess overhears Ian and Shelley in a whispered conversation and she begins to suspect that they are working together to take Jamie away from her and leave her by herself. She can’t lose Jamie too and the steps she takes to prevent Shelley and Ian from fulfilling their plans leads to a startling conclusion. I became engrossed in the story and the end was shocking and unexpected. I can’t wait to read more from Ms North, she did an amazing job keeping the reader interested and captivated. Thank-you to Netgalley, Berkley and Lauren North for an ARC in exchange for a honest review.
Clear your calendar and don’t start reading this book late at night as you wont be able to put it down !
Its a sad story as Tess has lost her husband in a plane crash and she is struggling to go through the process of grieving.
You cheer for her, you wonder is she needs more help than she is getting.
Things begin to happen like phone calls , she is followed, someone has been in the house.
I dont want to give anything away about The Perfect Son but this is one book that will stay with me for a long time.
THanks to NetGalley and Berkely Publishing Group to allow me to read The Perfect Son.
Talk about a psychological thriller! This story is about a young woman who loses her husband in an airplane crash. She grieves for her husband but throws her entire being into taking care of their almost 8 year old son, Jamie. The story tells how much she loves her son and will do anything, absolutely anything to protect him and keep him safe. The surprise ending of this book was wonderful…I had all kinds of scenarios in my mind of what was going on but, it wasn’t even close to what actually was happening. I highly recommend this book.
The Perfect Son by Lauren North is a psychological thriller, my favorite genre, about a young woman whose husband was killed in an airplane crash. She lives alone with her son, and her grieving consumes her making her life unbearable. She feels that she is a bad mom because of it. She and her husband had moved to a remote town in a tranquil English town, her husband’s deceased mom’s home, it is isolated which does not help her to overcome her grief.
She wakes up in the hospital with a stab wound in her stomach and her son missing.
She has a grief counselor, Shelley who Tess befriends, who is there in the hospital with her. While in the hospital, Tess tries to piece together the events that led her to the hospital.
The story starts 1 day after Jamie’s birthday. Jamie is Tess’s son and we learn that Tess is in the hospital. Then we go to 55 days before Jamie’s birthday. The book goes on in this vein, counting down the days before the fateful day that changes Tess’s world. I found this way of telling the story interesting. I enjoyed the author’s style and found the story suspenseful and sad at the same time. Sad because I could not imagine what Tess was going though, suspenseful because I kept turning the pages, finished the book in two sittings. To me, if an author can keep me in suspense and be surprised by the ending, then this is a good author! I really enjoyed the book! Keep writing Lauren!
/ 5
The Perfect Son by Lauren North was so good that I would never have guessed it is a debut novel.
What it’s about: Tess Clarke lost her husband in a plane crash a few months before her son Jamie’s 8th birthday. After Jamie’s birthday she wakes up in a hospital with a stab wound and no one will listen to her or tell her where Jamie is. As Tess tries to piece together what happened between the plane crash and her son’s birthday, she might not be able to come to terms with the truth.
The Perfect Son was very fast-paced and it was so easy to read that I was able to read it very quickly. Creepy phone calls and someone following her? Yes please! This book kept me engaged and had me wondering where it was all headed. It jumped around a lot and had different media in it which also kept me interested.
I didn’t guess the ending and even when I thought I had things figured out I didn’t. There were a few different twists in The Perfect Son and I wasn’t expecting any of them. I think this would be a great book for someone that loves a quick read in the thriller/mystery genre.
Final Thought: I am going to keep my review short so I don’t give anything away, but when it comes down to it I highly recommend reading this and I simply can’t wait for North’s second book!
Thank you to the publisher for providing me with an advance review copy of this book, all opinions are my own.
We meet Tess in the hospital after she had an accident at her son’s birthday party and after coping with the death of her husband a few weeks ago.
Something is going on since her husband’s death, and Tess doesn’t know what it is. All she knows is that she is happy she has her son.
Her brother-in-law, Ian, says Tess needs to pay back the 100,000 her husband lent him, flowers are left on her doorstep with no note, her son is being very difficult, and an appointment with a social worker that Tess doesn’t remember making do not add up and make things worse for Tess.
We learn of all these things in between the time we meet Tess in the hospital and the flash backs to the days before her son’s eighth birthday party where Tess was stabbed.
There was a lot going on as Tess grieved for Mark, and what was going on wasn’t good. She thought she saw Mark in the grocery store, heard people in her driveway at night, had a social worker stopping by looking through her mail, had questions about what Ian told her, had hang-up phone calls at all hours, and other odd happenings.
You can feel there is something going on and plenty of hints that seem to go in the wrong direction not allowing you to be able to figure out what is really happening.
If you enjoy the feeling of something not quite right growing underneath it all, THE PERFECT SON shouldn’t be missed.
If biting your finger nails keeps you reading because of the choices a character makes and doesn’t make and other characters that don’t really have another character’s best interest in mind, THE PERFECT SON should be your next read.
THE PERFECT SON will lead you down the wrong path as you read, but a terrific book and a surprise ending await you. 5/5
This book was given to me by the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
In her debut novel, The Perfect Son, author Lauren North examines the devastatingly destructive impact of sudden, profound loss with stunning effect.
Tess Clarke is happily married to Mark and they are raising their seven-year-old son, Jamie. When Mark is killed in an airplane crash, Tess’s world is shattered, but she is trying to carry on for Jamie’s sake. Her first-person narrative — an ongoing internal dialogue with Mark — commences 55 days prior to Jamie’s eighth birthday. She and Mark bought out his brother Ian’s interest in their childhood home, and Tess has opted to remain there. Aside from walking Jamie to and from the school in the nearby village, she rarely gets dressed or leaves the house. Sleep evades her, unopened mail is piling up, and she is reluctant to take the antidepressant medication prescribed by her physician. Tess cuts off communications with her old friends, mother and beloved brother. She has failed to respond to her attorney’s urging that she begin the painful process of carrying out the terms of Mark’s will. Concerned for Tess’s well-being, her mother arranges for a local grief counselor, Shelley, to pay Tess a visit and provide support.
Shelly became a grief counselor after losing her four-year-old son to leukemia. He would be just about Jamie’s age now. Realizing that they have much in common, Tess accepts Shelley’s assistance and friendship, agrees to being taking the antidepressant, and is delighted by the changes she observes in Jamie as a result of Shelley’s presence in their lives. However, as Jamie’s eighth birthday approaches, Tess becomes increasingly paranoid and frightened. Tess and Ian never had a close relationship. When he appears, claiming that Mark borrowed money from him and demanding that Tess repay the loan — about which Tess had no knowledge — she becomes convinced that Ian has a nefarious motive. She believes he wants to collect the proceeds of Mark’s life insurance and has been inside her home while she was away, rifling through Mark’s office in search of information. Tess also becomes convinced that she is being followed by a mysterious man, and that she is receiving ominous, threatening telephone calls demanding that she return something Mark took from the stranger, although she has no idea what he seeks.
North alternates the chapters detailing Tess’s daily activities and thoughts with transcripts from an interview with her in the hospital by an individual Tess believes to be a detective, as well as excerpts from declarations executed by Ian and Shelley.
The Perfect Son is unpredictable and engrossing. Tess is a compellingly tragic character. Her distress is palpable, understandable, and heartbreaking. She is also incredibly angry about Mark’s death which North reveals to have been senseless and a result of a series of unfortunate occurrences. As the story advances, North keeps readers guessing about what is motivating Ian and Shelley, and the nature and history of their relationship, as well as whether Tess is a reliable narrator. North’s pacing is spot-on and unrelenting, as she inserts clues about the impending momentous event that will take place on Jamie’s birthday. When the truth is fully revealed, it is shocking,emotionally wrenching, and demonstrates how skillfully North constructed and executed the Tess’s harrowing story.
The Perfect Son is an impressive and promising debut thriller that proves Lauren North can hold her own among other female authors penning psychological thrillers, and leaves readers clamoring for more of her work.
Thanks to NetGalley for an Advance Reader’s Copy of the book.
A powerful, unpredictable debut thriller about a mother’s attempt to reassemble her life from the shards of tragedy. Lauren North’s skillful narrative casts everyone as a suspect and keeps the reader guessing until the final, emotion-packed pages.
Wow what a suspenseful page-turner . Each chapter was short and kind of slow paced. Had a couple sleepless nights while enjoying the ride this story took me on. The way the characters come to life in each chapter kept me engrossed and waiting for the next plot twists, There was alot of plot twists that left you saying omg i didn’t see that coming.I was hooked on the story from the beginning and it kept my attention until the very last page. I found the characters to be interesting and well drawn.Suspense was built up nicely and the end was a surprise. Many parts of this book caught me by suprise and trust me that does not happen often often. I had to go back and read the last couple of chapters a second time just to wrap my head around what I had just read lol .Each scene was described so well that it was as if I was picked up and transported to right there . I Really enjoyed this book . This was my first read by this author, but will not be the last. You can also read this review and all my other reviews on my fb page at Joyce Stewart Book Reviews , my fb Group Stewart Book Reviews Book Club , Good Reads at Joyce Stewart Reviews and instagram at Stewarts_bookreviews.
A heart-rending evocation of grief that packs a devious punch. It left me reeling.
Beautifully written psychological suspense about the power of love after a life-changing loss. A sense of impending doom and foreboding gripped me from the first page….The ending is stunning and powerful.
A captivating, suspenseful thriller that draws you in—with a twist that will take your breath away.