This book was too science fiction for me but I hope others enjoy it. Thank you to Netgalley and Random house Publishing for my honest review

The book was well written and interesting enough for me to continue, but the blurb leaves out a very significant item that you discover in the first few pages. The Abbie that is "brought back from the abyss" is a companion robot. Her tech husband build a robot and uploaded all of her social media and other info so that she can be empathetic and think. I was so thrown off that this is basically a sci-fi book that I almost stopped reading very early on, but I continued because I wanted to know what cobot Abbie ultimately decided to do. So many twists and turns up until the very end, and I just didn't enjoy the ending. If a reader is fascinated by robots and artificial intelligence, they would likely enjoy this book very much, but it just wasn't my style.
I received an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Wow! What did I just read?!?!? I am not entirely certain how to classify what I just read, let alone describe it. JP Delaney blew me out of the water with this one! This thriller/sci-fi/family drama was so enthralling I could not put it down! It had plenty of plot twists to keep you guessing right up to the end. I found the perspectives from which it was narrated quite brilliant! Definitely thought-provoking, disturbing, and a bit creepy! RUN, do not walk, to the book store to get a copy of this!!! Thank you to Net Galley, Random House Publishing, and J.P. Delaney for the digital ARC!

I loved the concept for this book, but I didn't like the story's execution at all.

To start, the majority of the narration is from Abbie's perspective in the rarely used second person, as in: "You walk up the stairs," or "You take his hand..." It's as if the author is telling us to imagine if we were Abbie, and this is what we'd experience. The effect is weird, which is probably why so few books are written this way.

Then there is another POV, which I've never seen done before and hope to never see again. I can only describe it as second person omniscient. The narrator's pronouns are "we" and "our," and it's written from the group perspective of everyone who works for Tim and knows Abbie. This group collective tells us all about things they witness, and the most irritating part of this is the absolute worship of Abbie. I swear they reacted as if she was a goddess, falling at her feet and mesmerized by her very presence. Despite Abbie's character being central to this story, we never get to know her as more than a shadow figure or an ideal, making the goddess-like worship even more irritating.

The pacing is slow throughout the entire middle. We know early on what type of man Tim is, yet it's continually unveiled as if we should be shocked by each revelation. None of the twists surprised me. The ending raced to its conclusion, becoming almost comical in it's strangeness.

These complaints are all specific to me. If you don't mind the stylistic choices in narration, you might be one of the many who love this book.

I received an ARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. This book was kind of "out there" for me. I don't usually enjoy books like this but it was interesting and I did enjoy to a point. I felt the deception and narcissism presented were distracting from the plot. It was thought provoking for sure. Would you like the "perfect" mate? Enjoy! 📚

I didn't know from the description of this book that it was science fiction, but it becomes obvious pretty much from the beginning. I almost decided not to read it since that's really not my genre, but the writing was quite engaging and had many of the factors I find appealing in regular fiction, so I kept reading and don't regret it. You have to totally suspend disbelief, but I did think the plot was intriguing. Tim is definitely very Steve Jobs-like, and Abbie, though a cobot, is a sympathetic, likable character. The plot concerning Abbie and Tim's autistic son is a nice bonus, providing good information and food for thought. I wasn't a fan of the ending, but all in all, it was an interesting and well written book which I enjoyed more than I expected.

Thanks to RandomHouse/Ballantine and NetGalley for a copy of The Perfect Wife by JP Delaney in exchange for an honest review. I’m very fond of woman-in-danger psychological thrillers, so I was eager to read this book. For some reason, I kept having trouble getting into it, but it turned out to be a fun read. A woman named Abbie wakes up and has no idea who she is or how she got to be in her current condition, totally without any memory of – well, anything.

As if that isn’t unsettling enough, there is a man claiming to be her husband. He’s a big wheel in the tech industry, having founded one of Silicon Valley’s most innovative start-ups (think something on the scale of Twitter). He tells Abbie she’s an artist, a loving mother to their son, a surfer, and the perfect wife. According to him, the accident she had five years ago left her in a terrible state, but thanks to technology, she is back! A miracle!

As she starts to put together memories, she starts to wonder about her husband’s motives—and his version of her story.

Very entertaining. Four stars.

First of all, I’m not a sci-fi fan but this one hooked me in early and was definitely a page turner!
A mesmerizing story of a mother, Abbie, married to tech CEO Tim Scott, and their 10-year old autistic son, Danny. Abbie is revealed to be a cobot (companion robot) in the first few pages. The farther in I read the more I was amazed and repelled by what was happening but I could not put it down. It was like Stepford wives mixed with a mad scientist!
The story definitely presents the moral and ethical issues of artificial intelligence – how can it be managed? What will it look like? Should there be full disclosure? Can a cobot be treated as a real person? Certainly more questions than answers!
Parts of the story are very moving and I thought the end was amazing & confusing! Who was that narrator? Can’t wait to discuss this with a friend!

The Perfect Wife is a fantastic thriller story from JP Delaney.

"Abbie wakes up in a daze with no memory of what's happened to her. A miracle of technology has brought her back to life.The man next to her claims to be her husband and explains her former life to her. Abbie begins to question her memories - what's real and what's not? Can she trust Tim - who claims to love her? What really happened to her?"

This is the best book so far from JP Delaney. The story moves back-and-forth from present-day Abbie to her memories until eventually we get the full story of what happened to her.
This book had me from the opening - So many times it was - "Wait...What? They're what? He did what?" This book is a thriller with a sci-fi flavor. Just enough to make you think "that could happen."
Tim and Abbie have an autistic son, Danny, who plays a big part in their decisions. Be sure to read the acknowledgements to see the author's own experiences with his autistic son.
At times, Tim seems to be the stereotypical tech-company founder and visionary, but you won't see until the end what he's really like.
The twist at the end was a big Wow...and then there was another twist after that. Interesting observations about technology in our homes these days.
A great story from Delaney - one you will definitely want to add to your reading list.

This book was much different than I thought it was going to be, but I didn't read the blurb and went in blind. I'm not usually a fan of sci-fi, but I enjoyed the storyline and the two voices that it was told in. The ending surprised me. Thanks to Netgalley and Ballantine for allowing me to read this early in exchange for an honest review.

This was one of those ARCs that I requested from Net Galley without fully reading the description. Sometimes going in blind to a book is fun, because you have zero expectations and are more open minded. The Perfect Wife by JP Delaney is a psychological thriller with The Stepford Wives vibes. I ended up thoroughly enjoying this page turning thriller with a sci fi twist.

Abbie Cullen-Scott awakens from a vivid dream filled sleep to a man who claims to be her husband and no idea of who she is or where she is. Her husband, Tim Scott, is an icon in the Silicon Valley tech world and he runs a company, Scott Robotics, that specializes in creating robots that can replace job roles formerly held by humans. Abbie, or this cobot version of Abbie, learns that she is a talented artist, a perfect wife, and mother to their beloved son, Danny. Tim tells her she was the victim of a terrible incident five years ago, but has been brought back in another life form, artificial intelligence. She is a technological breakthrough with the memories of Abbie and the ability to empathize and feel emotions. Tim has given her a second chance at life as a cobot, but at what cost? Her memories have been programed, but not all of them, as Abbie cannot recall how she died. Did she even ever die? Is Tim telling her the truth? Was she the perfect wife he claims she was? Abbie starts to recover memories, piece them together, and uncover that Tim is not being completely honest with her.

The Perfect Wife by JP Delaney is a wild ride. The robot storyline caught me off guard, but only because I did not fully read the synopsis. I saw "psychological thriller" and clicked "request," but I was pleasantly surprised. The short chapters alternating between cobot Abbie's experience navigating the world in her new form and a group of unnamed narrators, who appear to be Scott Robotic's employees, make the book fast paced. The Scott Robotic's employees describe how Tim and Abbie first met and started dating, how Tim runs his company with an iron fist, and all of the unanswered questions about Tim. Each chapter gave me a little morsel of more information, just enough to keep me wanting to turn the page to learn more.

Though The Perfect Wife is in the thriller genre, it touched on some topics and social issues in a way that was almost literary fiction-esque. Abbie and Tim's son Danny has autism and that dynamic is a large part of the storyline. Cobot Abbie feels maternal instincts towards Danny and it helps her uncover some of Abbie's past secrets. Tim treats his son the way he treats his robots, which is difficult to read at some points. This also plays into Tim's true self. The narration from his employees reveals Tim's misogynistic, egotistical dark side. He treated women like objects and objectified Abbie the most. He put her on a pedestal as the perfect wife, from where she could only go one way, but down. Cobot Abbie uncovers the dark secrets and rumors that meld together to form the complete picture.

I rated The Perfect Wife by JP Delaney a hearty ★★★★. It is not your typical thriller, but the AI spin made it an interesting storyline. There were a few twists, nothing major until the last few chapters, which kept me intrigued. The twist at the end was surprising and not what I was expecting. I finished the book and thought "what the f&*$ did I just read?!," but I think that is what JP Delaney was going for. It was an entertaining book, but with a deeper message, which I loved because I am a huge fan of literary fiction.

Thank you to Random House and Net Galley for the free advanced review copy in exchange for an honest review! If you are intrigued, you can pick up your copy starting August 6th, when this thriller sci fi gem is published and out for the world to read.

Really interesting read! It pulled me in from the first chapter and kept me guessing and I thought I knew where it was going a few times but it ended up going in a different direction each time. The plot moves along quickly while simultaneously giving you 2 different viewpoints at different time lines. I really like that approach to story telling. When it’s non linear it allows clues to be planted along the way and big twists to happen which I love! I definitely recommend this one!

"What if you found the perfect wife...could you really just let her go?"

This is a tough one for me to rate as there was a surprise element once I started readingI Yes, I went in completely blind! A techy, sci-fi type of surprise, a genre I normally do not read. However, this book was interesting and engaging and had enough twists and turns to keep me turning the pages. I must give credit where credit is due and say this was a very creative and original idea. Nicely done JP Delaney!

Abbie wakes in the hospital, groggy and disoriented. Just as she is trying to get a grasp on what has happened to her, she is informed by her husband that she is not real, she is a cobot, or rather a companion robot that he himself designed and the "real" Abbie died 5 years ago in a tragic surfing accident. He tells her she is his perfect wife, and they have a son Danny who has autism. This "cobot" has real feelings though which makes things all the more difficult.... and interesting.

You may never think about technology the same again after reading this book, it definitely makes one wonder what our future in technology may hold... 4 stars! I have read JP Delaney's other books and enjoyed them all.

A big thank you to Ballantine Books and NetGalley for an advanced copy of this book.

This may not be a beat the drums 5 star for me, but it was definitely better than a 4. Abbie has died and has now been brought back to life, sort of. As she starts to recover her memories and interact with people around her, she starts to question what she is really here for and how she died. This book may be a bit too sci-fi for most thriller readers, but I thought the author found the right balance between the two worlds. I liked how the author was able to avoid many of the plot pitfalls possible in a book like this. Mr. Delaney obviously knew what would make for a trite story and thankfully avoided those tropes. I also liked the somewhat subtle connections made between the resurrected Abbie and her son who was suffering from childhood disintegrative disorder (a form of autism) and the look at various forms of therapy being touted to treat autism. I was surprised at how well the book could tackle two very different subjects without making for a disjointed story. I will say that I would have liked a bit more from some of the characters in the book. Most of them never quite got filled in and were instead bit players when some of them could have had larger roles. But, overall, this was a fascinating read!

The best so far from J.P. Delaney. They have all been quite unique and this one does not disappoint. Combine the issue of autism treatment, AI and domestic drama and you get a riveting read. Sci fi lovers will enjoy the treatment of AI and its potential. The family dynamics surrounding the pressures of working in the tech industry and having a child with CDD autism. This is a thriller that covers a large amount of territory and is so very timely. I am definitely a J.P. Delaney fan.

Thank you to Random House-Ballantine and NetGalley for a digital ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.

I read this book a week ago and I'm still thinking about it. It was one of the strangest books I've ever read, but strange in a good way. It had a lot of layers to it -- it made me ponder the growing prevalence of artificial intelligence and what it means to be human. The book had lots of twists and turns -- I completely didn't see the ending coming. However, it was deeper than the typical thriller. I recommended it to my book club because I thought It would lead to a really interesting discussion.

I went into this expecting a thriller so I was pretty disappointed when I realized this is more sci-fy than thriller. That’s not my genre and I would not have requested this book had I realized it falls more into fantasy category. Not for me, sorry, Thank you to publisher and netgalley for this arc in exchange of an honest review.

Rating: 4.5/5 Stars

JP Delaney had already situated himself as an auto-buy author for me after his two brilliant thrillers, The Girl Before and Believe Me (the latter was one of my top reads of 2018 and I read the former in one sitting on the plane back from Thailand), but he just continues to blow me away with his unique plots and captivating writing. The Perfect Wife was my first approved ARC, and I’m so happy to be able to finally share a review – this thriller hits stores on August 6th! Be sure to check it and Delaney’s other books out ASAP! And, as always, thanks to NetGalley, the publisher, and the author for providing access to this ARC in exchange for my honest review!

The Perfect Wife comes out of the gate swinging: Abbie wakes up in a hospital, unsure of what’s happened to her, terrified that she and her family – her husband and young son – were in some kind of an accident. But, the man with her tells her he’s actually her husband, and while Abbie was in a terrible accident five years ago, he has managed a miracle of science. He has brought her back to life. Abbie is a technological feat unlike any other.

After her initial shock, Abbie begins to fill in the gaps in her memories, piecing together the life she once had with her husband and their son. But, as more and more pieces fall into place, Abbie begins to wonder what really happened five years ago, and what her husband’s true motives were for bringing her back to life. (dun dun dun)

RATING BREAKDOWN

WRITING (2/2): Delaney’s writing is perfect for unputdownable thrillers – I felt this way about his other two books, and The Perfect Wife was no different. From the first page, I constantly wanted just a little bit more…until I was reading for another hour instead of just “one more minute.” The suspense he was able to build throughout this one was excellent. The story alternates between present day and 5+ years ago, when Abbie and her husband Tim first met and fell in love, and Delaney handles the juggling time lines perfectly.

PLOT (2/2): Unlike any other thriller I have read! This story was seriously so unique. It blended the genres of thriller and scifi without getting too out there – which is what made it so creepy. Nothing he created seemed too far beyond the near future of technology in the world, which meant I could get on board with the plot without any thoughts of, “but, reeeally?”

THRILLS/TWISTS (2/2): The mystery is built incredibly well through the use of a second person POV. I know! Second person is so rare it actually took me a few chapters to realize how much it impacted my ability to believe the narrator – because the biggest question throughout the whole book is, “who the heck IS the narrator?!?” Then, the giant twists at the end (yup, twists – plural) are everything I needed and more from the ending. The build up was perfect, and the ending was perfect.

CHARACTERS (1/2): This is the only area where Delaney loses a small point from me. Overall, I loved the character development. Abbie is awesome – even non-human Abbie is awesome. I was cheering for her the whole way, even when it made me feel a bit conflicted because…she’s a robot. Abbie’s husband, Tim, is pretty well flushed out, but not quite as much as I wanted. We learn so much about Abbie, I just wanted to get a bit more about Tim – especially his past.

FEEL (2/2): I’ve always been fascinated by the tech industry and the mysteries of what all goes on in the giants of Silicon Valley – I have no idea where this fascination comes from, considering I have zero desire to do anything related to working in that field, but nonetheless, it’s just so cool. So it was fun to read a book that combines my number one genre – thrillers – with this other area that amazes me. This blended world made caught my attention from the start and kept me entertained throughout the entire story. Delaney really can’t go wrong!

Just missing that one small point, The Perfect Wife comes in at a nice 9/10 points, or 4.5 stars. I highly, highly recommend you read Delaney’s two other thrillers and then be sure to grab this one when it comes out on August 6th!

Abbie, the carefree artist, married Tim, the driven tech guy, and life was never the same. Abbie woke up in a strange room confused on where she is and what happened. She quickly finds out she is not Abbie, Tim’s wife, but Abbie, the cobot Tim created after Abbie mysteriously disappeared five years ago. Tim’s creation was meant to help people live forever by uploading their memories and personality into a cobot, a realistic looking and acting robot. It takes AI to a new level. As Abbie investigates what happens to the human Abbie, she discovers terrifying things.

This is a very interesting plot. AI is becoming a larger issue each year and this story is not just about AI but the impact a robot based on an actual person could have. How will this affect the persons family. How does the robot feel knowing they are a replacement? How are they viewed in the law and what rights do they have? Delaney does not take a heavy look at these issues but brings them to light and gets you thinking about them. I really enjoyed the book not only for the very interesting storyline but for the potential of a similar situation happening in the not too distant future.

Tech guru Tim Scott lost his wife 5 years ago. Now suddenly there appears what looks to be Abbie returned to take up where she left off before disappearing. Gaining thoughts, memories and feelings as she awakes we soon discover she is a cobot built by Tim. Abbie the cobot seems to be all things original Abbie - the perfect wife as Tim calls her. Is she a replacement or something more? Can companion robots be 'human'? Questions abound as Abbie tells her story and narrators (who exactly are they) tell her story, past and present. The story brings to mind the British TV Show "Humans" and leads to lots of questions about where technology and robotics are taking and will take us. I read the book through and set it aside for a week not quite figuring how to write a review. Then I went back and reread the final chapters to really get a feeling for its conclusions and the many questions about technology, family, souls, humanity, and so much more. Great thought provoking psychological thriller!