Abbie awakens to a strange feeling of not knowing exactly who or where she is. As she adjusts, she finds her husband telling her that she's a cobot (companion robot) that he created to replace his wife who disappeared and presumably died five years before. She's been programmed to have Abbie's personality, habits, tendencies, memory, and vocabulary--but not all of it. Her husband says that's because it might be too much for her right away. He tells her though, that she was and is The Perfect Wife.

The problems she faces as she learns her role as wife and mother are how to parent their autistic son, how to cook for her family and entertain guests when she can't taste the food she cooks, and whether she can trust the things her husband tells her about their life together.

More of a sci-fi book that a thriller - not bad, just not what I was expecting.....by the end, it came together and I wanted to know what happened, but a little slow at the start.
I’m more of a thriller type of reader, so maybe someone who loves sci fi will really love the book

I wasn’t a huge fan of this one. For some reason I just couldn’t get it to keep my attention I didn’t care for the main character Abbie and that could be why I just wasn’t invested in her story. The plot reminded me of another thriller I’ve read and it just didn’t seem fresh

I really enjoyed this book. The story catches your attention right from the beginning and keeps you reading because you just have to know how it ends. I would definitely recommend it to friends.

Thoroughly enjoyable, twist filled, compelling ride. I'd say more, but don't want to spoil it for you. This is one you will enjoy! JP Delaney's stories just keep getting better and better.

Every book I've read by this author has been insane! I really thought I had a grasp of what was going on until around chapter 26 and had my mind blooooown. Very cool book about Artificial Intelligence and autism that I foresee to be a hot topic at release!

4 STARS

Thank you, NetGalley, for an advanced reader copy of The Perfect Wife.

This is not typically a novel I would be interested in. Sci-fi is a category I normally stay away from but I am so glad it didn’t deter me from this wild ride. The characters kept me guessing from the moment they were introduced and the storyline was fascinating and unlike anything I’d read before.

The Perfect Wife is an engaging, character driven thriller that you do not want to miss.

I DNFed this for the time being, but don't want to harm my NetGalley ratio. I might come back to the book and try again, and at that time will amend my review/rating based on a full read.

But essentially I felt a bit of a bait & switch here. The description, title, cover are clearly geared toward the suspense thriller market, and the pen name the author chose is meant to obscure gender. Which, indeed, I expected this to be a first person domestic suspense thriller from the POV of a woman and by a woman, and wow is that not what this book is. The blurb hints at the speculative twist--and I am fine with a speculative twist--but this is not a suspense thriller. It is a sci-fi novel with suspense elements. And it's in SECOND PERSON. That was the deal-breaker for me. I loathe second person. I find it uncomfortable and frustrating to read. So immediately I was thrown off on page one.

Also thrown off by the cultural blunder--there is no such thing as "Hindi patterns" in henna--Hindi is a *language*. This actually sent me to Google to check on the author, which is how I discovered it's a white dude. Which is fine, except if you're a white dude who wants to borrow South Asian culture to set a colorful scene in your novel opening, maybe Google it? The actual patterns for henna are usually paisley, but the art itself can be best referred to as mehendi. The more you know. (I am a white person, but I do South Asian marketing AND I checked with a South Asian friend to sanity-check myself) I passed on this note to the publisher and hope they will fix it.

I tried to about the 10% mark but when it was clear the style of the book wasn't what I was hankering for, I put it aside for a different read. I might try again, but I'd have to be in a sci-fi mood so I could stomach the 2nd person.

I enjoyed this book very, very much, even though it's not one I would normally have picked up. Part domestic thriller, part sci fi, it kept me interested with its rapid pace and well developed characters. My only criticism is the ending, which I didn't find particularly satisfying, and seemed to be more complex and confusing than it needed to be. But, I would still recommend!

I really loved the preview for this book, but I could not get past the first two chapters. It lost my attention constantly, and didn't seem to match the preview or my expectations at all.

Don't bother.

Great writing with lots of twist and turns. Such a suspenseful thrill ride until the very end.
Thanks for letting me read an advance copy.

When I started reading The Perfect Wife, I was expecting a psychological thriller. I was expecting to read about Abbie’s remembering what happened to her the night of her accident. I was even expecting a few twists to the plot, which the book delivered. What I wasn’t expecting was the science fiction angle of the book. That took me by surprise.

The plotline of The Perfect Wife was interesting. Abbie wakes up wondering who she was. She is filled in by her husband. Abbie is an AI. She is a replica of Tim’s wife who went missing over five years ago. Abbie’s memories of her marriage show that Tim and herself are in love and happy. But Abbie can’t help but think that something is missing. That memories are missing. Abbie soon embarks on a mission to discover her missing memories. She also wants to find out what happened to Abbie 5 years earlier. Did she disappear? Or did something more sinister happen?

I liked Abbie, but I couldn’t get a feel for the AI. She was bland, personality- wise, for 90% of the book. I couldn’t connect to either version of her, which irritated me because I wanted to in the worse way. Abbie before was much more enjoyable.

Tim creeped me out. I understood that he was devastated by Abbie disappearance. But to make an AI that had her memories was creepy. Even creepier was how he was before Abbie. Talk about chills!!

Danny was also an essential character in The Perfect Wife. The author did a tremendous job of describing his form of autism. The author also did a fantastic job of explaining the various schools/treatments that Abbie and Tim tried.

I wasn’t a fan of the switch between 2nd person POV and 3rd person POV. I don’t like 2nd person POV. Add in that it kept switching to 3rd person and I was like “What” during some parts of the plotline. I kept having to reread chapters, and I am not a huge fan of doing that.

The end of The Perfect Wife confused me. I had to read it a few times. Even now, after I have finished the book, I still don’t get it. The author did wrap up the “What Happened To Abbie” storyline well but it didn’t jive with the rest of the story. Plus, what happened to Abbie and Danny at the end. I couldn’t figure out which one was the truth.

I love this authour! I read Believe Me and it was so good and The Perfect Wife does not disappoint. I love murder/thriller books. When you find out that the wife is an AI bot, right at the beginning, so no spoiler alert. I was not sure if I would like this book but the writing and story were so good. For us who grew up with Robots taking over the world this is a must read. I felt sorry for the AI. It also touches on autism which was so interesting at how an different people deal with it in there family. In life no one is perfect and no one should try to live up to being perfect, you and everyone around you will be disappointed. Whether you have a child with Autism, you husband or wife if not perfect, or life just does not go the way you want it to accept it.

"I'm so happy you're finally here. That we're together again, at last."

Well, I wasn't expecting this. The synopsis is a little bit deceiving. Since I don't want to ruin the experience for anyone else, I'll hold off from divulging too much.

The Perfect Wife is a creepy novel. The mystery centers around a young mother, Abbie Cullen What really happened to her?

Abbi is an artist who's hired by a robotics company and here is where she meets the owner, Tim, a millionaire tech guide. She proceeds to marry him and they have a child together, Danny. Then, like waking up from a dream, Abbie opens her eyes and she can't remember much of what has happened to her life in the last five years. When she wakes up, the only face she recognizes is her husband's. Tim tells her she has been gone for five years. It will be up to Abbie to put the pieces of her life back together.

The Perfect Wife had a component of suspense combined with sci-fi. There is a lot of tech talk and AI information which is extremely intriguing to me. Our world is constantly morphing because of it. AI is everywhere and will only surround us more. Do I love AI? Absolutely. Some of the things related to technology in this book are probably already in the works by some crazy people. It wouldn't surprise. J.P. Delaney brings many good questions to the table and some of them are quite scary.

I did have some issues in regards to the ending. Specifically with what happens with Abbie.

(view spoiler)[Why after everything robot Abbie does, she has to die? The real Abbie already died. Why does the evil predator win? Is the premise of the book that no matter what, the men will always win? Yes, Robot Tim might kill the real Tim but what if he doesn't? Then still a male robot wins. It doesn't help either Abbie. No justice for human Abbie or robot Abbie. (hide spoiler)]

Cliffhanger: No

3/5 Fangs

A complimentary copy was provided by Ballantine Books via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

Wow! This psychological thriller really took me out of my comfort zone and I loved it! The author combined a brilliant premise with mystery and suspense and kept me guessing. There were a few sections in this novel where the story fizzled, but overall this was a refreshingly different psychological thriller.

“Abbie awakens in a daze with no memory of who she is or how she landed in this unsettling condition. The man by her side claims to be her husband. He’s a titan of the tech world, the founder of one of Silicon Valley’s most innovative start-ups. He tells Abbie that she is a gifted artist, an avid surfer, a loving mother to their young son, and the perfect wife. He says she had a terrible accident five years ago and that, through a huge technological breakthrough, she has been brought back from the abyss.”

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2786188420

The concept in this book was a really interesting one (creating robots/cobots for someone after they die). I enjoyed the twists and turns and did not see the ending coming. However, I felt this one fell a little short for me. Maybe it was the terrifying concept that the cobot started thinking on her own or the part where Tim makes a robot of his wife, but I felt that the story was a little slow to progress. Then the ending seemed rushed to finish.

The "Stepford Wives" are now high tech!!! This book is amazing! JP Delaney blends "scary" futuristic technology of "cloning" our loved ones as robots, but having feelings, with the reality of having a son with autism (Heller's Syndrome).

Thank you Netgalley for an early copy of The Perfect Wife

Tim is a Silicon Valley tech magnate and he has just successfully created the first authentic cobot...a life like robot programmed to have emotions and thoughts like an actual human. He has modeled Abbie as an exact replica of his wife, also Abbie, who disappeared after going surfing in a storm. The robot Abbie has been brought to life with her own thoughts and feelings. The new version is trying to adapt to every day life wile caring for Tim and Abbie's autistic son, Daniel, and trying to piece together the past relationship Tim and Abbie had. While learning the ins and outs of the first Abbie she begins to uncover information that Tim may not be who she thought he was and must figure out his involvement with the original Abbie's disappearance.

I really enjoyed JP Deaney's previous work, The Girl Before, so I was very excited to receive an early copy of The Prefect Wife. In all honesty I am a big thriller fan but do not enjoy sci-fi fiction. That was the first hurdle I had to get over but overall enjoyed the novel. The twist and turns in Delaney's work are interesting and will keep you guessing to the end. The story is told from two points of view, robot Abbie in present day and an unknown narrator explaining snippets of Abbie and Tim's past. Robot Abbie, however controversially, has been designed to look and sound exactly like the real life Abbie and even intuitively piece together her thoughts. I struggled with wrapping my mind around things like when the robot was able to remember conversations and gain the real Abbie memories, when the programmers had no previous knowledge of the conversation or actions. Robot Abbie and Daniel develop a great relationship and you get a sense that the robot could have emotions or feelings toward someone. With some suspension of disbelief I began to really like the work and if you like thrillers, sci-fi or a mash up of the genres this is a great novel for you.

This book was a bit outside the type I normally read or enjoy. However it was well written but a tad boring. Not as good as this author's other books, but I liked that she went outside reality a bit. added a star for originality

I finished reading “The Perfect Wife” several weeks ago and I’m still thinking about it, which I think is a great compliment for a book - that you keep going back to it long after you finished it. The main character wakes up in a hospital, disoriented about how she got there and the explanation is shocking. Beyond being a great thriller, this book raises questions of morality and science and personality and humanity and what makes you you. I would definitely recommend it.