Review: Perfect by Judith McNaught.

Posted May 18, 2008 by Rowena in Reviews | 15 Comments


One of my friends Daphne read this book not too long ago and she didn’t like this one…so I had to resurrect this one and remind myself how much I loved it….so this one’s for you Daphne! =)

Hero: Zack Benedict
Heroine: Julie Mathison
Grade: 5 out of 5

A rootless foster child, Julie Mathison had blossomed under the love showered upon her by her adoptive family. Now a lovely and vivacious young woman, she was a respected teacher in her small Texas town, and she passionately lived her ideals. Julie was determined to give back all the kindness she’d received; nothing and no one would ever shatter the perfect life she had fashioned.

Zachary Benedict was an actor/director whose Academy Award-winning career had been shattered when he was wrongly convicted of murdering his wife. After the tall, ruggedly handsome Zack escaped from a Texas prison, he abducted Julie and forced her to drive him to his Colorado mountain hideout. She was outraged, cautious, and unable to ignore the instincts that whispered of his innocence. He was cynical, wary, and increasingly attracted to her. Passion was about to capture them both in its fierce embrace…but the journey to trust, true commitment, and proving Zack’s innocence was just beginning….

This is most definitely one of my favorite Judith McNaught’s.

If you think about it, there’s so many things to love about this book.

The Hero: Zack Benedict.

He came from a rich background, was born with a silver spoon in his mouth and the world at his feet and then his parents died before he was legal and left him in the care of his grandmother who immediately disowned him, taking whatever money was his in the meantime, leaving him all on his own without a dime to his name and making sure he knew just how much she loathed him.

He heads west and gets picked up as a grip on a movie in Hollywood. His pretty face and sexy body lands him a movie deal and suddenly he’s thrown into the Hollywood scene with everyone wanting a piece of Zack Benedict. Little boys want to be him when they grow up and little girls want to lose their virginity to him and have his babies…yeah he’s THAT hot.

You see, he makes it really big and gets to be an uber millionaire without the help of his stuffy old money Grandma. In fact, because he was booted from the family tree, it drove him to make something of himself and shove it to his family, because when his parents died, he not only lost his parents, but he lost his entire family. He had a sister and a brother who were younger than he was and were not kicked out, they were not to contact nor have any contact with Zack if they wanted to continue to live in the big money life they were used to and because they were selfish and spoiled, they did as their Grandmother instructed them.

So Zack was completely and utterly alone. Did he cry like a baby at the injustice of it all? Oh no, he moved on. He became a cold and unfeeling bastard, but hey he was still hot. He married another fellow beautiful actress who cheated on him with one of her co stars and she ends up dead on the set of a movie that Zack is directing.

Of course, Zack is blamed for the entire thing because the story of how she was unfaithful to him comes out and he goes to prison for a murder he didn’t commit. He becomes even more unattached from the world and his cynical nature is taken up a notch, he becomes an even BIGGER bastard.

…and then he met Julie Mathison.

And she turns his world around, gives him hope of a better life and makes him into the man we fall in love with at the end of the book.

You have to read the book to really get a feel of just what an awesome hero Zack is, but trust me…he’s one of the best.

The “Drowning” Scene.

Because he takes Julie hostage, it’s only obvious that she would try to escape from him and when Zack realizes that Julie is gone and that she might have drowned in the lake, when he goes in to save her?

*sigh*

The bomb. Read it, you’ll love it.

The Letter.

Never in my life have I read a letter that made me cry as much as this letter did. Zack is seriously one hella great hero and the love he writes about in this book totally melts my heart every time. I’m telling you, read the book, you’ll love it.

The Setting.

Most of the book is set in the Colorado Mountains where the air is crisp and clean, the weather a bit chilled but perfect for a snow day. Perfect for hot chocolate and getting to “know” your partner. It’s the perfect setting for a romance novel, because the atmosphere is just so beautiful and JM does a fantastic job of taking us on a journey all the way to beautiful Colorado, you can totally feel like you’re there.

Okay, I can go on and on about how much I love this book and what I loved about it, but you guys are seriously going to have to read it for yourself. This book is just all out FABULOUS. Zack and Julie’s story, the way it’s told and the things they both go through to get to the end is just one of the best stories you’ll read about in a very long time.

This book is swoonworthy good, for real.

This book is available from Pocket Books. You can buy it here.


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15 responses to “Review: Perfect by Judith McNaught.

  1. Dev

    Okay, okay, okay ~ I’ll move this one to the top of my TBR pile, too. This sounds great ~ can’t wait to read it.

  2. To me that book deserves its title. Near perfection. So romantic. The wrongly convicted movie star, the kidnapping, hiding in the Colorado mountains, the good girl falling for her tender-hearted captor…sigh. I’m not one for big misundertsandings usually, but here it felt justified and thankfully it didn’t drag for too long. I had my mother read it too and she adored it as well. PERFECT is the book that made me start to read in English and opened a whole new world to me. It’s the ultimate keeper for me.

  3. I started this one when I was in one of my slumps and just never finished it. I”ll have to dig it back out and give it another go!

  4. Rowena

    Anne,

    I definitely recommend a reread of this book..it IS perfect.

    Dev,

    Oh goodness, you seriously need to read this book and Paradise..they’re so frickin’ good!

    AL,

    I totally agree.

    Nath,

    Mine too…that Zack Benedict is so frickin’ hot!

    Mary,

    Welcome to Book Binge and you are so right, this book was just great!

    Kris,

    You must read these books pronto…and then tell us how you liked them.

  5. I read this one years ago and it remains one of my all-time favorite classic keepers. McNaught ruled with this one. I think I like it better than Paradise, and that’s sayin’ something.

  6. You know, one of the reason why I love it so much it’s that it doesn’t end after Zack is cleared. We get to actually see him grovel a little and go through the wedding and all. That’s my favorite part of the book actually 😛

  7. Ok, I know I’m ALWAYS the one who doesn’t like the books that everyone loves, but I really didn’t care for this book all that much. I couldn’t forgive Julie for what she did to Zach.

    And that makes me wonder:

    Nath, WTF do you mean you liked that we got to see HIM Grovel. He didn’t need to grovel! Julie needed to do something WAY better than write some stupid letter to make up for what she did to him. Gosh, just thinking about it pisses me off to no end. Ugh.

  8. No, she wrote a letter to her family saying goodbye to them, remember? A letter she wrote BEFORE she screwed Zach over. And yet that same letter was used to show she wasn’t really a bad person and he should forgive her. Sorry, but that video and letter weren’t enough.

  9. Like I explain to you, Holly… I didn’t mean grovel. Wrong wording. I meant I’m happy we got to see him going after her… I guess that the only decent thing she did was stay away from him after the whole fiasco…

    anyway, I meant, we got to see him go after her and what I enjoyed is that it didn’t end at the “I love you” part. We got to see them spending time together, going through their engagement and wedding. That is my favorite part of the book.

  10. Rowena

    Julie wrote him a letter? That was Zack. Paul went to Zack and showed him the video of Julie going crazy because of what they were doing in Mexico City.

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