The Perfect Mother by Matthew Farrell

Genre: Thriller/Suspense
Format: Digital
Pages: 321
Start Date: June 30th, 2023
End Date: July 1st, 2023
Overall: ★★★
Character Development: ★★★
Ending: ★★
Recommend: Yes

 🚨 Contains Spoilers, Continue at Your Own Risk 🚨

The Perfect Mother, immediately gave me a Lifetime Movie vibe. SIGN ME UP! They are my guilty pleasure & this book did not disappoint. Whenever I’m in a reading slump I reach for one of these quick read thrillers. So I already knew there was something not so perfect about our girl Laura, too obvious but were you suspicious of Laura? Did you think that the kidnappers made a mistake? I was thinking there must be some mistake, but in the end we’d discover what made Laura the opposite of perfect. I figured she’d crossed paths with the real Betty somewhere in life. Were you shocked that Laura (Betty) chose the tequila over her daughter? Do you understand her reasoning & do you think it's valid? We learned that Laura (Betty) had a drinking problem, even with that said I was FLOORED when she chose the tequila over her daughter. I mean, I got what she was saying “I could think if I just had a taste” because the body is strong & when in withdraw you do not think straight, but I have such a fierce love for my babies I have a hard time believing a substance could take such control. Now, with that said - I’m speaking from purely a hypothetical higher horse because I’ve never been faced with those actual struggles & I’m sure it’s not nearly as black and white as I just painted it. Did you understand where Orton & his sister Annie were coming from? Do you agree that Laura (Betty) deserved "payback"? I think that she deserves some punishment, but I don’t know that payback by the hands of the victims hands was necessary. Honestly, if their behavior is justified by her actions then aren’t her actions justified by the fact she lost her brother because of their mother’s drunk driving? I think too often people want to blame everyone else in these situations instead of looking within. Betty's (Laura) mom really had a distaste for her own daughter, but even so with a diagnosis of early dementia - do you really think she could have been the mastermind behind the whole scheme? Now firstly, I’m no doctor & secondly I’m not a criminal mastermind SOOOOO with that said, I do still think that it’s unlikely that a person suffering from any mental diminishing illness would be so clever. Circling back to the Mother/Daughter dynamic in this darn book - I don’t have one single clue how her Mother could be so upset with her over what happened to her brother, clearly favoritism but that doesn’t compute with me having two children myself. 

Next Book: To Die For by Lisa Gray