Title: Perfeclty Imperfect
Author: Harper Sloan
Series: none
Genre: new adult, contemporary romance
**Standalone novel**
Mirror, mirror ... who's the fairest of them all?
I still cringe when I hear that line. A fairy tale that had girls pretending they were the fairest, the most beautiful, and the most entitled. A fairy tale most couldn't grow out of turned my haunted childhood memories into a living nightmare. Girls who grew up believing that pile of garbage became the meanest of all 'mean girls.'
And those mean girls were right - it was a line meant for all the beautiful people in the world - and I knew the answer would never be me.
The women with long legs, flat stomachs, and perfect chests.
The type of women Kane Masters gravitated toward.
Well, that's definitely not Willow Tate.
No. That will never be me.
Because I'm completely imperfect.
And ... I hate myself.
I have no idea what Kane could possibly see in someone like me when he could have them.
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FLO'S REVIEW
Perfectly Imperfect by Harper Sloan
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
4 **#IAMWILLOW** STARS
“A person can be stronger than fear tries to trick them into believing.”
Harper Sloan went for the jugular with this book. That being the emotional jugular that makes you feel all the feels until your throat closes up with tears and you start re-thinking your life choices and how you can start treating yourself better from now on.
While I’m used to campy entertainment with my guilty pleasure author, she just did an one-eighty and bombarded me with heavy food for thought, wrapped up in a fairytale. The story of Willow and Kane delivers an important message about body image and social perceptions, while telling a classic over the top black swan gets her prince charming romantic tale. I wasn’t really sure if I was supposed to laugh, roll my eyes or maybe cry a little. I ended up with a bit of all of the above. Once I got passed the fact that this is not exactly a contemporary romance I actually had a rather dream like enjoyable time reading this book. Drama notwithstanding.
“Today is the day when everything I have been working toward comes to fruition. Today, I choose to be a better me. One who doesn’t hate herself. One who isn’t so self-conscious of everyone around her. Today, I choose strength.”
Willow has a bad day, in fact she has had a bad couple of years. Starting with the death of her mother, the father who didn’t want her, the evil half sister and the verbally abusive ex-husband. Somewhere along the line she gave up caring for herself and for all intents and purposes she stopped living.
Enter the day of finalizing her divorce. Everything that can go wrong does and on top of all the embarrassment she is rescued by prince charming - a.k.a sexiest man alive and actor Kane Masters. Yeah, I told you it was a bit over the top. Just roll with it. I’m the last person to pretend that the romance books we read are in any way realistic, but to be perfectly honest and because I can't stress this enough you should read this book as a fairytale with deeper meaning.
Willow.
Oh Willow. She is a special character. Completely brainwashed and suppressed by her family, she is stuck in her head, unable to see the beauty in herself. I can’t lie, at times it is hard to see how badly she is treated and how little self-confidence she has left to find her way out of the downward spiral. It literally takes the prince in the shining armor for her to see the light. But once he appears she blooms.
Which leads us to the man. Kane Masters. He is a dreamy one. Obviously good looking, successful and lonely. Women throw themselves at him and yet he can't seem to find the one. That is until he meets the girl with the brown eyes.
What can I say? I guess the man is a pure figment of imagination. He always knows what to say and what to do. He literally is perfect. But don't hold it against him, Willow really needs a strong shoulder to lean on. I'm sure there were some minor flaws later on...yes, there must have been some. ;D
“When I look in the mirror, I won’t see the things they will most likely say about me. I’ll see me, Willow Tate, the woman who isn’t perfect, but she is perfect in her imperfections.”
Perfectly Imperfect was a good read for me. I was sucked in right from the start, just like watching a car crash in slow motion. Yes, that's exactly how messed up Willow's life is. I was immediately invested in the lovable, yet slightly awkward character and I devoured the rest of her story rather quickly.
Ms. Sloan has a nice writing style, hence her being my guilty pleasure author. She tells entertaining stories and this one fits that bill just like the ones I read before and on top of that it makes you think. In a world driven by superficial beauty and expectations it imperative to acknowledge the Willow within each and everyone of us and to make sure we live the life we want and not the one society expects us to. Willow alone makes this an exceptional read and a worthy one if you ask me.
**ARC very kindly provided by author in exchange for an honest review.
Excerpt
“Are you nervous right now?”
I nod.
“Tell me why.” His demand, steady and calm, gives me the courage I need to tell him. To open a vein and bleed my insecurities.
“I’m not perfect,” I whisper.
“And neither am I, Willow. I don’t want perfect. What so many see as perfect, to me, is fake. Perfect isn’t achievable naturally. No one, and I mean no one, is perfect.”
I’m shaking my head before he’s even done speaking, but one long finger comes up and presses against my lips before I can speak.
“No, let me finish. There isn’t beauty in perfection. It’s as fake as the image the word projects. Beauty is found in imperfection, Willow, because to admit you’re not perfect means you’re admitting you’re not whole and absolute. When I think of myself, I see someone willing to admit he’s as far from complete as it gets because, in order to get to that perfection, I need to find the other part of me who will make my life better. To take all the faults I have and fill them, and only then will I be there. You see, the way I see it, the only way to become perfect is to find that perfectly imperfect person who brings it out of you.”
When he stops, I swear I might have stopped breathing. How am I supposed to respond to that?
“Do you trust me?” he asks, his voice strong and sure.
“Yes, Kane. Nerves or not, I do.”
“Then let me show you what I see when I look at you.”
He brings his hands up, framing my face once again in a way I’m quickly becoming addicted to the feeling of. His warm eyes implore, begging me without words to let him continue. I do not intend to stop him, regardless of the butterflies currently taking over my system. I’m all in.
About the Author
Harper lives in small town Georgia just a short drive from her hometown of Peachtree City. She (and her 3 daughters) enjoy ruling the house they dubbed 'Estrogen Ocean', much to her husband’s chagrin. Harper has a borderline unhealthy obsession with books; you can almost ALWAYS find her with her eReader attached. She enjoys bad reality TV and cheesy romantic flicks. Her favorite kind of hero--the super alpha kind!
Harper started using writing as a way to unwind when the house went to sleep at night; and with a house full of crazy it was the perfect way to just relax. It didn't take long before a head full of very demanding alphas would stop at nothing to have their story told.
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