Julie Ortolon Just Perfect

Just Perfect

Julie Ortolon

Signet, Oct 2005, $6.99, 304 pp.

ISBN: 0451216881

Artist Maddy Mills, Dr. Christine Ashton, and Amy Baker, are elated for former college roommate Jane Redding, who has written a self-help book "How to have the Perfect Life". However, they become angry when they realize Jane used the trio as classic examples of how fear can destroy your life. Angry and feeling ridiculed, the threesome vow to prove little Ms. Perfect wrong by regaining the passion they lost when they allowed phobias to paralyze them.

Maddy has overcome her fears (see ALMOST PERFECT), and now it is Christine's turn. Her objective is to overcome her fear of heights by riding a ski lift with her ultimate goal being to gain her father's praise. Her new job should go a long way towards receiving his accolades. Search and rescue worker Alec Hunter agrees to provide Christine with skiing instructions. She assumes he is an unemployed ski bum, which angers him. When they work together to assist a snowboarding accident victim, they begin to fall in love, but her family thinks he is beneath her; to marry for love means giving up the job that would finally earn her daddy's praise.

The second Perfect tale is a fabulous contemporary, that uses comedy and romance to provide readers with deep messages: you can't earn love by living someone else's life, and don't let fears stop you from being yourself. Christine is a terrific protagonist struggling to gain daddy's approval, but never achieving the mark; she must choose between her father and Alec. Fans will hope she makes the right choice for her, which can only occur if she accepts that she will never be perfect to her dad, and almost is not good enough for him.