Review
This was a very strange book in some ways, one of the main plot twists which is not really mentioned in the synopsis is given away in the first few pages, I was intrigued and haven’t read anything like it before.
I didnt hate this book but I didnt love it, I read it quickly as I wanted to know the ending which I didnt guess and probably should have.
So if you want something a little futuristic, this book may be for you. I cant say much more without mentioning spoilers I am afraid.

Rated 3/5

Thanks to Net Galley for an advanced copy of this book in return for an honest review

This was a fascinating psychological thriller with a sci-fi theme. It also touched on so many topics such as autism, marriage issues etc. The many twists in the plot were great and kept me guessing what was going to happen next. I also like the retelling from the different perspectives. Well worth a read.

Well, am not sure what to say about this, it certainly was interesting and nothing like I've ever read before. The storyline was fab as were the real characters.. I'm just not convinced about robots! I've a feeling this will be a 'marmite' book

The Perfect Wife.
by JP Delaney

2 stars

What started out as an interesting drama slowly fizzled, with two interesting twists right at the end.

Abbie wakes in a hospital bed with no memory of how she got there. The man by her side explains that he's her husband. He's a titan of the tech world, the founder of one of Silicon Valley's most innovative startups. He tells Abbie she's a gifted artist, a doting mother to their young son, and the perfect wife.

The further you read, the harder read it becomes.

#ThePerfectWife #NetGalley

Abbie wakes in a hospital bed to discover everything she thinks she knows to be true is wrong. She’s an AI who’s been created by her tech genius husband using memories of the real Abbie, who died five years before. As she struggles to come to terms with her life, Abbie starts to question everything she’s been told. But when she has no rights, who can she trust? Suspense, twists and moral quandaries abound in this skilful thriller.

WOW. What an incredible book....very hard to define it - psychological thriller, domestic thriller, scifi...it could come under any of those genres.. Either way it made for compulsive reading. Exciting, different, clever, sensitive , entertaining, gripping - I could go on and on but to truly appreciate it you have to read it - and read it I did, in ONE sitting. I've always enjoyed JP Delaney's writing and his stories but with THE PERFECT WIFE he has surpassed himself and then some. It will stay with me a long time and has given me many things on which to ponder. Highly recommended. My brain is still fizzing! Thanks go to NetGalley for the ARC.

Abbie wakes in a hospital bed with no memory of how she got there. The man by her side explains that he's her husband. He's a titan of the tech world, the founder of one of Silicon Valley's most innovative startups. He tells Abbie she's a gifted artist, a doting mother to their young son, and the perfect wife. Five years ago, she suffered a terrible accident. Her return from the abyss is a miracle of science, a breakthrough in artificial intelligence that has taken him half a decade to achieve. As Abbie pieces together memories of her marriage, she begins questioning her husband's motives - and his version of events.

So, this kind of book is not normally my thing, I do not read much about artificial intelligence, but seeing as this was written by Delaney, of course I wanted to read it. Oh my goodness am I glad I did. This is essentially a thriller, a really twisting, creepy thriller, but has a side note of artificial intelligence, quite a big side note mind you, but you will see what I mean by reading this.

I promise that you can absolutely suspend disbelief and just enjoy the thriller that Delaney has written. I adored getting to know Abbie and her family and following her as she fights for the truth is incredibly absorbing. Of course, if nothing else, Delaney has written an incredibly unique thriller which ensures for refreshing reading. As a side note to the above, I have recently read 'Machines Like Me' by Ian McEwan showing artificial intelligence is moving into mainstream books.

'The Perfect Wife' is full of tension throughout, I was on the edge of my seat trying to figure out the truth and Delaney just keeps throwing in the twists, some are more obvious than others and the ones that took me by surprise, really took my breath away. Autism is another essential theme to this book that runs throughout and I loved how Delaney uses this against artificial intelligence to draw on any similarities or differences, I will not be more specific as I do not want to ruin the read, but it is very clever and thought-provoking and I really enjoyed these two themes together.

Character wise, I really hooked onto Abbie, I was a bit surprised by this, but Delaney has really captured the difficulties she faces and the way she navigates her way through her new life. Tim is another strong character, and one just brimming with surprises, it was intriguing to follow him and try and figure out what is going on inside his head.

'The Perfect Wife' is a thriller with a difference and I urge you to give this a go if you are unsure. Delaney has written a refreshing thriller that will get you thinking as well as having you guessing the truth the whole way through this twisting, chilling thriller.

Thank you to NetGalley and Quercus Books for an advance copy.

This is an extraordinary book that is truly deserving of the psychological thriller description. It is thought-provoking and intelligent as well as being hugely entertaining.

Abbie wakes from a coma with no memory of how she came to be in a hospital bed. Her husband greets her and she quickly learns the shocking truth; that she is a cobot, designed to replace his much-loved wife who dies in a tragic accident. This means that she looks like his first wife, talks like his first wife and is expected to think like his first wife. Her husband is Tim, the hugely successful Silicon Valley techie who has created her and just wants his perfect wife back where she belongs. She returns with him to their house and autistic child Danny, and gradually she realises that the perfect life is simply a facade.
The fact that their son is autistic was far more than a plot device. His condition and Abbie's ability to communicate with him opened up ideas about emotions and cognitive abilities and whether AI can be humane. The book raises some really interesting ideas about what it means to be human and to have a soul. The idea that cobots could replace certain roles in society is not so farfetched that I didn't shiver at the ethical and moral implications of this.
The book has a slower pace than other psychological thrillers I have read recently. This really works to create a creeping sense that nothing and no-one is as it appears as Abbie begins to realise that her predecessor was as trapped as she is. The pace does pick up towards the close of the book where there are some fantastic reveals that I was not expecting.

It's an amazing read and my thanks go to the publishers and Net Galley for the advanced copy in return for an honest review.

Oh my Gosh, I loved this book.
Stepford Wives for the modern era!

Abbie wakes up from some kind of accident... but is immediately hold by her millionaire tech husband that she is a robot, a form of artificial intelligence created after the death of ‘The Real Abbie’. AI Abbie tries to fit into her new role but soon the press find out about her and some people are not happy with her being allowed to walk around pretending to be a dead woman. Abbie starts to doubt her husband’s motives for creating the AI machine and does her own investigation into what really happened to the ‘Real Abbie’, with startling results.

This was like an awesome thriller with sci fi thrown in. It was great. I found myself empathising with this empathetic robot and wanting to see her come out on top.

I love the switching narratives, especially the 2nd person narration for Robot Abbie - I have huge respect for writers who create second person narratives and especially those that do it well and effectively.

I’m not a tech genius at all so a lot of this flew over my head and I can’t say whether it was actually believable or not. The Autism Danny has however, to me was very accurate. Having grown up in a household with an autistic brother, I can vouch for a lot of what Abbie experiences with Danny, and while it isn’t the same for everyone, I think the author did a great job in highlighting this point.

I’ve read some reviews where people are unhappy with the idea of sex robots. To those people I ask, did you actually read the book? Because the whole point of this AI Abbie was definitely not sex...

I received and ARC of this book from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

I don’t know what I was expecting, but it wasn’t this. I love J P Delaney’s books, and I think this might be the best of the lot.

Five years after Abbie was in a devastating accident, her husband Tim has done the impossible and brought her back. But why? And can she trust everything he’s telling her, or even her own memories?

At first, with the mention of robotics and AI, I thought it wasn’t for me, as I’m not a huge science-fiction fan. But this isn’t really science fiction, it is frighteningly plausible. An incredibly original idea, devastating and clever and tricky and twisty. I was utterly gripped by this brilliant thriller. Wow, and wow again.

Abbie wakes up in a hospital bed to find that she dies 5 years ago and has been ‘brought back’ by her tech guru husband as an advanced breakthrough in artificial intelligence, a robot capable of feelings and having most of the memories of the original Abbie.

As Abbie reconnects with her husband and son, she tries to fill in the gaps of her memory and come to terms with what she now is. An anonymous text and a hidden iPad urge her to look deeper into her past; beginning with, how exactly did she die? Will she ever be able to live up to Abbie? Or is she in fact #ThePerfectWife now she is an android?

Twisty and suspenseful, I tore through this book. The ending took a few reads to completely understand, but I didn’t mind. A futuristic thriller with a plot to get your teeth into, which I highly recommend.

Thank you to #NetGalley and the publisher for my free advance copy in return for an unbiased review.

I have read and enjoyed J P Delaney's previous books and loved those so I had high expectations of this. It did not disappoint! Fascinating premise and story line, brilliant writing. This book is fantastic and will have you hooked.

There's an intriguing hook to this book which mixes an artificial intelligence (AI) edge to a more conventional domestic thriller as a memory-deficient cobot-wife turns investigator into her creepy marriage and unpleasant husband.

The AI element has been treated with more philosophical sophistication elsewhere (The Machine, Cloud Atlas) and this 'popular' version is more concerned with unearthing the mysteries of 'was she murdered?'. Lots of family stuff here, especially around the parenting of an autistic child. And it's hard to understand quite why Abbie or indeed any woman would fall for and marry such an unpleasant man as her husband Tim...

It's quite amusing as Abbie plugs herself into something to 'download' memories and it's super-weird (though relevant) that, like Barbie, she has no sex organs, is just smooth... Her narrative voice, though, never sounds like a 'cobot', even one that has advanced empathy skills programmed in: she's just a standard variation on the domestic thriller where a new wife gets suspicious about what happened to the first wife and her mysterious death and wonders how far she can trust her husband given her dodgy memory...

So some interesting frames about humanity, identity, gender and power, but they're subservient to a plot that runs on longer than it needs to - shorter and snappier would have been better.

J. P. Delaney is the pseudonym of a writer Tony Strong who has previously published best selling fiction under his own name. This is the 3rd book I have read by this author and found this met the previous high standards of 'Believe me' which I also thoroughly enjoyed.
The main character Abbie wakes in a hospital bed with no memory of how she got there. The man by her side explains that he's her husband. He is a titan of the tech world and the founder of one of Silicon Valley's most innovative startups. He tells Abbie she's a gifted artist, a doting mother to their young son, and the perfect wife.
Five years ago, she suffered a terrible accident. Her return from the abyss is a miracle of science, a breakthrough in artificial intelligence that has taken him half a decade to achieve.
But as Abbie pieces together memories of her marriage, she begins questioning her husband's motives and his version of events. Can she trust him when he says he wants them to be together for ever? And what really happened to her, half a decade ago?

I really enjoyed this one, a mystery thriller with a difference and the twists and turns will catch you out. I found myself re-reading the last chapters to fully take in the twists. Excellent read.
I would like to thank both Net Galley and Quercus Books for supplying copy of this novel in exchange for an honest review.

I loved, loved, loved this book. Its unique and original storyline kept me enthralled throughout. I have read all of JP Delaney's books and this is just as good as the others. I whole heartedly recommend it, you certainly won't be disappointed.

Another tense twisty thriller by this author which I thoroughly enjoyed. I would highly recommend this book to anyone & look forward to reading more by this author.

If I could turn back time to read The Perfect Wife afresh again I really would - I loved it. It’s an interesting concept; a robot as a replacement for a missing (presumed dead) wife. It could sound like perfection to some, but technician Tim takes it a level further in A.I. Abbie, making a ‘cobot’ capable of hosting his wife’s memories and feelings, turning the machine into so much more. And asking the question. ‘What makes us human?’ When does A.I. become more than a series of coding? I did feel as uncomfortable as Abbie when she was treated more as a commodity, a thing devoid of rights and personal respect.

The Perfect Wife raised lots of interesting questions and I enjoyed being challenged in my beliefs. I’m not sure if this was Delaney’s intention, but that was my reaction to the story.

Like Delaney’s previous novels it felt quite carefully crafted, weaving through two narratives that always kept me wanting to read just another page (or twenty). The plot is handled like David Bowie turning that ball through his fingers in Labyrinth*, twisting and turning its way through the characters and the pages they inhabit. The perfectness that Tim creates with Abbie is simultaneously at odds with his son, Danny, who has Heller’s syndrome, a profound form of autism. It was insightful for ‘Abbie’ to find a way to communicate with Danny - finding a logical way to decipher what he meant by his repetition of phrases from Thomas the Tank Engine to convey what he wanted for breakfast. I liked the positive way that this showed Danny’s autism; that perhaps Tim was the failure for not seeing what his son was trying to communicate. That in trying to mould Danny through an extreme version of the ABA Protocol and the quite unpalatable school that he placed Danny in, he failed to just ‘be’ with his son. Whether this was as a result of him thinking that perfection in a person can be obtained, or in just wanting the best for his son, is another question waiting for us to debate.

There are so many things just itching to be discussed! But needless to say, this is one of those books that you just won’t be able to put down. I absolutely loved it from beginning to end.

The Perfect Wife is out on 8th August 2019 from Quercus Books - don’t miss it!

I know it wasn’t Bowie himself manipulating the crystal ball, but you get my meaning!

tones of west world brought to life on the pages of this interesting thriller, combining different threads to pull together tot a shocking ending. One of the best reads of the year

Absolutely loved this book! I love psych thrillers and I love a bit of sci-fi, and this was like Sleeping with the Enemy meets Before I Go to Sleep meets Frankenstein! A brilliantly original take on the usual domestic noir storyline, compelling characters and expertly plotted. Highly recommended.

Sorry, just couldn't get to grips with this book. Sure it will appeal to others, but I always deliver an honest appraisal and gave up after only 16%. Just didn't grab me.