Your Perfect Year: A Novel

Written by Charlotte Lucas

Narrated by Carly Robins and P.J. Ochlan

A man consumed by a meaningless life is going to do something he’s never considered doing before. He’s going to enjoy the day…

For hyper-particular publishing heir Jonathan Grief, the day starts like any other—with a strict morning fitness regimen that’ll keep his divorced, easily irritated, cynical, forty-two-year-old self in absolutely flawless physical condition. But all it takes to put a crimp in his routine is one small annoyance. Someone has left a leather-bound day planner with the handwritten title Your Perfect Year in his spot on his mountain bike at his fitness course!

Determined to discover its owner, Jonathan opens the calendar to find that someone known only as “H.” has filled it in with suggestions, tasks, and affirmative actions for each day. The more he devotes himself to locating the elusive H., the deeper Jonathan is drawn into someone else’s rich and generous narrative—and into an attitude adjustment he desperately needs.

He may have ended up with a perfect year by accident, but it seems fate has set Jonathan on a path toward healing, feeling, and maybe even loving again…if only he can meet the stranger who’s changing his life one day at a time.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Brilliance Audio
• Translator: Alison Layland
• Release date: Nov 1, 2019
• ISBN: 9781799748953

Charlotte Lucas

Charlotte Lucas is the pseudonym of Wiebke Lorenz. Born and raised in Düsseldorf, she studied German, English, and media studies at Trier University and now lives in Hamburg. In collaboration with her sister, she has written more than a dozen bestselling novels under the pseudonym Anne Hertz. In Your Perfect Year Charlotte embarks on a search for the answers to the large and small questions of life.

Reviews for Your Perfect Year

[Deyse Borges · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

The male narrator is terrible. Couldnt listen tô the book

[Barbara Wolfe · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

It ran long and seemed to drag in places. There were some endearing characters, like Leo. The plot would periodically take unexpected twists which kept me listening. Otherwise it ended pretty much as you expected when it started.

[Jennifer O'Kelly · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I liked the story and the writing better than the narration. It’s a style thing and perhaps, a bit of a tone thing… With two narrators it’s jarring when the sound quality shifts from one to the other and some of the characterizations were so over-the-top it was distracting.

[hcnewton · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

This originally appeared at The Irresponsible Reader as part of a Quick Takes Catch-up post, emphasizing pithiness, not thoroughness.---Ugh. A few years ago I was in the middle of a “I need to read more ‘General Fiction” kick and saw an advertisement (or something) for this—it wasn’t on a blog, I know that much. Something about the description appealed to me, and I got a good Whispersync deal, so the audio and ebook versions sat around since. I wanted to go through the ebook rather than the audio initially—but never seemed to find the time. But I finally broke down and just wanted to get it finished, it’s been calling to me for so long.I should have held off a little (or a lot) longer. This book didn’t work for me in just about every imaginable way. Within a chapter or two you could see how the whole thing was going to go—including the “big surprise twist”. This is fine if the ride’s enjoyable. But it really wasn’t. The comedy wasn’t all that funny. The drama felt contrived (it’s fiction—all of it is contrived, I realize—but there’s “contrived” and there’s “feeling contrived”). The introspection and self-discovery really didn’t click for me, either.The best thing I can say about it is that the arc of the publisher of only captial-L Literature and noteworthy Non-Fiction discovering the value and appeal of popular fiction was pleasant (and I just spoiled that…oops). A little self-serving for the writer of popular fiction, but I’m not going to criticize that.Just pass on this one.

[penny_l-1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The book description and cover make this seem like a light chick lit read. But, it is not.I loved the story concept, and initially thought this would be a warm and feel good type novel. But for the most part, it's not.The characters are battling lots of issues in this book. The aftermath of suicide, dementia, cancer and a failing business just to name a few.Written from two alternating points of view, Hannah - who filled out the daily planner and John - the man who found it, the story builds around the events that led to the making of the planner and the journey taken to find it's owner.The story is slow paced with lots of detail. There may be a bit here and there that got lost in translation. But overall, it was very well written with interesting characters and quite a few good twists.Even though this book was not what I initially expected, I found it to be a really good read.

[bookczuk · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

May have been someone's perfect, but it wasn't mine. Freebie from Amazon.

[sunnydrk · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

An unexpectedly good book that got me "journalling" and how to be engaged with life...Jonathan is rich and stuck in a meaningless life, until he finds a dayplanner on his bike. As he sets off to find the owner, he realizes that he is starting to enjoy his life.