Estimated read time: 1-2 minutes
This archived news story is available only for your personal, non-commercial use. Information in the story may be outdated or superseded by additional information. Reading or replaying the story in its archived form does not constitute a republication of the story.
A PERFECT DAY
By Richard Paul Evans
I look forward to every new Richard Paul Evans book like I do to a new David Baldacci or Anne Tyler. Richard got me with The Christmas Box and I’ve been hooked ever since. But as I started to read his latest bestseller, A Perfect Day, I thought – I really don’t like this guy at all.
Robert Harlan was a radio account executive who works his butt off at a job he barely likes and is repaid for his efforts by being fired. Then his loving wife, Allyson, encourages him to write the book he’s always longed to write. He does, and it’s a huge hit. That’s when I start to not like him. The success, the tours, the media interviews turn him into an egocentric idiot.
Just as I was about to give up on him and the book, something truly miraculous happens. I’d tell you what page it happens on but I don’t want you to turn straight to that page. The miraculous thing proceeds to suck Robert Harlan, and us the readers, right in and change everything – and in the end we wind up learning that the only reason we’re here at all is to love. Period.
Plus, Richard Paul Evans is such a wonderful writer. I love his lines like this, “It’s a peculiar character flaw to those of us from cold climates that we feel superior to those who have the sense to live elsewhere.”
You’ll love all the local references too, like to the Hotel Monaco, Hires Big H, RC Willey and Stephens’ Gourmet Cocoa, in Richard Paul Evans’ newest bestseller – A Perfect Day. On the Book Beat for KSL Newsradio 1160, I’m Amanda Dickson.
