Review: The Most Improper Miss Sophie Valentine: Jayne Fresina

“Wanted: one husband, not too particular. Small dowry, several books, sundry furnishings, and elderly aunt included. Idlers, time-wasters, and gentlemen with other attachments need not apply.”

Scarred in a childhood accident, Sophia Valentine doesn’t expect any takers on her ad for a husband in the Farmer’s Gazette, until the mysterious Lazarus Kane shows up at her door. To Sophia, he is an exciting, enigmatic stranger. But Lazarus has known Sophia for years and has come a long way to find her. Things are about to get complicated for the mischievous Miss Valentine.

Series:
Release Date:  June 5, 2012
Publisher:  Sourcebooks
Source:  Provided by publisher, NetGalley
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Reviewer’s Thoughts:

I really, really, really wanted to love this one.  It wasn’t about a love affair between members of the aristocracy, but rather two commoners just trying to find the one person what would make them truly happy.  But this one fell a little short for me.

Sophie Valentine might as well walk around town with a scarlet letter sewn to her, since she’s fodder for village gossip, simply for being seen.   After she and her then beau were caught in flagrante delicto on the billiards table at a London party ten years prior, no one can let go of the past and have managed to cram a once vibrant and mischievous woman into spinster box demanding that she behave.

Enter Lazarus Kane.

Lazarus has an agenda and that includes finding the woman who placed the want ad the Farmer’s Gazette for a husband, who also happens to be the angel he fell in love with when he was fourteen in London.  Of course, Lazarus, like Sophie, is running from his past.  But Lazarus wants a fresh start to be the person he thought he would have been.

Sophie and Lazarus should have been the perfect couple, but to me, it seemed like they never truly connected with one another.  Instead of one “chasing” after the other, they entered into this weird contest to either ignore the other or to throw the attentions of the opposite sex in the challengers face.   We knew Lazarus has been in love with his “angel” since he was fourteen, so I would have assumed the man would have pursued her a little differently than he did.  More hearts and flowers or other displays of affection.

As for Sophie.  She frustrated me.  I’m not sure why a woman who was strong enough to jump over a ledge and run from the man she was intended to marry would allow herself to be talked down to and gossiped about.  I would have expected her to stand up for herself and be true to who she is, rather than let the her brother, sister-in-law and the townspeople dictate who she should be.

Some may enjoy this story more than I did, but for me I needed Sophie and Lazarus to be a bit truer to themselves.