A Perfect Proposal
Sophie Apperly has spent her whole life pleasing others– but when she realises her family see her less as indispensable treasure and more as general dogsbody, she decides she’s had enough. So when an old friend offers her the chance of a lifetime, she decides to swap Little England for the Big Apple, and heads off to the land of opportunity.
From the moment Sophie hits the bright lights of Manhattan she’s determined to enjoy every minute of her big adventure. And when fate throws her together with Matilda, a spirited grande dame of New York society who invites her to Connecticut for Thanksgiving, she willingly accepts. English-born Matilda is delighted with her new friend – though her grandson Luke, undeniably attractive but infuriatingly arrogant, is anything but welcoming.
When Luke arrives in England a few weeks later, Sophie hardly expects him to seek her out, but Matilda has hatched some complicated plans of her own– and so Luke has a proposal to make…
Sophie comes across at the start of the book as a complete dogsbody who her family take for granted and uses to keep their own lives running. I found her goody two shoes routine quite irritating at the start, even down to her constant keeping busy whilst looking after ‘Evil Uncle Eric’! That aside her character does start to grow on you and I found myself rather enjoying the story as things moved along – which they do so at a swift pace. Whilst in New York, which the overall summary leads you to believe is where most of the book is set but is in fact a relatively short part of the overall story; Sophie has a chance meeting with a rich elderly lady by the name of Matilda and her grandson Luke. Luke is not a particularly likeable character and acts for the most part like a sullen schoolboy, however he does somewhat redeem himself by the end! Matilda on the other hand is a superb character, not to be underestimated and certainly manages to engineer situations in a very clever manner. Sophie starts to come into her own and is an interesting and likeable character as the story unfolds, with a very practical side to her nature which she puts to good use during her excursion around the countryside with Luke!
A few nice touches and turns, round the story off in a clean if somewhat predictable manner.
Verdict: Reasonably predictable in places, your fairly typical ‘girl meets boy’ storyline, it was nonetheless an enjoyable story punctuated with some interesting and humorous characters. Not one I would rush to re-read or necessarily keep though.
Reviewed by Jane
