A review by nata2c_here
A Proper Charade by Esther Hatch

3.0

Well, I never would have picked this one up if it weren’t for a few bookstagram posts mention that it was funny, sweet and clean, which it was all those things, but it was also full of improbabilities. If I was rating this on being cleverly written or historically plausible it would get one star. My suspension of disbelief was severely challenged throughout. I had to think of it as an alternate, parallel universe as opposed to an actual, historical England. If you’ve read and love literature by the Brontes or Austen, or if you’ve watched PBS’s Manor House, or even Downton Abbey, you would know that this story is not possible. Therefore, I probably wouldn’t recommend it in general, but I read it in a day without skimming in anger, so I can’t say I didn’t like it. I just keep hoping to find something as delicately crafted as Pride and Prejudice and so every once in a while I fall for that “for fans of Pride and Prejudice” line, but just because it is clean and set in a Georgian or Victorian era with a romantic plot does not make it “like Pride and Prejudice”. It’s fine. I’ll probably just go reread the real deal again soon.