Love, Lies, and Spies by Cindy Anstey

Summary (from Goodreads):

Juliana Telford is not your average nineteenth-century young lady. She’s much more interested in researching ladybugs than marriage, fashionable dresses, or dances. So when her father sends her to London for a season, she’s determined not to form any attachments. Instead, she plans to secretly publish their research.

Spencer Northam is not the average young gentleman of leisure he appears. He is actually a spy for the War Office, and is more focused on acing his first mission than meeting eligible ladies. Fortunately, Juliana feels the same, and they agree to pretend to fall for each other. Spencer can finally focus, until he is tasked with observing Juliana’s traveling companions . . . and Juliana herself.

Review:

This is the perfect book to take outside and read at the lake. My mom and I had a very tiresome day of getting our nails done and buying flowers. Taking this book out to the lake, while my mom read her newspaper was just pure happiness at the end of a purely relaxing vacation day. It was also a good book to finish on my plane back to reality.

This author pays serious homage to Jane Austen. It was reminiscent of Mansfield Park, Northanger Abbey, and Emma.  Yet, it was also kind of silly and not too plausible. It’s kind of like this super sweet combination of Jane Austen and Meg Cabot. And ahh, can you think of a better summer read combination?

It was fun getting the guy’s perspective too. You don’t normally get the guy’s point of view in a regency romance.  Double bonus points for the guy being a spy and also being interested in women who are unique, intelligent, and independent. There’s so much witty banter and back and forth dialog, that I was practically smiling during my whole reading.

The one thing I didn’t like about this book was how lightly it seemed to take seriously dangerous situations. It wasn’t just about going for carriage rides and making societal blunders. Those carriage rides were with someone who kept trying to get Juliana alone to molest her (or worse). And Juliana kept ignoring this detail…

Everything else about this book was light, British, romantic, and rather innocent. There was just this one creeper in the background. Well of course, there was the spying stuff too. That was about a certain family giving information it shouldn’t to France. This was also super interesting. It did mostly take the sidelines to the teas, balls, and entering into society plotlines. Everything magically seemed to flow well together too.

I loved the main character. I loved the guy. I never fully loved any of the side characters. Her uncle was pretty great. But his greatness kind of just shows up out of nowhere at the end, in his helping to make everything end okay. The two romantic leads more than make up for the less interesting side characters though.

All in all, this had a few flaws, but was really just pure joy to read. It’s the perfect beach book, especially for Austen fans. I give it a 9/10.