Almost everything can be bought, but not the perfect man

Synopsis

Meet Annie Valentine: stylish, savvy, multi-tasker extraordinaire. As a personal shopper in a swanky London store, Annie can be relied on to solve everyone’s problems . . . except her own.

Because as a busy single mum to two kids, Annie’s realised there’s a gap in her life as well as her wardrobe. But with her heart still hurting from losing the love of her life, Annie’s discovered that finding the perfect partner is turning out to be so much trickier than finding the perfect pair of shoes!

Can she source a genuine classic? A lifelong investment? Or will Annie realise that her perfect man is already sitting on the front row of her life…

My review

Annie Valentine is a single mom, working as a personal shopper in a fancy store in London. It doesn’t matter who her clients are, she always manages to find the right things.
But being a single mom isn’t an easy task, and while she is still heartbroken after losing the love of her life, she realizes that it’s time to find someone new to fill that gap in her heart again.
However, where do you find that perfect man, that not only can make her happy again, but also her children and why not, also be financially very stable…
Or is her perfect man not the one that ticks her boxes, but closer than she thinks?

As I am expected to be very honest in my reviews, I had to admit that I wasn’t always truly really liking Annie.
While she is very good at her job, and doing her utterly best as a single mother to Lauren and Owen, I sometimes felt that her focus was only on making more money.
But obviously, getting to know and her situation better, I could understand where she was coming from.

Being a single mother isn’t easy, especially when you wat to give your children the world and aren’t able to…
So my opinion of her of being money – focused shifted into the opinion of a mother doing whatever she can to make her children happy. But I also saw that while trying to keep ahead of everything, she was losing the control she tried to keep.
And let’s not forget that she still isn’t over losing the father of her children…

Talking about the children… they both have the typical difficulties that are paired with their ages. Lauren is maybe being pulled on the wrong side by her friends, and is being the stubborn teenager everyone expects her to be.
And Owen, oooh my heart went out to him! Initially he was  a very closed character, not talking much, and not having many friends.
But thanks to his teacher who shows him the magic of music, we see Owen opening up more. how lovely to read those bits!

It wasn’t very clear what happened with the children’s father, and I initially thought he just left. I didn’t see that kind of revelation coming, and it broke my heart, because of the injustice. So much more made sense after as a reader we know about the past.

I’m not going to talk a lot about Annie and her pursuit of finding the perfect man. Of course that is the main theme of this story, but I want you to discover it yourself. Even if I didn’t agree with the initial man of her choice, there are many funny moments that made me laugh out loud, and also bits that proved me right about my gut feelings.
And let me just add, never underestimate the attraction of teachers!

What I liked about this story is that it shows us that no matter how posh someone seems to be, we never know what happens behind the façade.
While Annie seems to know everything what someone needs, she is obviously struggling with her own home situation. She is learning the hard way that not everything goes according to plan and love is not something you find by making a list with all your requirements.

This was a lovely read about the struggles of a family, a mother trying to do the right thing, but as it appears, she is doing the wrong thing for the right reasons.
By seeing the mistakes, and being almost forced to do the unthinkable, it is possible to overcome grief and look for the thing you truly need, what isn’t always what you think you want.