Etiquette and Espionage

Summary: It’s one thing to learn to curtsy properly. It’s quite another to learn to curtsy and throw a knife at the same time. Welcome to Finishing School.

Fourteen-year-old Sophronia is a great trial to her poor mother. Sophronia is more interested in dismantling clocks and climbing trees than proper manners–and the family can only hope that company never sees her atrocious curtsy. Mrs. Temminnick is desperate for her daughter to become a proper lady. So she enrolls Sophronia in Mademoiselle Geraldine’s Finishing Academy for Young Ladies of Quality.

But Sophronia soon realizes the school is not quite what her mother might have hoped. At Mademoiselle Geraldine’s, young ladies learn to finish…everything. Certainly, they learn the fine arts of dance, dress, and etiquette, but they also learn to deal out death, diversion, and espionage–in the politest possible ways, of course. Sophronia and her friends are in for a rousing first year’s education.

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Review: 4 stars

I wanted to read this for a while and waited for three weeks to get my copy as it was on hold at the e-book library. I love spy and crime books and con artists intrigue me. I did not know that this book also had some paranormal creatures and it, which was an added bonus. In addition to all that, it is also a steampunk novel, which I typically don’t like, but I actually really enjoyed that aspect in this novel. The inventions are explained well enough to understand their purpose, but not overly so that I found it dull. This is a blend of many genres, which at times I felt like it was trying to do too many things in one book.

The beginning I found a bit slow moving. To pick up around the middle, and want to pick up I found myself really enjoying it. It is a very humorous trade and I really enjoyed the characters. I feel as if the first book had a lot of world building to do, so the rest of the series might be better than this one. It didn’t have an intricate plot and really developed the setting and characters instead. I did find that at times it couldn’t hold my interest as I felt like I was trying to mash too many genres together. I did really enjoy the characters and the idea behind the book so I will return for the rest of the series.