Romantic escapism, a perfect feel-good, with a little bit of sadness book! Thank you to Netgalley and the author for the chance of an advance reading

Who doesn't love a wedding, and who doesn't love a wedding dress? Well there's plenty of both in this book!

The language of this novel is so beautifully crafted that you are drawn in from the word go, into a world of lace and satin and frippery. But there's no frippery about the underlying story, and it was a welcome surprise. Fran meets Rafael and their story unfolds, but it's not your classic boy meets girl chick lit saga. There's some real hard hitting moments in there, and at times it's not guaranteed that there will be a happy ending.

This book was a joy to read and I couldn't wait to get my wedding dress fix every day!

Fran sells wedding dresses but not just any dress, these are vintage or second hand. Each with a story and she matches them to the perfect bride. She just knows exactly what a bride needs not always what she wants but her own life is lacking love. After an incredible find, she may just get her own chance but is she ready?

Aww this was so lovely and I read it in one sitting. It's such a light read with a wonderful story. Yes it's obvious how it will end but I loved the build up. I loved the stories behind all the dresses. The writing is detailed and expressive, I could easily picture each dress. The ending was so utterly perfect and sweet too, I loved Fran, she has so much hope and love for what she does. You just want her to have her happy ending.

The Perfect Dress is a light, escapist romance with heart and quirk. If you like a good enemies-to-lovers story, you’ll like watching Fran and Rafe overcome their first impressions and stereotypes to get to know each other and, obviously, fall in love.

I enjoyed the unique angle of Fran finding unusual wedding dresses for her clients, though I wasn’t such a fan of the paranormal visions that accompanies her touching specific dresses. To me, this always feels like a bit of a cheat for wedging back story into the plot and forcing the pace along.

I’m not going to lie, I found Fran fairly annoying at times, most vividly when she first meets Rafe. She’s there as part of a house clearance, but very quickly becomes angry at his lack of enthusiasm – and, okay, rudeness – at her presence in a house that obviously holds some very painful memories. Where’s the empathy, Fran? He’s obviously in mourning – he’s not allowed to be withdrawn and suffering? She can also stray into being fairly judgemental when she’s making her observations about her clients and I wasn’t a fan of her superior-than-thou attitude in these instances, but they’re few and far enough between that it’s not a major criticism.
A cute, easy-to-read romance, but to me it fell a little flat.

A warm, cosy romantic read. Wonderfully descriptive with an intriguing story line,An.enchanting debut novel
.My thanks to Net Galley, the publisher and the author for allowing me to read an advance copy in exchange for an honest review.



.

'The Perfect Dress' is completely underrated. It just oozes with such warmth and coziness, I just couldn't put it down! I get that within a few chapters it does seem kind of cliche (like all romance novels do) and it's kind of obvious where it's going to go. But the way the story progresses is just lovely. There's a few twists that kept me on edge but at the same time it was a light read. I think what got me was the whimsical essence of the plot. Although Fran and her Whispering Dress shop didn't seem like my kind of thing because she was almost too day dreamy, I loved reading about how passionate she was about matching the right vintage dress to the right person based on its previous owner and its history.  Rafael, on the other hand, was the complete opposite. He was very rough and business-like. So it did take a while for me to actually like these characters but once their vulnerability was exposed, I did find comfort in them.

Overall, I really enjoyed this book. It's heartwarming and very magical. It's a cute little read!

Another shamelessly romantic read but well written if a bit whimsical in places.
The Whispering Dress is home to vintage wedding dresses lovingly collected by proprietor Fran who spends all her hours researching the provenance of each dress and lovingly finding the right match so that each bride to be has the perfect dress. Fran has clearly been hurt by love in the past and remains single. She is dotty, crazy, quirky and definitely not straight off the peg! She is one of a kind but charming and wise and yet very closed off to taking a risk and loving again.
Enter Rafe Colt, philanthropist and owner of the Colt Foundation, also damaged by the past and with a wayward sister very much in need of fixing. He is aloof, cool, brusque and yet there is something about him that pulls Fran in. They meet at one of Rafe's parents' mansions where there is a house clearance. By rescuing Rafe's mother's wedding dress there then ensues a story of putting the past to rights and in doing so coming to terms with history whilst striding out into the light of the future.
If you love a bit of romance (without any bodice ripping nonsense) then you are going to love this sweet, innocent book set in a surprising location. A dress shop and fashion fanatic does make for a change from the owners of tea rooms and beachside hotels!!!!

I’m a bit of a sucker for weddings. I really enjoyed planning mine, but I particularly loved flouncing around in beautiful dresses and pretending they were mine for a bit. In general I am 100% not into changing cubicles at shops, I always end up hot and flustered and struggle to get in and out of clothes. Sometimes I have to ask for help. One time I actually had to be cut out of a dress after the zip jammed (John Lennon Airport, June 2012, soft cotton, navy blue tea dress with white cat print). Trying on wedding dresses didn’t feel like that. Perhaps I was lucky with the shops I went to, but it felt like a delightful experience every time, and a bit of an adventure. I still follow some dress shops on facebook, and ogle their designs. I still think about the dresses I almost got but didn’t (White One Tango, with the bolero and Swiss dot tulle; Pronovias Berta, with the lace edging and swiss dot tulle; I really loved Swiss dot tulle, but didn’t actually get it – I need more occasions to wear fancy dresses so I can get a dress with Swiss dot tulle). Anyway, this is a tangent to say that basically this book description – about a woman who can pair the perfect dress to any bride, and who finds a dress that is perfect for her – absolutely ticked some boxes.

I adored the premise of the vintage dress shop, and of Fran being a woman obsessed with fashion, with a strange sort of psychic power that tells her the stories behind each dress and helps her to match the right dress to the right bride. The descriptions of the dresses and the stories behind them are all beautiful. Leaman clearly knows her stuff when it comes to clothes, and some of the dresses are described so vividly and richly. It’s so easy to picture them. I equally love how Fran always seems to dress in vintage too, her quirky and unusual style informed by her love of fashion history and a sense of whimsy rather than social convention. Rafael is the perfect romantic lead as well – tall, dark, handsome. Crunchy on the outside as he seems brusque and untouchable, but soft on the inside as he strives to ensure his family’s charity moves away from nepotism and wants to avoid being vulnerable.

Unfortunately, I didn’t quite get the chemistry between them. Or rather, I didn’t quite feel it as fast as they did, or with any sort of sustained pace. They go from intense attraction to “falling in love” extremely quickly, without having had any real conversations and mostly spent it arguing and apologising instead of finding common ground. Fran seemed to be Rafael’s manic pixie dream girl, wafting into his life full of bright colours and optimism, determined to teach him to feel again. I wasn’t entirely sure what he brought to the table, aside from judgemental comments and a big wallet.

That might be a little unfair. He’s clearly principled and kind, and willing to admit big mistakes. Unfortunately Fran isn’t willing to admit to mistakes either, and that was another issue I had. They meet at the clearance of his late mother’s house, when Fran finds a wedding dress by a long-dissolved, high end designer, known for evening dresses but not bridal wear. She knows the dress is worth a fortune, but after explaining this to Rafael, and he clearly stating that he understands but doesn’t want it or care, she keeps pushing until he snatches it off her and throws it in the skip.

She then comes back the next night and goes dumpster diving to try and retrieve it, only to get embroiled with drama between him and his drug-addict sister. From there they keep stumbling into each other, but every time they seem to make progress Fran massively oversteps her boundaries by pressing to know more about the wedding dress and Rafael’s mother. It’s clear that this is a sore subject, a deeply personal one, and one that is very unhappy. She’s known him ten minutes and cannot accept that she needs to respect his boundaries. While Rafael tended to explode every time she brought it up (which suggests volatility which ain’t a good look on a guy), I did see his point. When she goes behind his back to start digging up dirt with his sister after he refuses to answer I couldn’t believe it. When she asks him to take a romantic trip to Paris to meet a designer who holds answers without telling him why she wants to go, I could understand why he was narked. Especially since the designer had said he would come visit her in London in two weeks. Why was it so urgent? It wasn’t. It was a dress, one which needed fixing up anyway. Just… give it a rest will you?

My other gripe is that we never really see them addressing the issues which keep driving them apart. I mean, yes we explore Rafael’s traumatic childhood (which Fran keeps pushing him to share, while never offering up her own secret past which is definitely not anywhere near the same scale, until she causes more drama with that coming to light), and eventually exorcise Fran’s demons, but we never deal with the fact that they explode at each other rather than talk. With the fact that they storm off or split up instead of seeking resolutions. That’s not grounds for stable relationship. You don’t just go “Oh, here’s my trauma, but now I’ve told you why I’ve been weird we’ll never have any further problems!”

no problems.gif

Also: they have sex in a park, in Paris. Full on, strip naked sex. In a park. In the middle of Paris. Underneath a willow tree admittedly, but still guys, it was minutes (quoted in the book) from the busiest street in the city. That ain’t good. That ain’t right. Don’t do that. What about twigs. What about breezes. What about small children playing football.

These are all niggles which are very specific to me, however, and don’t let them put you off the book if these aren’t the sort of thing you’d generally notice. It’s a fun, fluffy and easy read, with fantastically luxurious descriptions – particularly of the dresses and the stories around them. I’d have loved more of those, more interactions with brides and their fun, unusual vintage dresses. Rafael is a textbook gorgeous romantic lead, and Fran is pretty cute as a protagonist. It was the perfect read while I was on holiday, even if it wasn’t 100% for me in the end.

Briefly:

- A cute, easy love story, with an added mystery and a little bit of subtle magic. A quirky girl and a stoic guy fall in love. The grumpy one is soft for the sunny one! Such a good trope.
- Where this book really shines is in the descriptions of all the wonderful dresses and the stories behind them, as well as the ways they transform the brides who wear them. It’s really uplifting, rich and charming.
- Don’t have sex in public parks guys. That’s not cool.
Rating: 3/5 – it’s an ideal holiday book, but it didn’t quite tick all the boxes needed to sweep me, personally, off my feet. There’s something cute and magical about it that might be just the ticket for others though.

I struggled a little with this. Although set in modern times, I found the writing style more suited for earlier times. The story was ok, but not really my cup of tea.

I really enjoyed this book, it was fun with lots of love but also sadness!

Fran owns her own Vintage wedding dress shop, called The Whispering Dress, she fits the dresses to certain brides, she knows which dress by what the brides to be tell her and also from what the dresses themselves tell her, afterall, they all have a story!

Raphael is a businessman, he is rude and and lives to work, he doesn’t believe in love and stays away from relationships.

When Fran finds a wedding dress, in a house clearance of a house Raphael owns, she asks him about its history, he is so rude to her and snatches the dress away and throws it in the skip!

What follows is two heartbroken people trying to get to know each other. Fran still wants to know the history of the dress and when she finds it out, it is exactly what she had imagined, a sad story and a dress that she doesn’t know if she could ever sell!

This book is full of Betrayal, heartbreak and letdowns, but underneath is the happiness and love of The Whispering Dress, it’s owner and a man who wants to believe in love!

I have to admit I winced when I started this book and found it was written in third person, present tense; I don’t particularly enjoy books written in the present tense no matter the narrator, but the storyline was intriguing enough I was able to set aside my prejudices to read the book. Fran, our heroine, was genuinely unique, the proprietor of a wedding dress shop who matches vintage bespoke gowns to brides. When she finds a valuable couture wedding gown at an estate clearance and clashes with the house’s owner, sparks fly.

I thoroughly enjoyed Fran, who was the main point of view character for most of the book. She was quirky and unique, sympathetic and empathetic in the way she worked to get to know each of her clients and find the perfect dress for them on their special day. She came across as judgemental and high-handed a couple of times, particularly with her last client, a reality TV starlet, but honestly she was a paragon of sweetness compared to Rafael, who came across as judgemental and high-handed all of the time, even to Fran herself. He makes it very obvious he thinks her business is basically a lot of woo-woo nonsense, even when the two of them are romantically involved, and I wanted to thump him upside the head any number of times and tell him to wise up.

This has an interesting premise even if, like me, you know absolutely nothing about fashion history and couture wedding gowns, but it came across as humourless and taking itself a bit too seriously, which not coincidentally is a description which exactly matches Rafael. The present tense really didn’t help. I’m giving it three stars because while it wasn’t bad, it just didn’t resonate with me at all.

Ahhhh, this book was so beautiful. Romantic fiction, but with a depth that made it a dream to read. Francesca Delaney has been hurt and where others may have become cynical, she chooses to believe in love and what better way to share this optimism than owning a wedding dress shop. The Whispering Dress is no ordinary shop though. Fran only chooses dresses that have a history and she researches each gown meticulously so she can match the perfect dress to the bride to be. Dresses that bring out the best in the person wearing them. But when she discovers a rare vintage dress worth thousands, she is set to be challenged like never before. The dress brings with it a dark sadness, also reflected in Rafael Colt whose mother wore the dress, and her mother before her. Fran wants to know more about where the sadness comes from and delves deeper into the past. And by doing so she is destined to cross paths with the misanthrope Rafael, who against all odds, allows her to open her heart once more. As Rafael forces her to face her past, she brings an irresistible joy to his life that he has never before found, and after many bumps in the road, they finally get their happy ever after.

This is a wonderful novel! A story you can sink into and disappear into the world of romance and wedding dresses - and it's not nearly as cheesy as I've just made it sound!

Francesca Delaney owns The Whispering Dress; a wedding boutique with a difference. Each dress is quite unique - a bit like the patron. Careful sourcing and selling of each item is a skill which few possess, and on one such a quest Fran meets Rafael - grumpy and rude in the extreme - so why can't she get him out of her head?

The basis of the story is quite enchanting and I loved it! The characters are bursting with personality, the writing is attention grabbing and the individual tales about the dresses are quite mesmerising. Beautiful from first to last and I couldn't pick fault even if I wanted to. For a debut novel, this is a stunning accomplishment, so very different from others I've read and I fully recommend it without any hesitation whatsoever. Five glowing stars!

My thanks to publisher Transworld Digital for my copy via NetGalley. This is my honest, original and unbiased review.

The perfect Dress is a charming sweet romantic tale that will delight fans of this type of fiction. Our heroine of the hour is Fran, quirky and quite bonkers, owner of the Whispering Dresses bridal shop. This is no ordinary bridal shop however as each vintage dress is lovingly matched, by Fran, to each bride to be, taking into account their personalities etc. I think it helps if you suspend all belief in reality when you start reading this book otherwise you might find Fran slightly irksome!! She painstakingly works out the provenance of each dress, believing the fabric to tell its own story and delves into the lives of previous owners hence the idea of whispering dresses. Her possible knight in shining armour is the dark and brooding Rafe Colt, part of a wealthy aristocratic family who turned to philanthropy in later years, founding a charity he now heads. Their worlds collide when Fran first meets Rafe at a house clearance and discovers a wonderful wedding dress previously worn by his grandmother and passed onto his mother. The dress has a troubled history and is at the heart of this ‘will they won’t they fall in love and live happily ever after’ tale and it is clear both Fran and Rafe have commitment issues for very different reasons.
This was an easy,lighthearted whimsical read made more appealing by the quirky nature of Fran’s character. The author’s descriptions of the dresses transport you into Fran’s dreamy world so you can almost imagine being there with her, believing the stories woven around these beloved outfits. Suitable for die hard romantics, you know exactly what you are getting when you pick up this book. Whilst not one that will remain in my consciousness for long (which I don’t think is expected anyway!) I think it is perfect for a lazy Sunday afternoon read. Thank you as always to the author and publisher and Netgalley for allowing me to read in exchange for an honest review.

I was offered a copy of this book from Netgalley and the Publisher. I loved the sound of the plot, as it was original and different.
I really enjoyed reading about the wedding dresses and their histories. It was very interesting.
I did not warm to the characters very much, I did not think that the romance between Fran and Rafael was very realistic or romantic.
Unfortunately I did not like this book as much as I hoped that I would.

My thanks to Random House U.K./Transworld Digital for an eARC via NetGalley of Louisa Leaman’s ‘The Perfect Dress’ in exchange for an honest review.

Francesca (Fran) Delaney is the owner of an unusual bridal shop. Whispering Dresses sells vintage bespoke wedding dresses and Fran takes pride in matching each dress to the right bride. She takes great care in investigating the background of each dress in her collection.

She attends a house clearance at a posh though decaying country retreat and discovers a stunning 1950s designer wedding gown that has been cast aside in a wardrobe. In seeking to learn more about the history of the dress she encounters Rafael, the dishy yet troubled son of its last wearer.

Even though Fran and Rafael initially clash and there are obstacles to a relationship as both are quite broken people, this is a romance and so it was lovely to just relax and enjoy their journey.

This story had a personal dimension for me as I have a close friend who used to visit estate sales and the like seeking vintage clothing. As my wedding approached she gave me an ivory vintage Edwardian tea dress that she felt would be perfect as my wedding dress. It was exquisite and remains full of meaning for me.

This was a sweet story that lightened up my weekend. I loved the detailed descriptions of the vintage dresses and their histories. The Instagram influencer seeking a ‘knockout’ wedding dress was comedy gold.

While I don’t often read romance fiction, finding such a delightful whimsical story like this was such a treat.

Loved this novel, possibly because I read it as I look forward to wearing my own “perfect dress” shortly. Beautiful and vivid descriptions of wedding dresses over the years make this novel come to life. Very suitably for a novel about love and weddings there is a hint of tragedy and a sprinkling of magic. Very enjoyable read, especially for brides to be!!

A nice, easy read with some romance. Set in a second-hand wedding shop Leaman does a great job describing all of the dresses although the "visions" are slightly hard to believe. A bit predictable but it has enough twists to keep your interest. A perfect holiday read as it's light and uncomplicated!

A beautiful,sweet,feel good book, all based around wedding dresses. It is a well written book that is also an easy read.
Thank you to both NetGalley and Transworld Publishers for my eARC in exchange for my review

I do enjoy a romantic book once in a while and this provides all the schmaltz you need and more. The book was well written and sweet.