Book Review: Most Ardently Yours
Most Ardently Yours by Freya Sampson will be released in the United States on July 7, 2026.
Zoe Knight is not quite living her dream as an aspiring writer. She’s given up on writing her own romance novel, but she still devours romance books all the time, even if she doesn’t feel confident enough to write them any longer. As the book begins, her a-hole ex-boyfriend is being celebrated for writing a literary novel. She spends her days as a waitress at a Great Expectations-literary-themed café, until some excitement enters her life the day she steals a mysterious copy of Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice from a grumpy bookstore owner named Nick (yes, he also happens to be hot with misguided taste in literature). Zoe has no clue why Nick even had one of the best romantic novels of all time at his bookstore, when he said he refuses to sell romances and doesn’t believe in happily ever afters…
A hint of literary magic is sprinkled over Zoe’s life after she reads aloud from Pride and Prejudice, magical edition, and the next day, a man who claims to be Fitzwilliam Darcy, dressed in full Regency-era clothing, shows up at the café where she works. Intending to take him to the hospital, instead she can’t resist spending some time with him. Lots of funny hijinks ensue, including Darcy’s love affair with reality television. It seems like Zoe is trying to fall in love with Darcy, her literary crush since she was a teenager, but she can’t stop thinking about Nick Baskerville of Baskerville Books.
Things get even crazier when Darcy realizes he’s not meant to be in contemporary London, and let’s just say Zoe and Nick will have to team up and figure out how to harness some literary magic through an unorthodox tour of Longbourn and Pemberley.
Mixed Reviews, Just Go For It
Some readers mentioned they were not fans of the third act, because there are some curveballs there, plot-wise, but I just went along with it and had fun without thinking too hard about plot holes or anything. You have to suspend some disbelief and just go with the flow and then you’ll enjoy the book all the way through.
Bookalikes
Most Ardently Yours is for Pride and Prejudice fans and romance readers who like books set in bookstores, as well those who enjoyed A Novel Love Story by Ashley Poston and Austenland by Shannon Hale.
Thank you to Sourcebooks Landmark and NetGalley for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.
