Talia Hibbert

Jen is working at the advertisement firm Brown Cow. As she tries to send an email about the office sleaze to her coworker, it accidentally land on the table of the partner, Theo.
A short email exchange makes Theo excited to meet his employee, and as he finally does he know he wants more from Jennifer and he starts his seduction campaign. But while Jennifer is also very attracted to Theo, she needs her job, and is accordingly reluctant to start an affair with her boss.

So, it seems M/F contemporary romance really is not for me. It has all the tropes I usually like in M/M (boss-employee, virgin, age difference) and came highly recommended, but I guess wish-fulfillment fantasies only work, if you agree on the wish.

The book is certainly written well, it just did nothing for me. I found Theo to be way too sappy, syrupy. Almost needy in a puppy dog "I do everything for you, just tell me" kind of way. I don't find that sexy, it just feels desperate. But he also has flashes where he gets a bit too demanding, sometimes breaking Jens explicit rules. While there are certainly times when I liked him (he is adorable at times, a bit insecure and I like that he asks his parents for advice) he's just too much most of the time.
I did like Jen more. She has her anxieties, but she knows what she wants and she's not afraid to tell Theo "no" when necessary, but I just could not relate to her. I guess she's just too different from me.

I thought the plot was all over the place. The beginning is pretty good, when they have their "dream date" and start to get to know each other. But then there's blackmail, a stalker and a bitchy fitness client and it get's quite busy and a bit convoluted, and I felt all that activity took away from the budding romance, instead of cementing it.

I felt the sex scenes where really very boring. One of the sex tips Jen gets is not to put in any effort before the 5th time, because otherwise the guy gets all lazy. For one, I thought that was a pretty mean statement and also, it just makes things boring. Theo just rubs  her off the first 3 times or so, no reciprocity whatsoever. And even after that she doesn't really do much at all.  I know she's inexperienced, but doesn't she want to do something? Experiment? Personally, I want to get my partners off even more than I want to get off, so since that doesn't happen in the book I pretty much lost interest in that part of the proceedings.
I also thought the sex scenes where not narrated very well and felt a bit monotonous and short.

The book also keeps hinting at D/s. Theo tells her one time she's got to do what he tells her, or he's punish her. But, it just doesn't happen. There are some slaps to the butt and some minor bondage, but there's really nothing D/s whatsoever about the relationship. Theo is the least domly Dom I've ever read about (because: needy puppy), and I don't think he's supposed to be.
Maybe it's just to get the 50 shades crowd in? I have no idea. Those bits feel a bit weird and don't quite fit in with the rest. It feels forced, maybe an alteration at the end?

But the book does some things right. It manages to be very effortlessly diverse. Jen is black, unapologeticly overweight and also bi, Theo is half-Asian, even though that barely comes up at all.
It has a certain feminist undertone and even though I don't agree with all of it, it's certainly refreshing in this genre.

So, yeah, the book is not badly written, and it was free to boot, but it just was not my cup of tea. I'm sure someone else will love this.