The Hating Game by Sally Thorne

The Hating Game

By Sally Thorne

Genre:

Romance

My Rating:

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️/5

Spice Factor:

🌶🌶/5

Summary:

Debut author Sally Thorne bursts on the scene with a hilarious and sexy workplace comedy all about that thin, fine line between hate and love.

Nemesis (n.) 1) An opponent or rival whom a person cannot best or overcome.

2) A person’s undoing

3) Joshua Templeman

Lucy Hutton has always been certain that the nice girl can get the corner office. She’s charming and accommodating and prides herself on being loved by everyone at Bexley & Gamin. Everyone except for coldly efficient, impeccably attired, physically intimidating Joshua Templeman. And the feeling is mutual.

Trapped in a shared office together 40 (OK, 50 or 60) hours a week, they’ve become entrenched in an addictive, ridiculous never-ending game of one-upmanship. There’s the Staring Game. The Mirror Game. The HR Game. Lucy can’t let Joshua beat her at anything—especially when a huge new promotion goes up for the taking.

If Lucy wins this game, she’ll be Joshua’s boss. If she loses, she’ll resign. So why is she suddenly having steamy dreams about Joshua, and dressing for work like she’s got a hot date? After a perfectly innocent elevator ride ends with an earth shattering kiss, Lucy starts to wonder whether she’s got Joshua Templeman all wrong.

Maybe Lucy Hutton doesn’t hate Joshua Templeman. And maybe, he doesn’t hate her either. Or maybe this is just another game. ​​

My Thoughts:

I have seen this book allll over Bookstagram and BookTok and wasn't really interested in it at first because of the cover (sorry to whoever illustrated this). As I was waiting for my Libby holds to come through there was a skip-the-line-loan available for this and I had been in a rom-com mood so I decided to give it a try.

Well... I binged the entire book in one day. Sally Thorne did an amazing job at creating these characters who seemingly hate each other but end up in a tangled work relationship where they are competing for the same job. I absolutely loved how the story played out (with a few exceptions that I thought were a little overboard) and the characters themselves.

This book had me laughing out loud at times, smiling at my book (which made my husband give me weird looks), and sad at certain parts. I am so glad I gave this book a chance. This book easily earned a 5-star rating from me because I could not put it down. I desperately wanted to know where things were going with Lucy and Josh and who would get the job in the end. I loved how they both transformed each other and saw the best in each other.

I watched the movie after I finished it and while it did go away from the book at times, the actors were the perfect fit and the story went like I imagined it would in real life.

Overall, I would definitely recommend this to anyone who loves a good rom-com read that's easy to bing and loves a good enemies-to-lovers trope as well as an office romance trope. It even has a one-bed trope in it as well for those who love that.