Although I'm heading into winter in my part of the hemisphere, I could easily picture this book as a great summer beach read. It's an easy read, with a great coastal beach setting for the majority of the book. I liked this novel, but there were aspects that I thought could've been a bit stronger. The relationship development between Whitney and Brie was a bit odd to me. There's a one night stand, Whitney kicking her out, Brie basically stalking her and then a very fast semi-quasi relationship that continues for the duration of the book until the end's resolution. I just wish there was a bit more of a slow burn to this, or an aspect where we see Whitney's development of feelings. I feel as though this was missed or glossed over to the point where it felt unnatural.

Regardless, I'd still recommend this novel as the side characters of Liz and Reece were great, and the show business storyline was quite good.

Many thanks to Netgalley and Bold Strokes Books for a copy of this novel. ARC provided in exchange for an honest review.

This was a fun light and enjoyable read. Talk about sleeping with your enemy!
Give it to me is greatly structured and well written. The chemistry between the main characters was amazing, I thought Liz was hilarious. This will make a great summer read. I definitely recommend.
4.5 stars

Thank you Bold Strokes Books and NetGalley for this ARC.

Whitney Ainsworth is the author of a very successful suspense series. Well, that was until the last book which bombed. Add to that, her recent divorced from an A-list actress who cheated on her and the writer's block she is now experiencing. Whitney is not having a good year. She is now touring the country and giving speeches about achieving success, something she doesn't enjoy but pays well. During one of her tour dates Whitney's manager sends an incredibly attractive woman to her hotel room to get her to distress and have some fun. Gabriela Talbot, Brie, loves books and writing, so when the chase to meet her favourite author arrives, she doesn't think twice.

This book was very interesting and unexpected. It was an easy read and it kept you interested enough to finish it and I am very glad I did. I think the book had a great start and finish and the middle was just .... not exciting. However, that ending was wow! I wasn't expecting that climax. I really wasn't prepare for how my heart broke a bit and then was restore. I loved the relationship of Brie with her family and how supportive they were. Also, her relationship with her brother was heart warming and hilarious at times.

Definitely worth the read! The chemistry is amazing and both characters are sexy and confident and just very well written. Thank you Elle Spencer for another great book!

This ARC was provided via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

This one felt like a good summer read. Mainly due to the beach house; I had total house envy. Meanwhile the antagonism between the two leads was excellent, especially given the way they met, which was cleverly done. At the beginning it was hard to know if you wanted them to be together. The cool (eventually) ex girlfriend seemed liked a better possibility at one point. Really liked the BFF/agent/wingwoman as she was a great character. Burning question - who was the mum related to in Hollywood? I wanted more information there.

Thank you NetGalley, the author and publishers for the opportunity to read and review "Give In To Me".

I really enjoy this author's style of writing. Her characters come alive on the page. There is a good structuring throughout and characters are all well-defined and are used well to advance the storyline. In this latest offering there are several sub plots where different characters interact and become a part of engaging banter with other characters and further develop the different storylines and plots between main and secondary characters..

I love the character of Brie who is simply one of those stand out characters that stands out from the rest. And the arrival at various intervals of her family members, and their sub plots serves additionally to provide more comic timing and give more substance to Brie, and add to the overall reading enjoyment.

I'm usually keen to read quickly and finish a book but with "Give In To Me" I consciously enjoyed reading it at a slower pace and was reluctant to turn the last page. I'm left undecided about Whitney, whose self-absorption was visceral on the pages. Did she deserve her journey? Granted some of it became understandable! 4.5*

If you love a fun, light read filled with humor, an array of slightly off side characters, and 2 strong minded main characters then this book is for you. We are introduced to Whitney, a famous writer and a more famous divorce from her wife, and Gabriela (Brie...and the cheese jokes follow <smile>)., who happens to be a reviewer of books- and the one night stand turns into anger, regret, stalking, and at some point compromises, friendships and love.

Throw in a pushy Liz(book agent), Reece(ex-wife that wants Whit back), Mom(just wants to keep Brie out of the Hollywood machine), Dad(still living his surfing days) and Adam(the twin brother that just lives to give Brie a hard time), and you have a rich story of of push and pull between Whit and Brie.

If you have read pass books by Ms. Spencer you will know there is a lot of humor in her writing and this one was no different, I especially got to laughing with Brie and Adam's interaction, you just can't beat having a loving brother by your side. I was torn with Reece, it seemed like she got blamed a lot for some angst between Whit and Brie, at the end I was kind of feeling sorry for her even though she did wrong by Whit.

I did have a hard time warming up to Whit, I kept going back and forth with thinking she is good for Brie and not being good for Brie-the cabin scene had me fuming, and by the end of the book, even though I came around to liking Whit, I still felt she was a bit to self-centered so yeah Brie was more the one I loved in this story.

Bottom line, Ms. Spencer delivers us a story that will make you laugh, cry, and kind of hate on a few characters but in the end, love does rise to the top-oh and you may be craving some cheese after you are done with the book

I received an ARC through Netgalley in exchange for an honest review, but would have written the same opinion if I had come across this author on my own.

To see my Amazon review, it is under CC-Funny and makes you crave some cheese

The previous Elle Spencer books made it so that she will be going to the top of my to read list when I can get my hands on her books. I love her casual, funny writing style with nice banter, superb dialogue, great supporting cast and a lot of romance.

Give in to Me is about Brie and Whitney who have a one night stand when afterwards it turns out Brie is the blogger that wrote a bad review about Whitneys last book and then it turns into the enemies to lovers trope.
Interesting premise but since that is also rather quickly resolved the story turns into something else yet again.

For me this wasn't her best book...by far. I will still give it 3 stars since nothing is really wrong with the writing and I did mostly enjoy reading it but I lacked a connection to the main pair and I couldn't see their connection either. They had good sex yes, Brie is supportive yes, but there is no real reciprocation from Whitney and I didn't buy into this love story. I like to fall in love alongside the characters when reading a romance and while I was told they loved eachother, I didn't feel it.

*** An ARC was provided by Netgalley in exchange for a honest review. ***

I like Elle Spencer’s writing, there is a casualness to it that is just nice. I moved this book up my ARC list because I saw some other reviewers that had remarks about inappropriate jokes, I had no issue with them. I was actually waiting for these jokes, I wanted to see if they were really that bad, but in all honesty they aren’t. Are they edgy and maybe walking that fine line between funny and inappropriate? Definitely. But so are 90% of my jokes so I am ok with it.

One night in a bar Brie is ogling her favourite author, Whitney, when Whit’s agent sends Brie up to her room she thinks she is getting an interview for her blog. She isn’t, she gets a night of sexiness. Only in the morning Whitney finds out Brie actually wrote the most horrible review of her latest book that just put some more nails in the coffin that her ex-wife left her in. (Figure of speech her, not literally of course). Brie is understandably kicked out of the room and resorts to minor stalking of Whit to apologise. This doesn’t go to plan, but they do end up in each other’s orbit.
This is a ones-night-stand-to-enemies-to-lovers-to-forever romance and it’s fun and light reading. Just the middle of the book is just so I’d say a bit plain, leaning towards boring. Nothing much happens, some jokes and banter, but relationship wise or even story wise it’s just a state of nothingness. I didn’t really mind as it is comfortable reading, and I was in the mood for something light, which is what I got.
I get that the jokes, the way these characters are with each other, from the mains to the secondary characters, won’t work for everyone. You need a slightly edgy/ dark sense of humour, as with most of Spencer’s writing I think. I am a reader who enjoys this, because as I said, it’s the type of humour I use as well. One remark, Brie’s brother is referred to her as metrosexual, multiple times, it’s all said as a joke in my opinion but that word feels so out of place and outdated or something. Come to think of it the metrosexual thing is repeated a couple times, so are some other things that didn’t need any repeating, it’s something that stands out, not super annoying, but could be better. And a good looking guy who takes care of himself is just that right, just as it would be with a woman, we don’t need to give them any other labels...

I enjoyed myself, it’s a fun light read, don’t go in expecting and amazing emotional story with loads of character developments. Just enjoyed it for what it is, a nice story with wicked jokes and fun characters.

When Whitney meets the blogger, Gabriela, who gave her a scathing review of her last book, sparks fly. That is until Whitney finds out who Gabriela really is. Gabriela is immediately smitten with Whitney, having been a long time fan. Gabriela also knows that Whitney is not looking for any type of relationship having recently had a very public divorce from her actress wife.
Gabriela begins to make it up to Whitney for deceiving her. Whitney has all the walls up to protect herself and her heart. Gabriela is persistent and it does begin to pay off, very slowly.
I really enjoyed this book and would recommend.
I received an ARC from NetGalley for an honest review.

This book is a good example of my overall relationship with Elle Spencer books. It's always a rollercoaster experience and I never know what to expect. With Spencer's past works I've really loved both Casting Lacey, and The Holiday Treatment, while Edge of Seventeen and Waiting for You fell more flat to me. "Give In To Me" leans more in the later category, but different times reading this book felt like totally different reading.

This book follows the author Whitney Ainsworth, who is reeling after going through a very public divorce, and the flopping of her last book. And after she hooks up with Gabriela "Brie" Talbot, she is surprised to find that Brie is the reviewer who panned her last book and was just expecting an interview until Whitney started kissing her. And it goes on from there.

I was expecting a book with it's blurb to be a sort of enemies-to-lovers one night stand to relationship slow progressing book. But that's not really what this is. This book had elements of both, but I wouldn't say you can classify this strictly as either.

I had an interesting time reading this, as I mentioned it was a rollercoaster. The beginning was interesting, but shortly after the events of the blurb, I had trouble paying attention to the book as it wasn't grabbing me at all. But I decided to keep going and the book picked back up around the 50% mark, and I was actually was liking it a lot from there, but it all came crashing down and I felt the resolution towards the end was really rushed.

So with that it's hard to write all of my thoughts in a more concise spoiler free way for a review. I did like the relationship between Whitney and Brie as it grew and they began to trust each other. After their rocky start I really did enjoy seeing them learn to rely on each other and use each other for support in their lives. But I have to say, the star of this book to me is Reese, Whitney's ex-wife. I wasn't expecting to like her as much as I did, but she REALLY grew on me especially as her friendship with Brie developed. It is a very lesbian experience to have your exes in your life. I know I do <spoiler> low key though, I was kinda hoping they would end up in a triad. Oh well <spoiler>

Also there are the jokes to mention. Like a lot of this books, they are really hit or miss to me. A lot of this book was sincerely funny and I was smiling a lot! But also, there are references to suicide jokes, rape jokes, and an incest joke. Other reviewers have discussed them in a little more depth, and I'll default to those. Also the numerous references to Brie's brother Adam being "metrosexual". Metrosexual is such a ridiculous concept- it's not that weird for a straight man to be well dressed and groomed in 2021. Can we just like drop that as a descriptor? It's not needed.

Anyway. This book has a lot going for it, but also just as much going against it. I would say I did overall enjoy the book, but it's not my favorite among Spencer's catalogue. 3/5

<i> Thank you to Bold Strokes Books and Netgalley for providing me this ARC in exchange for an honest review </i>

My knee jerk reaction to this book was that I need to start reading more Elle Spencer books.
I knew within the first couple of pages I was going to love this one. I really enjoy her writing style; clever, slightly awkward and all out funny. She is just a talented writer and this book is a good example of that. Her style is clear and concise, and executed with the best sense of humor.

I had a hard time putting this book down. The plot wasn’t unique necessarily. Brie and Whitney meet on uncomfortable terms. After waking up from what they thought was a one night stand Whitney realizes Brie is someone she has classified as the enemy. Brie won’t accept dismissal that easily as she chases Whitney both physically and emotionally throughout the book. Whitney is going through a complicated time in her life, but soon comes to the conclusion that her priority has turned out to be Brie.

I enjoyed everything about this book. It was uncomplicated and had me both laughing and crying. It was the perfect read for the perfect day. Now the burning questions I still need answered... What does the new logo look like? Did Brie ever get her dress back?

3 stars. Novelist Whitney Ainsworth is now divorced from her actress wife. She is doing speaking engagements since she has not been able to write since the divorce. She also received bad reviews on her last book, one of which is from a blog where the review went viral. Gabriela Talbot is the blogger who gave Whitney a bad review. After Whitney's manager sends Brie to Whitney's room and they wind up sleeping together, Whitney can't get her night with Brie out of her mind, until she discovers Brie is the blogger with the review that went viral. Brie and Whitney need to overcome to really be together.

I enjoyed this novel. I thought it was pretty good and enjoyed the chemistry between the two characters and even the interactions with Whitney's ex wife. I did enjoy Brie chasing after Whitney to try and get her attention. The only thing I did not like was the drama towards the end of the book, it seemed a little much and I wish it was a little better. This book was not a memorable one, which is why I only gave it three stars instead of four. I read it about a week before posting the review and I already forgot some of the little details of the book. It was a good quick read but not a book I would necessarily re-read.

2.5 stars. This was an interesting read for me. The concept is absolutely genius – book reviewer writes a bad review of her favorite author’s book, only to end up in a tumultuous relationship with said author – but I can’t say I loved the execution of that concept. Whitney and Gabriela (“Brie”) are both likable enough, but I didn’t understand either of them very well. And while I sometimes found this book hilarious and fun (I did laugh out loud a few times in the beginning), at other times I just wasn’t a fan of the humor.

Overall, I liked and related to Brie: her reviewer/blogger status, her love of Whitney’s book series, and her wishes that the movie adaptations be just right. She’s sassy one moment and sweet the next, which I love to see in a character. However, in the beginning of the book she follows Whitney to (publicly known) conferences, in one case flying to Cincinnati to try to speak with Whitney. I can’t decide if this is weird or not, but Whitney does call Brie out on stalkerish behavior, so there’s that. Brie’s actions and fangirl status made her “love” for Whitney a bit hard to believe, as there’s not much to hint at her being anything other than starstruck. And as for Whitney, she went from hating Brie’s guts to instantly forgiving Brie because…Brie is sexy? I felt like Whitney was a fleshed-out character before she forgave Brie, but after she forgave Brie, she felt distant and like a different person. I never felt like the MC’s got to know each other fully, and I would have liked a lot more depth to the romance.

There’s no doubt that Elle Spencer is talented at writing entertaining narratives. The sequence of events is utterly berserk, and the relationship development is often spurred by meddling side characters. There is an ex in the picture – Whitney’s ex-wife, Reece – which I know some readers won’t be happy about. While I didn’t like Reece at first, by the end of the book she, became one of my favorite characters. There’s also Whitney’s agent and BFF, Liz, who has an alarming amount of free time on her hands and uses it to wreak havoc on people’s lives (I can’t say I was a fan of this).

I didn’t really vibe with the humor for a lot of this book. There are a lot of sex jokes – so much so that I began to wonder if the main theme of the book was sex and not author/reviewer romance – but of course that’s not a bad thing; that’s just not my style. I did have problems with the frequent suicide jokes, the rape joke, the actors-don’t-eat joke, and the weird…incest-esque jokes, though.

Even though this one didn’t totally work for me, I do like Spencer’s writing and I will probably read more of her books in the future.

I am conflicted about Give In to Me. On one hand, I cannot deny that it was entertaining and I appreciate that one of the main characters is a book blogger; on the other though, some conflict resolutions fell short for me and I also couldn’t overlook many of the inappropriate jokes throughout, namely, a handful of suicide jokes, one rape joke, and two incest jokes.

Novelist Whitney Ainsworth (late-30s, lesbian) hasn’t had sex way too long since her divorce with her famous ex-wife, Reece, so when the chance arises, she spontaneously has a one-night stand with a stranger who turns out to be the book blogger, Gabriela “Brie” Talbot (30), that wrote a cruel review of her newest book, book three of the Piper Kane series. As they navigate their awkward dynamic post-sex, Whitney and Gabriela also have to deal with the drama that comes with the new Piper Kane movie, starring Reece.

The official blurb is slightly misleading. I went into the book thinking the whole story would center around Whitney and Gabriela getting past their differences and author-blogger conflict, but it was resolved fairly early. Instead, it is more about living under the scrutiny of the public eye due to the filming of the Piper Kane movie.

Give In to Me felt a bit like two novellas where the first part is about the main characters making up and the second about Hollywood drama. I thought having their relationship built upon a one-night stand would be fun to read about, since it is one of the few situations where I don’t mind instalust. But when lust becomes the solution to most problems, it left me confused and unsatisfied. I also couldn’t quite understand that if Whitney is Gabriela’s favorite author, why would she write such a mean review? Maybe it wasn’t mean. Then why would Whitney be so angry about it?

Yet I am glad to see them get together because it was fun to watch them getting sucked into the bigger drama involving Reece, the ex-wife who cheated on Whitney. If you told me I’d end up liking Reece when I started the book, I wouldn’t have believed it. And yet, I just might like Reece a bit more than I like the mains, but the best character award goes to Brie’s mother.

Now about the jokes. Spencer writes some of the funniest dialogues and there were indeed a lot of hilarious moments in Give In to Me. A lot of them were sex jokes, which were fun. But a lot of the others were suicide jokes and one semi–rape joke. Those left a sour taste in my mouth.

Also, being someone who unconsciously keeps careful track of time and locations of objects and people while reading, there were several scenes that made me unsure how we are suddenly there. And the filming of the Piper Kane movie seems to be way less than three months. Try one. The crew is incredibly efficient.

I enjoyed Spencer’s The Holiday Treatment and loved her Waiting for You, but I guess I am not the target audience for Give In to Me.

[Content warnings: suicide jokes, rape joke, incest jokes, graphic sex, gun, past infidelity]

This book is written with a very interesting plot. There are two main characters Brie and Whitney. The secondary characters in this book enhance the story, they are: Liz who is Whitney‘s agent; Reece who is Whitney‘s ex wife; and Jade who is Brie’s mother. Whitney is a well-known author of books who is on a speaking tour because she has writers block after her wife left her for another woman and she received a very negative review of her latest book by a blogger. One night after a convention speech she is sitting in a bar with Liz and a very attractive woman is sitting at the bar by herself. The two women make eye contact all night and then when Whitney leaves the bar her manager goes up to the woman and send her to Whitney’s room to have a sexual encounter. Neither women speaks about who they are they know it is just a one night stand no need for more.After an incredible night of sex the next morning the mystery woman makes a comment about interviewing Whitney and Whitney flips out and throws the woman out of her room in a rage. That woman was Brie who is a blogger who wrote the bod review of Whitney’s book. Brie feels terrible about the review and does her best to apologize to Whitney, even going across the country to see her at different speaking engagements, to no avail. When she finally gets Whitney to speak to her they begin a tenuous relationship that soon develops into much more because either woman could not get out of their mind the incredible connection they had the first night they met. Making matters worse for Whitney is a book of hers is being transformed into a movie no other than her ex-wife Reece playing the lead. This is quite challenging for her and interestingly enough it is her relationship with Brie that helps her develop A professional attitude and working with Reece and when Whitney realizes Brie knows more about her characters than she does, Whitney hires Bree on to rewrite the transcript for the movie. what could possibly go wrong with this scenario?
This book is very well written and the characters are developed to such a point that you really understand where they all are coming from and that is due to the author switching the first person narrative between the two main characters mid chapter so that the reader really gets a full picture of how both women are feeling. As I mentioned earlier the addition of the secondary characters really enhance the story. There are so many twists and turns in this book that it keeps the interest of the reader. While there is a lot of sexual tension throughout this book the sex scenes generally fade to black but the readers is left with the impression that the sexual encounters are scorching hot. This book, with its complex plot is one that I was one that I will certainly reread. I highly recommend it.

This is a sweet book. Lots of drama with a touch of lesbian ex to friends and some really great comedic lines made for a great read. Closed off defensive stubborn characters aren't my favorite but Whitney grew on me. The epilogue was appreciated because the storyline really resolves in the last few pages of the last chapter. All in all a good read. I received an ARC of this book from the publisher via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

Whitney Ainsworth is losing the plot. She discovered her celebrity spouse cheating on her through social media, was thrashed for her latest book and is suffering from writer’s block.

A misunderstanding got her in bed with a stranger; a beautiful and alluring stranger who happened to not only be her fan; but also the blogger who rated her latest book a disaster.

Brie (Gabriela) loves Whitney Ainsworth’s books, though not the last one. Emboldened by Whitney’s agent, she grabbed the opportunity to interview Whitney but somehow ended up spending a memorable night with her that ended sourly in the morning.

Due to their unconventional hook up, Whitney harboured deep distrust but Brie kept knocking down her walls until they slowly developed a friendship.

4.5 stars. I enjoyed the build up. The gush from admiration to lust, the treading from zero to friendship and the growth to love. The author threw me off with a sneaky twist deep into the book. It got me a little gritty, but hey what heart wrenching sapphic romance doesn’t have some angst? On a lighter note, the book is full of witty dialogues between all the characters, the humour in the book feels like an extension of the author herself. And wait! Quinn and Lacey! You cannot not know them, I have already gone through Casting Lacey three times (and maybe a 4th soon).

I just reviewed Give In To Me by Elle Spencer. Thank you NetGalley and Bold Strokes Books for the ARC.

Yes! And Yes again! I loved Brie’s character because she was so real. She was rich but not entitled, she loved her family, and I think that she wanted to find her life partner. I loved how close their family was, and man did her mom remind me of my own with calling my brothers when something happens to me and then here they come calling! Whitney was a mess, but understandable, it’s not everyday that you learn that you played a big part in your previous relationship falling apart. But Liz stole the show! OMG I lived her, she had me cracking up. A must read. Well done

this is very funny book. and that's why I continue to read it tbh there's so many hilarious moments. However, I did not feel anything for the characters, both seem fine. I did not care if they ended up together or not. and honestly thought Whitney was just looking for a fun and not committed relationship " if it was relationship !" Brie on the other hand was living in some kind of fantasy and made me think she got some kind of obsession on Whitney " very fast liking to love " Loved her mom tho she was my fev in the book.

overall this is intreating read and well written " dialogues were very mature " and I'm very grateful for the author and her team

4.25 stars

This book was a really fun and engaging read for me. Like other reviewers have mentioned, it does take a turn in the last 20% which was unexpected, but it drew me in even more. One of the MCs ended up being not so great, and I'm not sure I wanted the couple to end up together, which is where this book lost some points.

--- The Breakdown ---

Whitney Ainsworth's career now consists of giving motivational talks to businesspeople. The author of a bestselling series, she's had major writer's block since her third book was a flop. Not just that, but her personal life is in the toilet. Her movie star wife left her for another woman. When Gabriela Talbot catches her eye at a hotel where she's giving a talk, Whitney realizes that maybe a one-night stand is exactly what she needs to cure her writer's block. After a night of great sex, Whitney learns that Gabriela is not quite who she seems. Whitney kicks Brie out of her life, but for some reason, she can't stop thinking about her...

cw: infidelity (by side character), divorce, briefly mentioned bullying/homophobia, police show up as minor side characters

The Characters: I loved Brie. She was warm and funny, and honestly I don't understand why she liked Whitney so much, beyond the famous author thing and physical attraction. I really liked Whitney in the beginning. She had lost some self-confidence, and she used a lot of self-deprecating humor, but I appreciated how real she seemed. After her first encounter with Brie, she's kind of cruel, and Brie ends up apologizing for it? I was willing to attribute that to distrust from her marriage, but later on, she's also cruel to Brie. She apologizes and Brie forgives her, but I didn't feel like that was enough. Aside from that, the characters were well-fleshed out, and I really enjoyed getting to know some of the side characters, including Reese, the ex-wife!

The Romance: It seemed kind of one-sided. A lot of it was Brie pining over Whitney for some reason. I appreciated the times when Brie held herself back and recognized that Whitney needed to make the next move, and that she couldn't always be the one chasing after Whitney. But I wasn't a fan of Brie and Whitney together. At some point towards the end, I was wondering if Elle Spencer was gonna pull off a huge twist and make Brie end up with another character, and honestly, I was down with that. I just didn't like how Whitney treated Brie, even when they were on good terms with each other. It felt like Brie was losing herself in Whitney and would do anything for her.

The Plot: It was more complex than I'm used to, and I kind of enjoyed being taken for a few turns. It revolves around Brie and Whitney's relationship, with some side plots thrown in about the book series, Brie's parents, and Brie's writing. Very engaging.

The Writing: Superb. Elle Spencer delivers! Everything flowed smoothly, and I enjoyed a lot of witty banter.

All in all: It was entertaining and I liked it despite its faults. As long as you're not expecting a sweeping, perfect romance, I would recommend!

*I received a free ARC via NetGalley. All opinions are my own.