Despite the intriguing cover, I couldn't get into this book. Romance books about romance books sounded like something I would enjoy, but the characters did not appeal to me. I found myself more confused at the half way mark, so I just gave up because I did not like the writing style.

Thank you to Netgalley and The publisher for the ARC of this book. This was a honest review.

After two weeks of trying, I DNF at 49%...

A book about a romance writer and a publisher : it should be at total hit with me. But it was such a miss, it's comical.

Sorry, Miles is a lawyer and should fight the contract. If not, she should just tell Lars the truth so they could hire a model or whatever other solution could protect her identity. And she should fire Pippy.

The lying thing is sooo wrong to create a healthy relationship (at least Miles' reasons are not good, according to me).

I am not into historical romance, so reading some extracts could have been ok if they were really as steamy as they were sold to be. Which they were not unfortunately.

I wanted to like this book, I just didn't.

Thank you to Netgalley for providing an eARC in exchange of an honest review.

This book was slightly infuriating. Sometimes it worked, Miles and Lars banter was witty and new but the chemistry between them was forced. Miles is an attorney from a very famous author and poet and writes romance under a pseudonym. She is unexpectedly entered into a contest and thrown into a position where she will have to tell the world who she is. Then there’s some random pole-dancing class with a host of people who make no sense to the story. Also, not nearly enough about horses. But that’s just me.

Thanks to Escape publishing, the author and Netgalley for an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Being an Australian and seeing a character's name is Miles Franklin, I was really looking forward to reading this book. Miles Franklin (the real one) had a bit of a reputation for being a 'difficult woman' and I was anticipating that the main character in this book might bear some of her traits. I was not mistaken - the Miles in this book is prickly and awkward in social situations, but she has very good reasons for being so.

I like the way contemporary romances seem to be broaching the subject of mental health and attempting to illuminate the challenges people with mental health conditions have when compared with the people around them.

Lars provides this contrast as he is confident where Miles is not, and cannot bring herself to be.

That being said, I didn't like Miles as a character very much. And there wasn't enough emphasis on the romance between these two for me to invest in the story totally.

It was an enjoyable read though and funny in parts. 3.5 stars from me,

(Thank you Netgalley and the publisher for the eARC in exchange for a honest review)

Publication date: 01 April 2022
Publisher: Escape Publishing

Plot

Miles Franklin leads a double life of lawyer by day, author by night by the name of Emma Browning. No one knows of Emma's existence or the way she looks. Trouble knocks on her doors when one of 'Emma's' novels wins a prestigious literary award. When Lars Kristensen, the CEO of the publishing house which would publish 'Emma's' novels insists on meeting with Emma, Miles becomes all the more stressed. Miles and Lars are like even poles of a magnet: they bicker all the time and there is an unavoidable sexual tension. However when they start spending more time together, things start to change. Miles is hell-bent on keeping her identity a secret even though she has to deal with all the judgements from her parents' and the publishers.

Miles is not someone who backs down before she gets what she wants and with Lars's constant pushing and probing to get his way, is it possible for Miles and Lars to ever agree?

Thoughts

This is my first book from Penelope and I especially chose it for its illustrated cover (I'm a sucker for it if it isn't clear yet!). The hate-love relationship between Miles and Lars gave me [book:The Hating Game|25883848] vibes so do check this book out if you enjoyed it.

I liked the effort and dedication she put behind her books. We were given glimpses of her books (a book within a book!) and I found it interesting that she went to great lengths to gain inspiration for her books. She also had references to other authors and books which was nice to read. But this is the only part I liked in the book (other than the cover).

I found it really hard to relate to Miles because her thoughts were erratic. I didn't like that Miles did not deal with the problems and instead chose to ignore them. The relationship between Miles and Lars lacked emotional depth and connection, it was instead built up on their sexual attraction which felt shallow.

Lars appearances in the book were little at the start and then it progressed on. However, it was a slow burn between Miles and him which was frustrating to read. He also had this image of being prim and proper yet grumpy always which got a little too much to read. He seemed immature, resorting to calling Miles names whenever they had a disagreement.

The side characters also had the spotlight on them too often that I had to go back to read and remember who were they and why were they in the scene. Miles' disapproving parents had too much to say as compared to her and I kept waiting for her to do something about it. The book was also too long I found myself skimming past some parts.

Overall, the plot could have served something better but this was a little messy for me.

Very grateful to have been given a chance to read this book! I wanted to love it but the story did not quite hook me. DNF. That said, it is well written, it just didn’t draw me in enough to keep reading.

2.25 stars

This was a chilly flake on the spice scale with fade to black scenes. Note that the excerpts read from Miles' work was steamier than anything that happened between the main characters.

On the Same Page provides some interesting commentary regarding the disdain many literary readers and writers pose specifically on the romance genre, especially regency romance.

Our heroin, Miles, has a very valid fear of exposing her identity as both her parents are critically exclaimed writers that fail to see the value in romance. Miles also works with many other romance authors who receive similar negative remarks.

I did find the writing quite convoluted with an excessive use of complex terms. The pacing was also a bit off where some scenes would abruptly end making it difficult to tell who was speaking in a scene. I felt like I skipped a chapter at points and had to reread sections to make sure I didn't miss anything. For one there was barely any build up to Lars interest in Miles and the hotel room scene.

Although the plot was intriguing, I felt like I was walking in circles with Miles wishy washy behavior. I failed to see why she couldn't be with Lars. What was stopping her from doing so? There needed to be some discussion about how the power dynamic between her and Lars would be seen as a form of favoritism. There are also plenty of writers that write under a pen name. I see no reason for Miles not to mention her true identity with the people at Iconic. I stayed up late into the night waiting for Miles to own up to her mistakes and admit to her feelings and now I'm still longing for more. With further editing this novel could really come to its full potential.

NetGalley and Escape Publishing provided an e-ARC in exchange for my honest review.

2 ⭐️

I really wanted to like this book, but I just could not get into it.

Our MC is Miles, who is a lawyer by day, and transforms into Emma, historical romance author at night. When Emma wins a national literary award, Miles jumps through hoops to keep her identity a secret and finds love along the way.

The book started going downhill for me when we spent more sentences than I thought was necessary toward the beginning talking about the color of her eyes and how they look when she wears certain clothing. It was giving very much Wattpad-esque “big, blue orbs” vibes.

As a self-proclaimed smut lover, I can’t believe I’m saying this, but the enemies to lovers plot did not flow for me - it felt very rushed. Also, the thing that could’ve saved this book did not occur. Where was my smut?!? You can’t “Much later, after we made love”’d me!

The reason I did not rate this book 1 ⭐️ is because a strong cast of supporting characters attempted to pick up the slack when the book fell short.

Our female main character, Miles, is a lawyer by day and successful, historical romance writer by night. Her parents are both literary giants and so her writing is done in secret under the name Emma Browning. Romance is low brow in their opinion. Emma is up for an award that her friend and assistant Pippy entered her in and if she wins, Miles would no longer be anonymous. Lars is the CEO of the publishing house that sponsored the award. Miles presents herself as Emma's legal counsel and meets Lars when he wants to speak to Emma. There is much back and forth between Miles and Lars and their attraction to each other. Miles parents' really were so involved in their own lives and careers that they didn't give her a good home life and as an adult she is insecure about herself and suffers panic attacks. I'm glad Miles and Lars finally got on the same page. It would have been nice to see how her parents handled the revelation of Miles being Emma.

I only made it to chapter 9 before deciding I couldn't keep going. I don't know if this will be a permanent DNF but right now, pushing through will only leave me dissatisfied and result in a low rating.

Miles is secretly writing and self-publishing historical romances. She has parents with high literary acclaim who look down on romance, and as she suffers with severe anxiety she wants to stay out of the spotlight. But when she wins a literary prize her new publishers want to push Emma into the public eye and honestly, it made me feel a little ill. I don't know if this is an accurate reflection of publishing but the minimal royalties, disdain for her genre, and complete disregard for an authors wish to remain anonymous made me feel disgusted. And I know we're supposed to feel sympathy here but I didn't enjoy any of this to the extent that I don't want to keep reading. Something about the writing didn't work for me either. It feels like the plot is a little bit everywhere and I honestly didn't follow some of the conversations. It read so formulaic. I just don't care about anything and have no interest in what may happen next.

This was just not for me. Truthfully, I don't think I would have finished this book if it (a) wasn't an arc and (b) wasn't as fast-paced as it was. I liked the premise, but unfortunately, I didn't like the execution.
The romance between Miles and Lars felt off. I feel like at times, there was missing information in their conversation or I just didn't understand how they one second are hating each other to making out. Overall, I didn't really understand why they each did certain things.
Also, Lars becomes obsessed with Miles for no reason (I don't even think it was explained other than love at first sight). He is just hostile to Miles the entire of the book until he suddenly isn't, and then is again... I think this is a case of lust and not love. Also, he abruptly loves her?? There wasn't enough build-up to their romance and no explanation as to why they were suddenly making out.

The two main characters are unlikeable, mostly Miles. Miles never answers her phone, which makes everyone's life harder than it needs to be. I did appreciate the representation of anxiety but also she didn't really get any actual help. Also, she is terrible at keeping the one secret that mattered, everyone turned out to already know, except the general public and her dipshit parents.
Lars was just confusing and rude mostly.
Jack was even more confusing. I don't understand his relationship with Miles at all. Throughout the first half of the book, I thought he was bi because of the way they behaved.

As for the side characters, there were just too many and too much going on:
1. Miles' parents
2. Jack and Jules (so irrelevant in my opinion)
3. Pippy
4. Pole dancing characters
5. Lars and his ex
6. Amy (kind of cute but mostly irrelevant)
7. Tom (again, so irrelevant and could have been removed from the book)

There are probably more but I can't even remember.

Overall, it was confusing and I didn't really care for the romance (which is a key factor in a rom-com).

I have tried multiple times to read this book, but I cannot get over how it's written. The sentences are so short and choppy it feels like it was written by one of my middle school students. Sorry. This book is just not for me.

DNF at 15%

I have no idea what I just read. The writing felt so choppy and disjointed, which prevented me from connecting with the characters at all. What did me in was Miles asking Lars, the owner of the publishing company that 'Emma' aka Miles just won a prize from to pose shirtless to prove his allegiance to the romance genre...who in their right mind would ask a professional acquaintance this 10 seconds into knowing them? I hope others enjoy this book, but it was not for me. I can appreciate wanting to tackle the literary stigma that romance tends to attract, but this book isn't successful in that.

ARC received via Netgalley for an honest review

Lawyer by day. Romance author by night. This is the life of Miles Franklin - not THAT Miles Franklin though!

But she is so keen to keep her alter-ego-writer a secret, that when she wins a big competition she does everything she can to get out of the obligations. And oh the lengths she goes to.

And in the meantime falls for the guy who is pushing those obligations.

Miles is a bit of a door mat for most of the story, and I just wanted to scream in frustration when she let it all happen. Her parents are the worst kink of literary snobs and I wanted to snot them. Her besty/PA/harginger of all her current troubles, she is so sweet and I loved the way she tries to get Miles to come out as the author, you can't help but love her.

I adored the Sydney setting, and could picture so many of the places so clearly it brought an extra dimension to the story for me, as I wandered down the streets of my home city with Miles.

This was my first experience of a Penelope Janu story, and I will definitely be reading more in the future.

I wish this book was better. It had so much potential. This book gave me whiplash! Some scenes seem to have come out of nowhere, because there was no build-up to! There was also quite a few timeline holes.

Thank you for NetGalley and the publisher for sending me a copy of this book in exchange of l’y honest opinion.
This book was a breath of air. The characters, the storyline, it was was really great.
I loved Miles, and the fact that she had a double identity. She was complex, and I loved how she had those quick replies.
It was a fast paced book, with a great plot. Having short extract of Emma’s books was truly a plus.
The enemies-to-lovers was there, but I didn’t really understand the end, and how it went next level.

A big thank you to NetGalley and Escape Publishing for the ARC.. Really enjoyed this book. The feature of panic attacks was well-written and characters were developed well.

The premise of this book seemed so interesting and I thought it would be a fun romp but I ended up DNFing this one pretty quick.

I just couldn't bring myself to root for the characters at all. Given that Miles is a lawyer, it seemed very unrealistic to me that she wasn't able to get herself out of a contract especially when her entire specialization is working with authors, most of them who write romance, like she did.

I also didn't like how her assistant forged her signatures and entered Emma for a price without ever asking for permission and then didn't seem to suffer any consequences. Well, she hadn't till the part I'd gotten to. Can't be sure if she was later, but seeing the reviews, it doesn't seem so.

It just wasn't for me.

I found it quite hard to really get in to, but once I did, I really enjoyed it. It was a very fun read and I really recommend it!

This book has me hooked since the very beginning. And I really enjoyed it. The characters were so fun. I really loved the banter, and the chemistry between both the MCs . Especially that ending was everything. Overall, it’s a 5 stars read for me.