As a woman working in STEM, Lark feels underappreciated; she is neither heard nor seen. An incident happens, and she gets fired from work. Worried about her bills and her net income, Lark takes the advice of her best friend Teagan and starts sexting to pay her bills.

This is a slow-burning, friend-to-lover’s romance. I loved the premise of the book; it was very sex positive, fun, and amusing at times, but I didn’t like the protagonist or the writing style. It starts off very promising, then everything just falls flat.

All in all, it was an okay read. Thank you, NetGalley, for the arc.

I wanted to like this book, but it just didn’t click for me. You can see the setup coming miles away, and yes part of the reason I do love romance is because it’s predictable and always gives us a happy ending, but that doesn’t mean I can just accept anything given to me on a page.

I didn’t connect with the characters or the main romance.

Thank you Alcove Press and NetGalley for the ARC.

Thank you so much Amber Roberts and Alcove Press for providing an early e-galley of Text Appeal - all opinion is my own.

Text Appeal was a really fun, easy-to-read romcom, with a new concept on dating/online romantic relationship searching and/with added physical presence.

I really liked the premise of the book (love reading about women in workplaces where they need to stand up against the male dominance), however I found myself slowly disconnecting from the storyline because of some characters. Please don't get me wrong, the book is great with banter, lot of sex and body positivity, struggles of dating, miscommunication between friends...

But for me, it did not hit that "wow i am obsessed" level because I was annoyed by Teagan (Lark's best friend) and her behaviour and it just made me sad to see such acts from a supposed best friend. It's just a me thing! My other point of why it felt a bit flat - the friends to lovers trope was explored okay, however I did not feel so sure about the deep friendship between Lark and Toby.

Text Appeal by Amber Roberts was a cute and quirky read. I enjoyed it but it wasn’t one of my favorites which is why I’d give it 3 stars. The storyline itself was funny but, the characters just got on my nerves.

Toby and Lark’s relationship was cute but, Lark really needed to just grow a backbone. She couldn’t stand up for herself in her personal life. I couldn’t stand her “best friend” Teagan. Teagan was honestly just a horrible friend. She got Lark into a tough spot, shifted all the blame onto Lark, and then basically kept being a lackluster friend.

Overall, I liked the premise but I just didn’t find myself connecting with the characters.

Thank you to Amber Roberts and Alcove Press for giving me an ARC in exchange for my honest review!

hooked and hooked some more. Loved all of this and couldn't put it down. I was like oh my. I need to know more. Read it.

Women in Stem! Text appeal follows Lark as she navigates being a woman in a male dominated profession. Once she gets fired from her job, she finds herself sexting for money. During this time she is also trying to figure out her feelings for her best friend Toby, only to start developing a platonic relationship with someone she’s been sexting.

I found this book to be hilariously awkward in the best possible way.

As a woman in STEM I have never read a opening pager of a book which I related to more.

I really enjoyed this book. Friends to lovers is growing on me as a trope and this one is done really well.

The plot was good, the characters all added something and I liked most of the side characters.

I will look out for more Amber Roberts books in the future!

Text Appeal is a fun romcom with lots of sex positivity, great banter, nerdy (in the best way) pop culture references, and a real look at what many women in STEM have to put up with! I loved following Lark's journey and the mishaps she experienced along the way when joining the world of sex work and also exploring a romantic relationship with her best friend. As someone who defaults to sarcasm, I also loved Lark's dry humor and inner monologue. Can't wait to get my physical copy when it comes out!

Thank you to NetGalley and Alcove for the ARC in exchange for an honest review

This was a fun premise and I really enjoyed the strong female friendships and a woman in a STEM environment.

Steam: 3

I'll admit upfront that I absolutely loved the cover of this book and it was one of the reasons why I wanted to read it, plus when it comes to communications-I love texting. However, don't let the cute cover fool you because this story is not all cute and has its struggles in dating, friendship among women, misogny at the workplace and more so women in tech space- so there is quite a lot going on and I personally at some point got thrown off by the awful offensive language in some of the texts the heroine, Lark, received but I rarely DNF a book and kept reading till the end-where I'd say it kinda fell into place.
It's not your sweet, cuddly, oh so cute romance because Lark struggles at work trying to prove herself and her ideas as a Programmer and is also trying her best to make sense of her relationship with her friend, crush, possible boyfriend, Toby- and has meddling friends who are also struggling with their dynamics. I would recommend this to readers of contemporary romance who know that relationships are not a straight line and it takes work with lots of assumptions and mistakes along the way.
Thank you Netgalley for the eARC.

Thank you for allowing me to review this.
That being said I’m kinda disappointed in what I read. I couldn’t finish this which is upsetting because I hate quitting a book. It’s written as friends to lovers but I had the hardest time seeing any type of love connection between the two main characters. I DNF around 40%

Thank you you to netgalley, the publisher and the author for allowing me the opportunity to read an e-arc in exchange for an honest review.

This was a very interesting premise and I have to say the cute cover really drew me in.

This was really fun, it’s a sex-positive debut with a romance that treats sex work with respect, you see the MC, Lark really come into her own- she learns to love her new side hustle and really begin to own her own sexuality, which is such a refreshing thing to see.

Obviously texting is a huge part of this story and for the most part and Amber Roberts absolutely nailed it- sometimes I find text threads to be a little cringe inducing but these were pretty good! This story is probably most relatable to women in their 20s or 30s, experiencing toxic workplace culture, dating apps, unsolicited pictures and most importantly: finding yourself. There’s lots of representation here too which is wonderful: women in stem, LGBTQ+, female friendships. Just to name a few.

I didn’t vibe as well with Lark as I’d hoped, I found her to be mildly infuriating at times and she did cause a lot of secondhand embarrassment for me. I also didn’t buy into her romance with Toby as much as I’d wished for either, it was cute but honestly, it felt a little strange that a friend had orchestrated an online sexual exchange between Lark and Toby without Lark knowing. But aside from that, this is a fun, amusing, quick read and it does pretty much what it sets out to do.

Marked at DNF at 60%.

Honestly, I wanted to DNF this at 20%. I was really hoping it would get better, and it just didn’t. The main character was very bland in my opinion and did whatever her rude best friend said to do, even if it was the last thing she wanted to do. It’s supposed to be friends to lovers, but Lark and Toby seemed to have no connection at all. I wasn’t a big fan of the writing style or the fact that the texting parts were actual pictures. The reason I gave 2 stars instead of 1 was because of the diverse characters and it including a women in STEM.

Thank you NetGalley and Alcove Press for the ARC copy.

Lark is a programmer at a tech company where most of her coworkers are highly misogynistic men. When the opportunity to lead a project comes along, Lark jumps on it, desperate to prove herself and finally get the respect she deserves.

Unfortunately, right as she's sharing her screen to pitch her idea to her team, she receives an unsolicited nude picture, which of course, pops up on screen for everyone to see. Lark loses her job and, thanks to her jerk of an ex-boss who blackballs her name, can't find more work. That's when her friend Teagan suggests the idea of sexting for money. Though the idea initially makes Lark uncomfortable, she goes for it. Meanwhile, she's also juggling her relationship with her friend and long-time crush, the newly-single Toby. Things get more complicated when Lark begins to grow close to a mysterious man she meets on her sexting app.

I really loved this story! It was so great to watch how every character experiences growth. The way Lark became more comfortable with her sexuality and grew into her own person was so satisfying, and I loved watching her friendship with Teagan evolve. Speaking of Teagan, I hope she gets her own book in the future because her personality was so fantastic! On the outside, she's happy-go-lucky, but she has this secret heart of gold that we only just scratched the surface of. She really reminds me of a female version of Barney from How I Met Your Mother, and totally stole every scene she was in.

Of course, while I loved the friendship dynamics of the girls, the romance was also a joy with plenty of swoon worthy moments and nerdy references to go around! Not to mention, the spice! I can't wait to read more from this author!

Our main character, Lark, works in the tech industry, and is one of the few women in her company. Like many women in a male-driven environment, she constantly deals with misogynistic comments and harassment on a daily basis. She finally gets an opportunity to progress in her career, but when something goes wrong, she ends up being fired.

Lark’s best friend Teagan suggests that she get into sex work to make some money while on the job hunt- specifically a texting(sexting) app where others pay her for dirty talk and companionship.

The main romance surrounds Lark and her male best friend Toby. Toby recently broke up with his girlfriend, and is rekindling his friendship with Lark. Of course, Lark is also talking to multiple other people on the sexting app, including one that she develops feelings and desire for.

I loved that this book included a bisexual main character, themes of pro-feminism and pro- LGBTQ, features women in STEM, and a side character that is a lesbian. So much diversity and inclusion that many romance novels wouldn’t even dare to include.

This book had all the bones in the right places, but I can only rate it a 3⭐️ because I never truly fell in love with the characters. Teagan was like nails on a chalkboard for me the entire novel. I love a strong, extroverted woman, but she completely crosses the line to annoying and controlling for me. Lark is a pushover and is incapable of any action without someone telling her what to do. And Toby….well I can’t tell you much about him without spoiling the end for you, but I haven’t forgiven all his actions yet.

Overall, this was a fun, lighthearted read that I recommend if you love

💻Women in STEM
📱Unique sexting plot
💕Feminism
🌈Pro LGBTQ+

🔥🔥🔥🔥 This isn't your average romance story, it's spicy, messy and will make you wonder who she is really falling for. Her best guy friend or some stranger that's texting her?

Thank you to NetGalley for supplying me this book for free.
I’m glad that I got this for free, because I would be pissed if I paid for the mediocre carousel ride that I just went on. I understand that this was a friends to lovers story, <spoiler>but if someone I knew violated my privacy like that or was remotely like Teagan? They’d be gone from my life, </spoiler> and that is what is so frustrating about this book because the fmc constantly puts herself through this, especially with her bff! It made the story really hard to enjoy.
Well, that and the constant bashing of sexist men, but what else are you going to fill the book with especially when you’re writing a book where the main character is a sex worker. I hate sexist men just as much as the next woman, but oh my god. Find other things to write about.
I started not liking almost every character by the end of the book and wasn’t rooting for the main couple.
Some of the jokes did hit for me. However, as a zillenial, a lot of them did not.
I like romcoms with unique premises. I’m sorry, this one was not executed well.

I enjoyed the sex-positivity in this book, but unfortunately didn't feel much zing between the main characters.

Also, the text bubbles were really difficult to read :(

Thank you Netgalley for providing this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Intriguing, entertaining, fun and even a little bit spicy. Lark’s story was really good to get through. I felt like her very unexpected employment and not so much unexpected relationship with her best friend Toby definitely made my day a little bit brighter. While the plot twist was a bit expected as I see it, the story in itself felt really engaging and fast paced so I didn’t bore myself not one minute.
Toby was absolutely amazing and I easy fell for him from moment one.
The friendship between this very crazy and fun group of women trying to find themselves happy moments and a happy life.
Plus these people (and especially Lark and Toby) are all big nerds like me so … best friends always and forever !!
I loved how this book put the value of understanding each other and speaking freely and openly with each other before anything else to build a good and healthy relationship that can last everywhere in any situation.
I so much appreciated the story as it was presented and I had a really great time reading it !!

Maybe it's because I started reading this book on the day I had a headache and already started and DNFed two other books but I couldn't get into this one either so I stopped reading it at around 10-20 %.
I didn't feel connected to the story, I also didn't love the formatting. The texts in the book were in clouds as you see on your phone but it was also so teeny tiny that you can't see the text at all. It put me off the book because I just wasn't in the mood to zoom in every time and it really puts off your reading experience. So, it is me and maybe some will like it if they can overlook that, personally, I just can't.