I REALLY wanted to love this book. I really did. I am a woman in IT. I like to code. I love the idea of this book. This book missed the mark for me. The whole book comes across as too preachy. I am 100% a feminist and a girl trying to make a start in the tech industry, but this book beats you over the head. All men are bad. The IT industry is full of pervs and men who excuse that behavior. It’s simply not true. There are pervs out there. There are men willing to look the other way out there, absolutely.

First of all, Mel should’ve quit that job. She’s a girl who codes, the industry is booming. She could get a new job in no time. She’s working a bottom tier helpdesk gig when she should be working in application development or even web design. Her job is beneath her, she gets verbally abused every. dang. day. She does nothing to make it stop. It is in no way her fault, but she could take steps to make it stop. Her immediate supervisor is willing to look the other way, but why doesn’t she go to HR? Why doesn’t she go to the owner of the company? Why doesn’t she go above her boss’ head? I would! Nobody deserves to be talked to that way.

Alex is a mostly absent character. We don’t see anything from his point of view, and he features only peripherally. I can’t honestly say anything about his character, because I don’t know anything about his character. He apologizes a lot, and he is sweet, but distracted, when they are together. That’s it. That’s all I’ve got.

Honestly, the only thing I liked about this story was the site Mel designed. JerkAlert was an awesome idea. Everyone that has ever used a dating app would love that idea. For sure.

How to Hack a Heartbreak is a fun story. Mel works in the male driven world of computer coding and all that. These horrible men basically sexually harass and get away with it. Mel is fed up with her job and men. Some guy sends inappropriate pictures and she gets stood up. After hanging out drinking one night, she creates the JerkAlert app that women can use to warn others about disgusting men. Then it's a big hit, there's a guy involved, etc. It's a good story and it's funny and relatable. This app needs to be real. It would be huge. I liked Mel and her friends. I recommend if you like romcoms and such. Such a cute story! Thanks to NetGalley for an arc in exchange for an honest review.

This is an interesting novel. Although it takes us through Mel's journey of finding love with Alex, the romance really takes a backseat to what this story is really about : the difficulty of finding love in the 21st century through the internet. Mel works for a company that facilitates resources to individuals in search of a space to launch their startups. She's one of the few women in the company and she handles the computer problems. Of course she's met with a lot of sexist comments and behaviors from the men she is hired to help. I was happy to read that Mel fought back and did not accept this kind of behavior.
Unfortunately her experience with her father and her disappointing blind dates leaves her feeling jaded and with a mistrust of all men. This leads to a lot of insecure paranoia and it affects her relationship with Alex. She creates Jerkfree and that brings about its own issues. What I admired about Mel is that she had the guts to create an app that gave her a space to voice her experiences and although it did not have the outcome she expected she learned from it and created something better. The #getofftheinternet needs to be a real movement.
Thank you Netgalley for providing this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

A fast, enjoyable read. I enjoyed the characters and the storyline very much. I found it quite hard to put this book down.

How to Hack a Heartbreak by Kristin Rockaway
Source: NetGalley and Graydon House
My Rating: 3/5 stars

I read this book in a single sitting which suggests I loved it and couldn’t put it down. However, that’s not exactly what happened. How to Hack a Heartbreak is one of those books where I find myself completely torn over whether I liked or disliked the read. Here’s the breakdown:

Whitney: Though a minor character in the book, Whitney has a HUGE personality that very much overshadowed nearly everyone else. While I am certainly not opposed to such a character, I am very much opposed to Whitney. She is loud, rude, obnoxious, brash, and though she does come through for her friend in the end, she is just hard to take and even harder to like.

The Hatchlings: WOW!! There isn’t a great deal of good to say about this group of first-class jerks! From the very beginning, the work environment that includes the Hatchlings is terribly toxic and doesn’t improve much over the course of the read. Since so much of the book takes place in this environment, I found it difficult to ever really be comfortable with the setting and many of the people in said environment.

The Man-Bashing: Holy crap is there a ton of man-bashing that happens in this book. While the cast of characters is predominately heterosexual female who have experienced some really awful dating events/situations, not every man in the world is that level of awful. Additionally, while a certain amount of man bashing is to be expected based on the characters experiences, I found myself often thinking, “What about the women out there who behave in the same way?” The bashing in this book is pretty relentless and is wholly one-sided.

Mel and Alex: Talk about doomed from the get-go! Mel is so traumatized by her past dating experiences that she doesn’t ever truly give Alex a fair shot. Mel is suspicious, untrusting, and willing to go to some very sketchy lengths to “prove” what she already “knows” about Alex. For Alex, much of his time with Mel is very confusing; he likes her, tells her he likes her but always seems to receive such mixed signals he has no hope of interpreting. What’s more, both Alex and Mel are so scared to be completely honest with themselves and one another that walk right into mutually assured destruction. Much of Mel and Alex’s time together is well and truly painful to “watch.”

The Bottom Line: How to Hack a Heartbreak has some great moments and, in the end all the truths are accepted and understood, and everything works out, but I’m just not sure it’s enough to convince me to really like this book. I think I wanted more out of the ADULTS in this book and simply got more too little, too late. So many of the ridiculous issues that arise in this story could have been completely avoided had the characters simply thought through their words and actions before speaking and/or acting. With all this being said, I did enjoy the ending: the adults finally decided to behave like adults, Mel and Alex get their business squared away, and some good things develop from the rubble of Mel’s life. As you can see, dear reader, my positives and my negatives tend to balance one another which leaves me not all sure if I liked this book or not.

This was a fun exploration of social media, gender disparities, 21st century ethics, and what it means to trust in a relationship. As a developer, I can say that while I don't encounter the kind of rampant sexism displayed in this book, everything about the tech environment was spot on--from the all-hands meetings to the Slack messaging. Although I don't encounter that level of sexism in my work environment (not that I encounter no sexism....), every one of the micro (and even macro) aggressions rang true, and all women will relate to having some of these encounters at some point or other. In this book, they're distilled down to make a broader point. And yes, I've even experienced the subway situation--and worse. So I enjoyed seeing how Mel dealt with these situations and how they caused her to grow and make decisions to empower herself and others. All of these things made Mel's reactions to the men who showed any interest in her plausible, and I was curious to see how things would turn out with the one man who seemed to defy expectations. I really loved watching her 2 apps come to life. It was fun to live vicariously as she barreled toward tech success.

This was my first book by Ms. Rockaway and I really liked it.
I enjoyed the writing style of this author, and I liked the main characters. None of them particularly "stand out", but they are very likeable. Story itself is light, funny, enjoyable & at times even a little sad. It made me laugh out loud, it frustrated me, it annoyed the hell out of me at times and in the end, it left me with a smile on my face. But you should read this book only if you want to read simple, uncomplicated, plain chick-lit. If you're looking for angsty or intense characters, complex plot, deep & emotional experience, then this book isn't for you. But it is highly recommended if you want a light (but not feather-light) but also kind of serious book with a dose of humor and fluffy-ness on top. So, overall Knocked-Up Cinderella was a nice read. It had humor, romance and good plotline. And it was just the right combination of them.

I wanted to like this book, but the characters felt flat and the plot predictable. I was surprised to find this isn’t the author’s first work.

Fun romcom that showed true chemistry between the main characters. First book from this author, but I’d read more!

I had heard buzz about his book and going into it I thought I would love it. It was not what I expected. I expected a romance novel with a cute side story about app development and tech stuff. What I got was a book about app development and tech stuff with a side romance. Only the female lead was developed well, but even some of her friends were better developed than the male lead. And maybe this was my fault because it was advertised as chick lit rather than romance but when you go into expecting romance, it’s a disappointment. For a good romance novel, I want well developed and likeable characters, and I didn’t even like Mel that much. It wasn’t awful. There was a lot of empowerment stuff and I didn’t find the app/website development stuff boring. It’s well paced. I just didn’t come away with that “oh, that was a good book” satisfaction I like to have when I finish a book. It was mostly “oh good, I finished that and can move on.” This just does not qualify as romance to me.

This book was a good representation of a lot of the struggles women deal with in life. I do think it's all obviously exaggerated to one person for the sake of the story, but these are all things women deal with. Dealing with all of that BS makes you cynical and irritable and I could relate to the MC, Mel, so much for that very reason. 
I also just really liked the journey that Mel took, she was sooooo cynical and skeptical and didn't trust anything that the men in her life did because of the men in her life and what they had previously done. 
I just really liked how the book was more about Mel and her growth and support of her friends than the romance, which isn't usually the case for me.

This is my first book by Kristin Rockaway, and I found it entertaining and a fun beach-type read.

The story is of coder and help desk worker Melanie who lives in expensive New York and is trying to meet Mr. Right, all the while being pursued by sexist pigs and just horrible men.

Wading through a popular dating app, Melanie realizes it's time to put men who send questionable photos, ghost, and lie about marriage on notice, and she invents a new site: Jerk Alert. This review-based site soon has quick a few disgruntled women writing reviews, and Melanie knows she may be onto a way out of the help desk.

Meanwhile, she meets a cute computer engineer at work and is shocked to find him on her Jerk Alert site. Is he all he seems?

While I really enjoyed the computer programming setting and very in the now harassment plot line, I found a lot of the store to meander and Melanie to be not a fully fleshed out character. While she, and her ability to trust, was impacted by her dad leaving their family, this was little more than a footnote. I also found it incredibly hard to believe a computer engineer with a degree would find it difficult to find a more fulfilling job. Also, while would people who are building apps even need a help desk?

That aside, I genuinely enjoyed Mel and her friends, especially Vanessa, and I would be happy to read another book by this author.

Thanks to NetGalley, the publisher, and author for my ARC.

Deliciously funny rom-com set in the fascinating world of tech startups! Witty writing, poignant commentary on sexism in the tech industry and the struggles of online/app dating, plus an incredibly relatable main character make How to Hack a Heartbreak a ridiculously enjoyable read!

2 stars
Fell flat for me. I was hoping for more, I struggled to get into it from the start. Flipped through to see if it got better.

After Mel is stood up by a date and then sent dick pics by another guy, she creates JerkAlert. It gives women the opportunity to warn other dating app users which guys are the bad ones so they can be avoided. It explodes into something bigger than she expected and she has to figure out what to do as it continues to grow.
This book was a lot more fun than I expected! What I enjoyed about this was that it showed that women can be just as good in the computer science field as men. She writes the code and creates the website all on her own. She's strong in that sense and that's what made me like her. Sure, there are times when she second guesses and doubts her abilities but her group of friends pick her back up. There are enjoyable supporting characters in the story that aren't one dimensional and are all smart/kiss-ass women. This story is a whole is full of strong women who encourage and support each other and help lead each other on their path. I also really liked Mel's Pinterest obsessed roommate and wish I could have seen her projects and parties myself!
I liked that the budding romance between Mel and Alex wasn't straightforward. The author balances Mel's skepticism of Alex well as the reader gets to know him. You're not quite sure if you're supposed to trust him or root for him and it was a good change of pace. How to Hack a Heartbreak is a fun romcom that has both humor and heart in it and it makes for an enjoyable read.

How to Hack a Heartbreak is a wonderful and original read! I can see this book being a total hit during summer 2019! I also think this is one of the most relatable novels I have read in a long time. I think this app should be a real thing (if it's not already) as many women would flock to purchase it! Anyway, I highly recommend this laugh out loud novel!

I was provided with an ARC of this book by NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

I loved this book! I felt it was rather true to life about how women coders are oftener treated in the tech arena, but the constant sexual harassment isn’t necessarily something that would fly as easily as it did in this book - but every company is different so I would not put it past a bunch of men either. Melanie was real and relatable and Alex did come off kinda shady but Mel was acting shady too really. It was a fun read and I recommend it!

I know it's only January, but without a doubt, How to Hack a Heartbreak WILL be making my top books of 2019 list! I absolutely loved this story from start to finish. Mel Strickland is fed up with being a tech professional in a male driven industry, but even more than that, she's sick of the current dating environment - being sent inappropriate pictures before even exchanging a word, being "ghosted, being stood up with no apology - so when Mel goes out drinking with girlfriends, she stumbles home and decides to create a little website called JerkAlert as a goof, where women can rate the jerk's they've gone out with to warn other women of what's out there.

There was so much about Mel I found myself relating to (and ugh, in the whole online dating/swipe culture situation), I quite possibly thought Rockaway was observing me and my friends while writing this (hello SoulCycle references!!!)... I was finding every moment possible to read this today, including finishing up on my lunch break, it was just that good! I think anyone who is a fan of Christina Lauren's work would love this one or maybe just someone else who has swiped on one too many wastes of time!

Thank you to Graydon House for an advanced copy. All opinions are my own.

I liked parts of this book, however the ending felt really rushed. While the technology portion is important, the romance took a complete step back, which is what I was expecting the focus to be.

Really cute story! I think I liked the relationship with the friends as much as the romantic one between the two main characters. I really liked the story line too. Good book!