In Crushing It by Lorelei Parker, a female game developer named Sierra struggles to overcome her fear of public speaking in order to pitch her new game at a Video Game Developer Conference. Following her attempt to practice this skill at an open-mic, this event sends her off on a wild love-story, complete with gaming references and a love triangle between two men she had known in college.

After reading the description to this book, I was immediately drawn in by the idea of a fun yet nerdy romance novel! Indeed, I was pleased to find a number of relatable references throughout the novel, however as I feared, some very too on the nose or cliche. Additionally, it was a struggle to read some of the love scenes as they were written in a very fantastical manner.

Regardless of these qualms, I found the novel to be very fun to read, with a spectrum of different characters. While Tristan, Sierra's longtime crush, ends up being the wrong choice, Alfie ends up the underdog in regards to Sierra's affections. Overall, it was a lighthearted and a neat nerdy girl read!

Book Review: Crushing It by Lorelei Parker (pub dare: 06/30/2020)

Thank you Kensington Books and NetGalley for this arc.

I give this book ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️. A story about Sierra, a passionate gamer and game developer who have a fear of public speaking due to humiliation she experienced in college. Guess who the culprit is? Her very own crush Tristan. Sierra wanted to present her new game to a Gamescon to be held in Germany and was signed up to a tell your “shameful/funny story” contest by her best friend to overcome her fear. The competition also has Tristan as a contestant and is being held in a bar owned by Alfie, who has a massive crush on Sierra back in college, which, by the way, has a huge secret as well. The world is indeed very small.

This story is charming. It’s like reminiscing and acting upon that huge grudge you hold against that one annoying classmate. It is very relatable and funny. It could've passed as your usual love story, but I like that I could see myself in Sierra and the way she had been handling her life and choices. All the characters are well developed and appeared to me like my own set of friends. It also has that flirty vibe and a bit drama on the side. I recommend this book if you want a lighter, fun, and easy read.

This was really funny. I know nothing about video games past the 1990 Super Nintendo we had but I didn’t feel like the game talk was too much in this - I liked the small bits about about how she codes games for her career. Sierra was awesome, even if she found herself in a few awkward moments. Cute little romance. There is a mild love triangle but it’s pretty clear who the reader should cheer for and I just adored him. A must have on your rom-com tbr!

Sierra is a video game designer, and gamer. She enters a contest at a bar that asks you to reveal your most embarrassing moments in order to help her get over her nerves for an upcoming presentation. The story she tells is about Tristen, the boy she had a crush on in college. She revealed all the embarrassing details of how she felt. What she doesn’t anticipate is that Tristen himself is the next contestant in the contest. The two y’all after, and eventually go out. As the contest continues, Sierra develops a friendship with the owner of the bar. And she starts to realize that he is sweet, and funny, and supportive.

This was a wonderful story. The characters were all well written and seemed like your friends. It was funny and sweet, and kept you interested page after page. I definitely recommend this book if you want a quick, sweet entertaining story.

Thank you to Netgalley for providing me with an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.

This is one of the cutest rom coms I’ve read in awhile. Sierra is extremely relatable, especially when it comes to Tristan. We’ve all been there liking a guy way more than they like us. I found the whole novel to be fresh and it snagged me by the first chapter. I enjoyed the character dynamics a lot and felt the author fleshed out the characters well. I loved this book and would definitely recommend it.

As a displaced Georgia girl I loved reading this book. It takes place in the Atlanta area where we find our main character Sierra. Sierra is a game developer. She has always dreamt of going to the gamers convention in Cologne Germany (another place I love). In order to get her coworkers to send her there she will need to present the newest game she is developing. The issue is, she is terrified of public speaking after an incident in college.

Her best friend Aida (a wonderful supporting character in this book) encourages her to sign up for an open mic night, of sorts, contest with the hope that it will help her overcome her fear. During the contest she meets a few more characters that I came to enjoy and a particular one that I did not.

I really loved getting to know the inner working of Sierra in this first person POV. I think Parker did a wonderful job with details and development. You can tell this is either first hand knowledge about gaming, or very well done research.

Dont let the gaming aspect veer you away from this story. It is so much more than that.

Thank you Kensington Books and Netgalley for the opportunity to read this one advanced. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

Let me start with what I liked and then...well, let's just start with what I liked.

Sierra Reid is part owner of a video game development company. She's smart, confident and talented. She loves her work, spends her days in the office alongside co-owner/best friend Aida, and evenings at home with Aida and her husband Marco (who also works with them) in the house they co-own in an affluent, desirable Atlanta suburb. Sierra hasn't had much luck finding her own happily ever after, and prefers one night stands to actual emotional intimacy. Although their gaming company is successful, the venture capitalist who funded their growth is looking for a bigger return on his investment. Sierra thinks their newest role-playing game could be the big success he's hoping for. Unfortunately, their usual pitch-person - Aida - is pregnant and due to deliver any day...so it falls to Sierra to pitch the game at a big European conference. And Sierra - after a horrifying experience in college - is terrified of speaking in public. She's managed to bungle or mortify herself at every public speaking opportunity she's had since, and all signs point to another disaster.

Aida is sympathetic, and she wants to help. She encourages Sierra to enter a contest at a local bar that pits contestants against one another as they reveal their most embarrassing experiences. She'll get practice speaking in public, share embarrassing stories with a bunch of other people sharing their own mortifying history, and possibly win $1,000. Aida convinces Sierra to go to the bar, but it's Alfie, the owner of the bar and a former college acquaintance, who gets her on the stage. His quiet support gives her the confidence to go for it, and go for it she does. Reading a page from a college journal, she reveals the cringe-inducing crush she had on another student, Tristan Spencer, who barely registered her existence. Then, just as she's exiting the stage, the next contestant is announced. You guessed it. It's Tristan. Oops.

Friends, I loved this set-up. Plausible, funny, mortifying...

But then the story unfolds, and it's bad. Really bad. Tristan is thrilled to learn about Sierra's crush and Sierra is thrilled he's finally noticing her...and ignores the fact that he calls her Sara the first few times they hang out. Reader, it's obvious to EVERY SINGLE PERSON ON EARTH EXCEPT SUPER SMART AND BRIGHT AND CONFIDENT Sierra that's he's a user and a loser, but we're supposed to keep pretending we can't see it. Meanwhile, sweet Alfie is in the background (lurking); he's kind and awesome and SUPER OBVIOUSLY INTO SIERRA WHO WAS APPARENTLY FRIENDS WITH HIM IN COLLEGE BUT DOESN'T REMEMBER (Yeah, I liked her in the beginning, but her obliviousness grew old fast), and he's secretly rich (I have no idea why this is part of his characterization except maybe to contrast with Tristan?). Big surprise to absolutely no one, Tristan turns out to be a dick, and Alfie turns out to be a hidden gem.

There is a love triangle of sorts here that could be compelling...but it's clunky and predictable, and Parker tries to do too many other things with this story. The contest becomes this farce to advance the narrative, with cookie cutter personalities battling it out over stories that are alternately painful and unfunny, and obviously made-up attempts to get a laugh from the reader. Such a wasted opportunity!
And then we have Sierra's backstory - which actually isn't all that terrible, secrets, creepy descriptions of sanitary napkins, purple prose, underdeveloped characters, and sex scenes featuring waterfalls, rainbows, solar systems...OH MY GOD. It's all terrible and it totally tanked any interest I had in this story. The dialogue is wooden and lacks any sort of nuance whatsoever, and the author is obsessed with Sierra internalizing whether her interactions with the men in her life are either Eros, Philia, or Agape versions of love. Don't ask. IT COMES UP OVER AND OVER AND OVER AND OVER AND OVER AND OVER AND OVER AND OVER AND OVER again and is based on some bizarre conversation she once had with her mother about sex and love. It made zero sense and yet Sierra thinks about it all the time.

I hated the misogynistic venture capitalist, struggled to buy into the bar owner who can take nights off and escape to his upstairs lair whenever he feels like it, predicted the ending long before we finally reached it. Such a disappointing end result from this very clever set-up.

Great premise, terrible delivery. And after all the colorful descriptions of Sierra's clothing, this cover is a 100% fail. It's an illustration! That's the best expression of Sierra in this story? Draw some gaming shit on the dress. Hard pass on the execution of this one from start to finish.

This was a really cute and fun debut novel by Lorelei Parker. I wasn't quite sure how I'd feel about the whole love triangle part since I usually don't like the whole 'dating 2 men at once' trope. But this wasn't really like that at all.

Sierra is a game developer and really wants to make the trip to Germany for her company to pitch the new game she developed. Only she's terrible at public speaking and botches a practice pitch with the person deciding if she'll represent the company at the event. So her best friend/roommate/business partner suggests she attend an open mic 'diary slam' at a local bar that will take place over several weeks. The grand prize of $1000 would pay for her to attend the event in Germany if her semi-boss wasn't willing to fund the trip. So she decides to read entries from her communications class diary from college - the class that led to her being embarrassed in front of the whole class and led to her being scared to speak in public again.

So when she starts reading the diary entry about her crush on Tristian, imagine her shock when Tristian is the next guy up to tell a story. She's embarrassed, he finds it charming and cute that she had a crush on him. They begin chatting and they go out a couple times. But something is off with Tristian. He's a bit smarmy and kind of a jerk when he doesn't get his way at times. I really didn't like him at all and was hoping she wouldn't end up with him, but on the other hand, I was kind of hoping he'd redeem himself and not be the guy he seemed to be deep down.

That's when Alfie comes in. He's the cute, charming, helpful bar owner that calm Sierra's nerves and encourages her to get up on stage. He also bears his own soul up on stage and tells some of his embarrassing stories, including some that seem familiar to Sierra (she didn't figure out they were classmates until later on in the book and didn't remember Alfie). He sees Tristian for who he is and he knew the old Tristian as well and how he was a jerk 10 years ago too. Sierra puts Alfie off quite often when he's flirting with her, but eventually she gives him a try at dating and it's so cute to see them together. Alfie is incredibly sweet and swoon-worthy. I just wanted to eat him up with a spoon.

Sierra did become quite annoying by the end. She was indecisive, naive and way too much 'woe is me' for me to really love her. She was good in the beginning, but I didn't like her much as a person by the end. So it's really Alfie who steals the show and makes the book.

In the end, they get their HEA, but it's not without a lot of drama. I look forward to more from the author.

This book was so amazing!! I laughed out loud at some parts and really fell in love with all the people in the story.

LOVED IT. It's a very fast read, well plotted and engaging. The main character is a developer at a video game company--a company she helped found, at that--dealing with a fear of public speaking that traces back to a bad experience in college. The love interests are well done, the side characters are beautifully fleshed out and interesting, and overall I LOVED it.

This book grabbed my attention from the moment I read the description. This book was hard to put down and kept me up until 4AM most nights. I loved the twist and turns as I followed Sierra in her journey to overcome personal obstacles in her personal and work life. There are plenty of comedic moments as cringe worthy excerpts are found throughout in personal narratives of other characters in the diary slam.

The only critique was in chapter 29, when Sierra said, "Capture Castle is a multimedia online..." Later in the chapter, Tristan said the acronym MMORPG. The statement above should have indicated that it was a "Massively Multiplayer," rather than just multiplayer. This elimination of the first M in the MMORPG can be a confusing discrepancy.

Thank you to Lorelei Parker, Kensington Books, and NetGalley for this complimentary copy in exchange for my honest review.

*Thank you to the publisher and Netgalley for providing an ARC in exchange for an honest review *

Crushing It overall a cute and easy read. I really enjoyed reading it. This was my first book by Lorelei Parker but it won't be my last!

Crushing it is about a Sierra a hardcore game developer with severe anxiety when it comes to public speaking due to an awful experience in her past. She needs to over come it so she can present a new game at convention in Germany for her company. Alfie is a bar owner and former college classmate who gives her the confidence boost she needs. Tristan is her college crush ready to prove he will do anything it takes to get what he wants. It's a modern day twist on the love triangle. That's jammed packed with video game references and some funny dialogue. Who gets the girl and can Sierra finally overcome her fear of public speaking?

I saw this book on bookstagram and knew I wanted to read it. I absolutely loved it. It drew me in and I didn't want to take a break. Definitely did not disappoint!

Overall this was a very cute and relatable story. Many of us have had some level of fear of public speaking, but Sierra has full-blown terror of it after a bad experience in college. She really wants to present her work at a gaming conference, though, so to face her fears she enters a local bar's contest to talk about embarrassing experiences from her past. Along the way she runs into two different men from her past, each of whom have something to do with her prior embarrassment.

Though I cringed at some of the embarrassing stories (as to be expected), I really enjoyed reading this book!

I liked the concept of the book and it definitely was an enjoyable read.
However I felt bored at some point and even though there were cute and funny moments at the end I wasn't swept of my feet.
Overall, it was an entertaining read but not a book I'd remember.

This was a super cute read. I especially liked that it was about a character gaining self confidence and coming out of her own shell. The romance was a nice addition. But I liked how it all centered around the main idea of Sierra gaining confidence in herself.
Usually I have a good sense of what the characters physically look like by the authors description, but with this book I struggled. I couldn’t get a good picture of what these characters looked like.

This book is about a woman who due to a bad experience in college is terrified of public speaking. She enters a contest to help her get over her fear where she comes face to face with 2 people from her past. You get to see how she deals with it and moves past it. There is also a romance involved. I liked this book and would read more from this author.

The story revolves around Sierra, a video game developer who suffers from stage fright. To conquer her fear, her best friend Aida suggests her to take part in a competition where a person has to get on stage and read embarrassing accounts about themselves from their old journals at a bar, sort of like a slam. As Sierra wants to give that big video game presentation at her workplace, she takes part in the slam contest to conquer her fear. As she confesses her decade old crush on Tristan Spencer, she didn't realize that Tristan was in the audience listening on. What follows then is something you'll have to read!
Sierra's development way shown throughout the book. Tristan is not a character I particularly liked but I found Alfie very sweet and kind. Aida was so protective of Sierra and I loved that too.
The slam concept was cool and the embarrassing stories of all the participants were entertaining to read about. The book as a whole was enjoyable and perfect for fans of Sophie Kinsella and the chick lit genre.

I really liked the premise of this book but it fell short for me. It started out as a decent rom-com but I started to get bored about 3/4 of the way through and could not get behind the character reveal in the end.

I received a copy of this novel from the publisher via NetGalley.

This took a while to get going for me, then I loved it in the middle, and wasn't that keen on the ending. It centres around a pub event where people share embarrassing past experiences in a competition. Sierra shares a journal entry from college about a boy she had a crush on, and then he turns out to be the next competitor. The blurb led me to believe that the humour of the book would be found here, but in fact the tone of the sections where people read out their competition entries was troubling to me.

There were very funny moments in the book, for example where Tristan claims to be good at video games, and then isn't at all, but there was a fair amount of ugliness as well. The hero was lovely and the romance well done, but the ending was a jolt I could have done without. I don't play online games, and I still enjoyed this book, but it is probably aimed at a younger readership than me.