I did not fall in love with this novel; I liked it fine, but didn’t love it.
What I liked: I really loved how the author tackled sexism in the workplace. This is such a current topic in our society, and I think as the main character, Melody tackles this issue in an incredible fashion. She doesn’t give up, or let them win. She goes after what she wants and that is so admirable, especially in a field dominated by white males, I also really liked Nolan! I enjoyed that they had chemistry, but built a great friendship first. That can be rare in iOS these days.
What I didn’t love: the writing fell a little flat for me. It felt a bit jerky at times, and I think there were some storylines that weren’t fleshed out as much as I would have liked..

This book is NOT a romance, but there is a romantic element to the story. I would recommend this book to anyone who likes gaming, and loves a good underdog story.

I actually really enjoyed this! I will say don’t go into this book expecting it to be fully romance & a hate to love story because honestly I don’t think it is.
It’s more about a woman working in a field dominated by men & having to prove herself time and time again. It’s got a ton of misogyny in it and honestly horrible men but you will root for the main character, Melody to stick it to these men over and over.
It does have some romance in it but it’s not the forefront of the book at all, I think if you know that you’ll like the book much more.

This book wasn’t for me, I admit. But, just because this book wasn’t for me doesn’t mean it won’t be for you! If you don’t want to dig into my full review (which has lots of more juicy details, by the way), here is something short and sweet – five reasons why you should read this book:

-Melody Joo never gives up. With all the shit she puts up with, she proves to be an incredibly strong heroine that faces the bullshit head on.
-Nolan is a nice guy. I think it’s rare that we see the ‘nice guy’ trope in romances. Nolan is a supportive guy who is totally different than his asshole colleagues. If you like a hero who is a nice guy, this book would do the trick.
-Enter the gaming world. I’d like more books set in the gaming world! I love to game casually myself. It’s realistic to how women are treated in gaming communities and how women are portrayed in games.
-Realistic portrayal of harassment. This book is hard to read because it’s realistic. But, in that same note, it’s important reality that needs to be told. Because that reality needs to change.
-A badass all-woman secret techie-group that helps save Melody. I won’t say more, but you’ll meet this group in the book. I’d love a book just about them!

Check out my full review here: https://nikkiswiftreads.com/book-review-loathe-at-first-sight-by-suzanne-park-upcoming-release/

I was really excited by the premise of Loathe at First Sight. It’s easy to root for a heroine who is in a hostile environment, and enemies-to-lovers is a well-established trope, especially in the workplace. I liked a lot about the book, but the end was unsatisfying.

Melody Joo is a young woman in her mid-twenties, living in Seattle. She’s just made an exciting career jump from advertising to the gaming industry, and become a producer at Seventeen Studios. Almost immediately, she fears that this is a mistake. The environment is not what we would call hospitable; in her first week, Melody rarely sees a friendly face, with the exception of her colleague, Kat, one of the few women at her office. To add insult to injury, Melody is booted from her desk and shunted to a shared office to make room for an MBA intern - Nolan MacKenzie, who happens to be the nephew of the company’s CEO. Said CEO is Ian MacKenzie, a gaming titan with the manners and temperament of a feudal despot. Despite his handsome features, Nolan does not make a good first impression; he’s a well-connected, rich white guy who is taking advantage of nepotism. Then he goes and breaks Melody’s coffee mug, landing him firmly into asshole territory.

If plopping feet-first in a misogynistic and racist office culture isn’t enough, Melody mis-steps by making a joke where her boss can hear it, and then an off-hand remark to Kat turns into a giant, scary project. Melody has to face down the sexism of the gaming industry, her disagreeable co-workers, and the challenges of developing her first game. To her chagrin, Ian foists Nolan onto Melody’s team, and she is forced to slowly acknowledge how smart, kind, and funny he is. She can’t get involved with him, because she is technically his boss, and her officemate Asher is looking for any reason to get Melody in trouble.

When Melody becomes the target of a persistent harassment campaign, she has to decide if the career she could have in gaming is worth it. Coupled with this, she has to face constant obstacles from Ian, who doesn’t seem to want her game to be successful, despite being the one who greenlit the project. Her growing feelings for Nolan add to Melody’s internal conflict, and she is increasingly torn between her desire for success, and her need for emotional intimacy.

Melody is a relatable heroine. She’s a successful woman, but she still enjoys microwave meals and sitting around at home, and when she gets strong-armed into difficult situations, she finds her own way out. Melody’s parents are notable presences in the book, and they are as overbearing as they are amusing, but while they love and support Melody, they have the stereotypical ethnic family gripe of wishing she was married with babies. Melody’s work struggles are infuriating to read about, and you really feel for her.

Melody’s friends are a little underwritten; they seem to be stock-character best friends who get drinks and hang out. I really liked Jane, just because she’s strongly - even though not entirely positively - characterized. Candace, Melody’s other friend, is a publicist, and that’s pretty much it, and their boyfriends are similarly bland and unremarkable. Weak secondary characters distract from the strong parts of the narrative, which lie in the workplace conflict and Melody’s chemistry with Nolan. The romance does play second fiddle to Melody’s work challenges, but it’s still one of the best parts of the book.

Nolan is a great leading man - he expresses himself well and provides support for Melody when she needs it. His is a realistic portrayal of a young man who grew up with privilege and advantages, but is completely unaware of that fact. This doesn’t make him unlikable, but it does present an additional obstacle to a relationship with Melody, an obstacle I’m not sure is fully resolved.

Ian, Melody’s boss, is an antagonist it’s easy to hate without his being a cartoon villain. He’s just a regular bad guy, which only makes him more realistic. The secondary antagonists are also pretty well-written, easy to dislike without being ridiculous. I did, however, find the ending to be somewhat unsatisfying, in that it didn’t really live up to the compelling beginning, and it kind of fell flat, especially given that the stakes were so high earlier in the story. It also seemed as though big conflicts were only partially resolved, and the ends were tied up with just a few lines in the last chapter and the epilogue. Melody’s work life is such a vibrant, interesting place, partially because of the conflict she constantly deals with, and partially because her co-workers are fleshed-out characters. It makes her personal interactions with her friends seem dull by comparison.

In general, however, Loathe at First Sight is an enjoyable, fun read, with some really great moments. Melody is a strong point-of-view character, and her story is really interesting. The less polished parts of the book detracted from my enjoyment a little, but the book is still a fascinating introduction to the world of game creation and the culture that surrounds it, as well as a sweet, romantic story.

~ Rachel Finston

Buy it at: Amazon, Audible, or your local independent bookstore
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More of a feminist workplace book. Barely any romance. And definitely not an enemies to lovers rom com. I kept confusing Asher and Nolan. I liked it more than her debut YA novel but felt like the marketing team pulled a bait and switch again. I enjoyed the scenes with Melody’s parents especially at the buffet the best.

Loathe at First Sight is set in an industry I have not typically seen many books written about. It gives us a glimpse of the gaming industry from the perspective of a female lead character who goes against classic stereotypes. Melody is an assertive Asian woman who is more soft than bone, likes food more than dieting, and is truly comfortable in her skin. She's funny. She's straight forward. She sticks up for herself when necessary. Being assertive can also have its downsides. Having to stick up for herself and having to push back when her abilities are called into question also means she doesn't typically ask for help nearly as much as she could or should. (Is there room for character growth? Yes, yes there is.) Melody is a likable main character and easily kept me entertained.

While the book is entertaining, where it might trip up readers is in the romance department. The title suggests this is an enemies-to-lovers romantic comedy but the romance actually takes a back seat. Additionally, it also never became a full-blown romance. Those expecting romance might be turned off by this aspect of the book.

Even though the romance is not central to the story, the book and Melody are compelling enough to read it to the end. To be honest, I forgot about the romance until I was more than half-way through the book. I was immersed in Melody's story, the story of a woman who is trying to navigate an industry that doesn't expect her to succeed. There is a push for diversity and inclusion but the existing culture--at least at the company she works in--doesn't take it seriously, refusing to embrace the need for change.

Melody's parents and her interactions with them are the highlights of the novel. Her parents are utilized as comedic relief and they hit the mark every time. It's certainly possible to see her parents as unpleasant and rude, but I was able to enjoy this largely because I saw Melody's mom as being nearly a reflection of my mom. I have to admit that it is a bit pleasing to see others share my frustration. Misery does love company...even if it's the company of a fictional character.

Overall, Loathe at First Sight is an enjoyable read. There was something every few pages that would just set me off and I would laugh despite myself. I enjoyed it so much, I purchased a physical copy.

The best thing I have to say about Loathe at First Sight is that it isn't very long. That isn't even damning with faint praise, I was just glad to finish. I had such high hopes - I love the enemies-to-lovers trope in romcoms, the cover is cute, and the video game background sounded so promising. But the actual novel was one of the biggest disappointments I've read in a while. For starters, the enemies-to-lovers romcom promised by the cover, title, and marketing copy? Barely present. Protagonist Melody and office crush Nolan are kind of enemy-ish for about five minutes (more like irritating co-worker, but I can work with that)... but then they get over that, and very quickly become perfectly amiable coworkers who are obviously attracted to one another. Okay, so much for that. But the romance takes a backseat, as the main plot is really focused on Melody's struggles at her new job, a video game company, where she's found herself thrown into a lead producer position on a title that was a joke idea in the first place and is given minimal support from the company, dealing with virulent misogyny in the office as well as a GamerGate-esque harassment campaign online, as news of the "feminist" (allegedly) (ohhh so allegedly) game leaks. Meanwhile, she's also stuck being maid of honor to a bridezilla friend, while her parents nag her to get a boyfriend already. All of which would be a perfectly fine plot, if it was what was promised, but...

However, in practice, even those plot elements are painfully, frustratingly mishandled. The theme of sexual harassment at work makes a weird background for...Melody actually lusting after her intern the whole time, and the so-called "feminism" is, across the board, superficial and hypocritical - for instance, Melody (rightly) tells off a co-worker for referring to adult women as "girls", while doing the same herself. That seems like a small example, but the book is rife with such tiny, trivial, incredibly frustrating details. There's a weird scene where Melody, who has more than once assured us that she's a size Medium, tries to fit into an XS t-shirt; a male coworker offers her his Large tee instead, saying something about how it's better than an S. She quickly assures him that actually this is an EXTRA small, and then, when she apologizes for the "weirdness" of mentioning that, he assures her that he has a wife and daughters, so he's used to that kind of thing. You know, that girly talk, about...T-shirt sizes.

And that wasn't even an example of her coworkers' sexism.

Melody is simply an unpleasant, cranky, entirely unlikeable heroine, whose "quirky" traits just make her sound immature and selfish. The maid-of-honor plotline, for instance, hinges entirely on the idea that Jane, the bride, is shallow, loves to throw money around, and is a total control freak bridezilla...but the examples of this we see are things like sampling cake flavors that sounded pretty good to me (but that, to Melody, sound gross - which she makes sure to tell Jane out loud. Jane then ends up getting a chocolate cake AS WELL because God forbid Melody and her five-year-old tastebuds go without cake at someone else's wedding), wanting an expensive wedding gown (although even there, if the point is to show how she throws money around, it fails weirdly - she tries on a dress that's nearly twice her budget, tells the saleswoman that's too much, and gets it discounted and is able to afford it. Great! She wasn't even rude to the saleswoman in accomplishing this! So... what's the issue here? Is it that she makes more money than Melody?), throwing an engagement party (excuse me, a "pre-rehearsal rehearsal dinner," as Melody insists on calling it, finding that weird) and then not even being annoyed when the other bridesmaid announces both a pregnancy and her own engagement at it, and having a schedule for her bachelorette party (schedule: pick up bridesmaid at this time, reservation at this time. That's it. Melody calls this level of planning "neurotic"). She is, admittedly, passive-aggressive to Melody about her weight a couple of times (suggests that they go on a diet together), but Melody is constantly acting disgusted by how big her officemate is, and mocking women with bigger bra sizes than her, so you know what, I don't have a lot of sympathy there.

Anyway, Justice for Jane, she sounds like a perfectly normal, albeit much richer than me, woman trying to have the wedding of her dreams even though she doesn't appear to have a single real friend. No justice for Melody, who is a detestable heroine who legitimately thinks that women had it better in "the olden days" of art, because artists back then CELEBRATED women in their paintings, in contrast to the trolls tweeting her death threats for daring to be a woman in the gaming industry. (Don't ask me what the one has to do with the other.) (And really don't ask me what Melody thinks the female artists "back then" were doing, her feminism hasn't reached that far.)

In case you can't tell, Loathe at First Sight left me seething, and the only reason I finished it is because I try to read every word of an ARC before writing a review. But it isn't just the badly pasted-on pseudo-feminism that irritated me, but the actual writing - there's a Chekhov's gun situation with a cat allergy that just...filled a scene and then went nowhere, for instance, and the whole thing felt stretched and padded with story lines and plot elements that didn't lead to anything. It just wasn't a good book, from start to finish.

Cute (if misleading) cover, though.

I received a copy of Loathe at First Sight from NetGalley and Avon Books in exchange for an honest review.

DNF @ 30%.

Y’all, I can’t keep going.

I was initially drawn to this own voices story because it was an enemies to lovers romance featuring a Korean-American female protagonist working in the male dominated gaming industry.

I emailed the publisher when Melody was describing her favorite mug that has the atomic structure of caffeine on it (C8H10N4O2). That is a molecular formula. Not an atomic structure. I immediately was put off because I can’t stand the misuse of chemistry terminology to sound more intelligent especially since it’s my field.

The sheer misogyny and racism that is constantly thrown in the reader’s face makes it difficult to focus on Melody, our MC. As a female who got a Ph.D. in a male dominated field, all this did was give me flashbacks to the bullshit that I had to endure in grad school. And considering this is supposed to be a romance, I couldn’t get past this. This book is so triggering.

I understand that Melody’s parents are Korean immigrants and the author portrays them as being set in their ways (to the point of toxicity). The comment about the Black car hire driver was infuriating since it was just glossed over. That was an opportunity for the author to address that her parents’ views were problematic versus just saying “uh-oh”.

Also, I want the feminist video game that Melody came up with was zombie apocalypse featuring male strippers who attacked supernatural characters. Why do female gamers need male strippers in order to be interested in a game? Isn’t that doing the exact same thing that male game developers are doing? That was so gross and honestly showed that the author doesn’t know female gamers.

This book is a huge nope.

“Loathe at First Sight” by Suzanne Park is a timely and relevant women’s fiction novel that sheds light on the struggles of a female/minority placed in a predominantly white male working environment in the gaming industry.

Snarky, entertaining, and glaringly accurate, this book makes for a compelling argument on why the work force needs more diversification and inclusivity. I wish I could make every white male CEO read this book!

Blurb: Melody Joo is the newest video game producer at her gaming company and faces sexism, racism, and internet bullying at every turn. Melody fights hard to overcome each obstacle, embarking on a journey of learning to accept help and find love along the way.

There is almost no romance in this book, but I immensely enjoyed the topic of inclusivity and sexism. Pretty much every sort of harassment a woman faces in the work force was addressed. Melody was a bold, kick butt female heroine and I loved the hints of attraction laces through-out the book. There’s even a little surprise in the epilogue that left me completely satisfied. A solid new voice for women, Park made this book an easy read for me, despite having little to no romance.

Loathe at First Sight was so much fun to read!

This book was so much more than your typical romcom. It deals with serious issues and focuses largely on Melody's experience with racism and sexism in the gaming industry.

Melody smashes the patriarchy in the wittiest ways! I loved her sense of humour and was constantly smiling to myself. Nolan is so sweet and supportive! This isn't exactly the enemies to lovers plot I was expecting but I still really enjoyed the romance. I was rooting for Melody and Nolan the whole way through.

I really liked Suzanne Park's writing style and pace. I found it easy and enjoyable to read. I couldn't put the book down! I'd love to read more of Suzanne Park's books in the future.

Thank you so much to the publisher for sending me an e-arc!

If you are expecting an enemies-to-lovers romance trope because of the title, you are in a rude awakening. While romance is part of the plot, I was more focused on the realistic portrayal of what life is like for many women, especially women of color, in a profession dominated by white males. Melody joo is a video producer new to her job at Seventeen Studios but the work environment is anything but friendly. Granted, she does come across some friends but the gaming industry revealed that it is a racist, misogynistic, cyberbullying work environment that wants women like Melody to fail. Realistically and unfortunately, there are work environments like that and Suzanne Park wrote the frustration, the fear, the anger spot on. Melody is a woman and Korean-American that works for men and their “bro” culture habits. But she pushed through by being her own smart, funny, savvy, flawed female self. While her parents do want her to find a husband and her friends want her to date someone and help them with their own stuff, Melody pulls through and accomplishes without giving up.

Thank you NetGalley and Harper Collins for this e-book in exchange for an honest review. Loathe of First Sight comes out August 18th, 2020! Go get your copy now.

A rom-com with a video game twist! This book is smart and funny and such a good read. I am already recommending it to book clubs and rom-com fans. The writing is great. The characters are a lot of fun. I can't wait to see what else Suzanne Park has to offer in the future.

This was SUCH an entertaining read! Melody, our heroine who has such great voice and is trying to thrive in a male-dominated profession!

The romance is sweet and engaging.

Highly recommend!

When I saw this book advertised as being for fans of Jasmine Guillory or Sally Thorne, and had an Asian protagonist, I snapped this one right up, and I’m so glad I did!

I’m a big fan of enemies to lovers romances, although the enemy in this one is not truly an enemy, Nolan is actually a great guy pretty much from the beginning. Melody’s real enemy (and there are lots of them) is far more sinister. I actually think the marketing of this one is a little off. The romance doesn’t seem to be the main storyline, taking a back seat to Melody’s work life. Luckily, that is super interesting, so I did not mind very much.

I really liked the setting of this book. I enjoyed seeing a hardworking female in a male-dominated industry handle both sexism and racism, which ran rampant. I thought Melody’s game idea was hilarious, and I liked seeing a behind-the-scenes look at how video games come to life.

With no explicit sex, this is a great book for those who just want a little romance and love story along with their story of female empowerment. Not a strict romance, but sweet and fun, and a great read.

REVIEW {gifted} #LoatheAtFirstSight by Suzanne Park follows Melody Joo. Melody is thrilled to land her dream job as a video game producer, but her new position comes with its share of challenges, including the infuriating ― yet distractingly handsome ― intern Nolan McKenzie. After creating a mobile game that has male strippers fighting for survival in a post-apocalyptic world, Melody's running the show on her studio's most high-profile project. But a slew of complications arise, including a social media trolling scandal that could end her career. Could the man she’s falling hard for help her play the game to win ― in work and love?

This book was- for the most part- a fun, lighthearted, easy read. The author was a comedian in a former life, and this definitely comes through in the writing – it was witty and had me chuckling out loud in parts. It is billed as an “enemies to lovers” romance, but for me it was a little light on the romance, and also a little light on the “enemies” part – it felt a bit more like “mildly irritating colleagues to friends to lovers” (is that a genre??). It is also very heavy on the toxic work culture. The reader is bombarded with example after example of sexism, racism, harassment, humiliation, bullying, even all-out death threats. I know that the author was trying to make a point here, and I’ve never worked in a video game company so this could well be an accurate portrayal of the environment (in which case DEAR GOD why does anyone work for video game companies??) but it was just a little much for me at times, and was a bit too much of a contrast to the “feel good” message of the rest of the book. Having said that, I didn’t mind so much that there wasn’t really much romance, as I thought the focus on Melody and her career was great. I do love an underdog story and watching Melody come into her own by the end and prove her haters wrong was extremely satisfying

All up, an enjoyable enough read but missed the mark just a little for me.

Thank you to @booksforwardpr for sending me a free copy of this book for review. All opinions are my own

3.5 ⭐️’s
Release date: Aug. 18th

Loathe At First Sight is about a woman working within the gaming industry and the challenges she faces. When I say challenges, I mean she is degraded, harassed by co-workers and trolls online, threatened, stalked, doxxed...it is just atrocious. I was angry at the male population she was surrounded by for most of the book. It irks my soul that women are treated like this. It’s crap. I would use stronger words, but I’ll keep it PC.

That was the main subject the book focused on, so I’m still sitting here wondering why Loathe At First Sight was chosen as the title. Yes, there was a hate to love relationship that happened within the novel, but it was a smaller storyline than the atrocities Melody faced. So that threw me off a bit. Going in, I thought I was getting a love story, but it was a lot more than that.

Another thing I wanted to focus on was the conversations with her parents. I found them to be hilarious, and loved Melody’s interactions with them. Her best friends were also pretty entertaining! There were quite a few times I laughed literally out loud. Makes me happy when that happens.

If you are a part of the gaming world, I think you would enjoy this. It was a cute, funny, but also angering, read.

Thank you to @netgalley and @harpercollins for the advanced copy for my honest review! ❤️

This was more funny than romantic, which I wasn't expecting but did enjoy. It was honestly more about the challenges of being a woman in a male-dominated field over being a woman looking for love. It was really refreshing in that respect and definitely made me think. If you love a slow burn rather than actual physical contact, this is the book for you!

Loathe at First Sight comes out later this month on August 18, 2020, and you can purchase HERE. If you love gaming, I would highly recommend this one!

The group of developers gaped as I barged into the almost-empty conference room. The wrong conference room. With beads of sweat on my forehead and upper lip, I panted, "Is. This. Tolkien.Room?".

Thanks Net Galley for providing me with a digital ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Loathe at First Sight by Suzanne Park was smart, witty, romantic, and charming. I liked Melody; she's smart, hardworking, a great friend, and a strong woman. Park did an excellent job of making Melody's experience at working in the gaming industry authentic and believable. Every time she was knocked down by misogyny, casual, and overt racism and just straight assholes, I rooted for her to get back up.

I don't think the title matched the book. I think the romantic aspect served as a good sub-plot, but the storyline very much centered around Melody being the underdog in a white male-dominated environment. Not entirely misleading, but the title doesn't really give what the story is about justice.

Another thing I didn't love, the budding relationship between Nolan and Melody was kind of lacking. It felt like I was reading about an office crush that should have fizzled out over time.

Overall, great read.

I so wanted to love Loathe at First Sight, a rom-com/chick-lit read featuring a Korean American mc *and* set in the cutthroat (and renowned den of toxic masculinity) set in the gaming development role. But everything felt so scripted: the mc is quirky! but also kind of a doormat who has to learn to really stand up for herself with her friends, family, her job, and herself! It's like every box of stereotypes you could check was brought out and crossed off and what could have and should have been a charming, clever read turns into a slogfest that left me feeling like Loathe at First Sight is sadly very aptly named.

Synopsis: Melody Joo just landed her dream job as a video game producer but the company she works for is full of issues, including but not limited to its CEO and the new handsome intern, who happens to be the CEO’s nephew. On top of all this, her jokey game pitch is now becoming a reality — and the pressure is on, especially when someone leaks top-secret intel and the internet trolls come after her. Failure is not an option.

I really, really wanted to like Loathe At First Sight by Suzanne Park and it had some great elements — but something kept holding me back. At first, I thought it was that I just don’t care about video games, but after some consideration, I think I just didn’t really like Melody or really many of the other characters? That sounds incredibly harsh, and I did like Melody’s go-getter attitude, intelligence and how dedicated she was to not letting the bullies get her down, but she wasn’t particularly nice to her friends, in like a concerningly old-fashioned women-hating-women way that acted as an antithesis to the overall message of “girl power” that the book was trying to push, and I felt like I never got to know her on more than a surface level. The male characters also felt somewhat underdeveloped, something I didn’t mind when it came from the sexist CEO, but irritated me when I wanted to know more about the romantic interest.

I also think that this book comes across from the cover and description as somewhat of a romance and I want to warn everyone that it’s an incredibly small portion of the overall plot. Primarily, it deals with the extremely sexist and racist aspects of the gaming industry and how hard it is to be a woman, much less a Korean-American woman, in any male-dominated industry. I want to issue full TWs for sexist and racist remarks, including slurs, threats of violence, and doxing.

So for me, I’d recommend this one if you’re a woman in the gaming industry, wanting to learn more about the gaming industry or love video games — otherwise, I’m just not sure what I missed because I felt like I should’ve liked it and just didn’t.