A Reformer and an Enthusiast. Meddling Grannies. And a one-in-a-lifetime bid.

You know, I've been reading a lot of romance lately, and oftentimes when you run into the "Enemies turned Lovers" trope, it's hard to believe that these two people who HATED each other three hundred pages ago are now deeply and irrevocably in love - but with Max & Aggie, I'm tempted to believe it!

After being forced to work together (in a very small space mind you) by their grandmothers, Aggie & Max constantly butt heads. Aggie is a free-spirit who is determined to not settle for a job that is anything less than her dream. Max is hard-headed & set in his routine - he has put in A LOT of work to get where he is & away from his silver spoon childhood, and he's not about to let an Enneagram 7 ruin that for him.

But as the two work together and learn that there's more than meets the eye (how cliche right?), they discover they actually have a lot more in common than they originally thought! While Aggie is a drifter, she is also VASTLY determined when she discovers something that is important to her. And while Max is driven and creative, he needs Aggie to see all of the possibilities a project could be.

I will say, one thing that aggravated me about these two was that they were both WAY too stuck in their own heads! Instead of TALKING to each other, many times they ran forward with their assumptions about the other & would take seventeen steps back in their new & precarious relationship. Aggie has a chip on her shoulder about being poor growing up, and she thinks that EVERYONE she meets can see it written all over her face that she didn't come from money. Max is stuck in the idea that Aggie is flighty & can't hold a job, so every time she steps even a little bit out of line or seems to make a decision differently than he would, he flips out!

HOWEVER, while it was irritating to see the two of them continue to backpedal in their relationship every time there was a misunderstanding, it made their reconciliations & deep conversations that much more gratifying to the reader (& I would presume to the characters).

Definitely enjoyed this book!

Which, if you doubt me, I finished it in less than 24 hours. So there's that.

Aggie the Horrible vs. Max the Pompous, a rom-com by Lisa Wells, is, for the most part flirty and fun.

In the past year Aggie Johanssen (disregard the name in the blurb as it’s not the same as in the book) has been through more jobs than can be imagined, which makes her Meemaw worry about her. Her Meemaw arranges for her to get an interview with Max Treadwell, who buys and flips properties. Max recognizes that his own grandmother and Aggie’s are up to something, but he agrees to give Aggie an interview to be his temporary assistant until his permanent one returns from maternity leave. He just doesn’t promise to his grandmother that the interview alone won’t make Aggie go screaming out of the building.

Aggie the Horrible vs. Max the Pompous has a lot of promise and manages to come through on a lot of it. Aggie and Max are both fun characters, although Aggie’s obsession with the fact that she comes from the wrong side of the tracks gets old really quickly merely from the fact that it’s mentioned so very often. Her lack of self-esteem, which is sometimes at odds with her confident sauciness, makes her question things that should be self-evident if she thought about them. And, actually that’s one of the bothersome things here because Aggie is smart. A person is not going to offer you a job if they’re just intent on getting rid of you. That doesn’t make sense.

Regardless, I let those things go (evidently mostly) because Aggie the Horrible vs. Max the Pompous did prove to be fun escapist fare. And I let it the little things that didn’t make sense go until the end. I expected a grand gesture but the end fizzled out like a dud firework. But even worse than the fizzling was that sex was pretty much being used as the apology, which is wrong on so many levels after they parted the way they did. Wrong. Just wrong. I thought it demeaning that anyone would think that insulting words and bad behavior could be dismissed by sex–even in a long term relationship that might be pushing it.

Up until the ending, this was a pretty solid, above-average read. The question is: how much emphasis do we put on the end in a rom-com? At the very least, we should come away feeling happy and even the epilogue didn’t get me there. For that reason, that ending dropped a solid point from this rating. Maybe others won’t mind the ending as much as I did.

I received an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Aggie the Horrible vs. Max the Pompous Ass was a funny, sweet and sexy book. I really enjoyed Aggie’s character, she was feisty and bold and charming, such a peach! I liked how she and Max interacted, how someone so buttoned up as Max had to know deal with the adventurous and wild Aggie. The premise for the story was great, as where the meddling grandmothers, and the sexy times where quite steamy indeed. Overall a fun read that had happy, hilarious and sad moments all mixed together.

This book follows the Aggie, a woman from the "wrong side of the tracks" and Max, who was born with a silver spoon in his mouth, as they are forced together due to the meddling of their two grandmothers. This book takes place in Kansas City and Aggie & her grandmother lay the Southern Charm™ on thick. Neither Max nor Aggie want to be set up by their grandmothers, but both wish to please & honor them, so they go along with the scheming while trying to pull their own punches. The book quickly goes from Max and Aggie hating each other to them liking each other (while still saying they hate each other), with talk of like-like and jealousy. This would be what I consider an enemies to lovers story, but it isn't so clearly delineated as others you might read with this troupe.

Spoilers below in terms of pros/cons:

Pros: They feel like real people with real problems. Aggie has a lot of baggage and familial issues that lead her to act irrationally. Max comes from a very privileged background and therefore has a hard time seeing outside of his bubble at times. The way they eventually fall for each other doesn't happen in a lightening strike moment which is more realistic in my opinion.

Cons: This is probably a personal thing, but I really couldn't deal with some of the bullheadedness that Aggie and Max had. I know both of them have baggage and were protecting their hearts, but they both were making things worse for themselves by not communicating like adults and just acting without thinking. They were constantly quick to provoke one another, yet were very slow to try and work through anything.

Overall, this was an easy read that I did enjoy, and I would give it a 3.5/4 out of 5. Pick it up if you want a nice weekend enemies to lovers.

This book reminded me of one of my favorite rom-com books: The Hating Game. I liked the dialogue between the two main characters. But most of all I liked the free spirit Aggie and I liked that how her relationship with Max developed. This is a great summer read and adds it to your reading list.

A sexy funny story about two single who get to work together for 2 months and try to resist their feelings . Their grandmothers were amazing characters . It had some very funny moments but also some very sad that made me cry .
I received this novel from net galley and the publisher as an ARC. Thank you! All thoughts and opinions are my own.

I'm a huge fan of romance and when this book came out on NetGalley I was intrigued by its Synopsys and the beautiful cover. So thank you for granting me the privilege of a copy.

Now, let's talk about the book.
I believe this is a debut novel for Lisa Wells and I must say is not as bad as some debut novels are, is not perfect (what book is, anyway) but is not awful either, so I give it 3 stars.

It's longer than I would have expected from a romance, but it's easy to read and it comes to an end pretty quickly.

The story revolves around Agnes and Maxwell who couldn't be more different from each other, Agnes (Aggie) lives on the poor and wrong side of the railroad in Kansas City (like...literally) with her grandmother, she graduated bottom of her class from college, and can't keep a job, Maxwell (Max, or Maxi for his Granny) is rich, well educated and a little bit snob.
The two meet because their respective grandmothers are good friends and love to play matchmaking, since Agnes needs a job and Max of a new assistant, two and two together!

The premisiss are good, but unfortunatelly are not very well executed.
I loved the general idea but I've found the plot a little bit too crowded and sometimes a little messy, this should have been an "enemies to lover" but I've read a lot about lovers and a little of the enemies part.
Max and Aggie like each other from chapter 2 and start to flirt, I thought it was way too soon, let them fight and hate each other, everything else can develop throughout the rest of the book.
I also think the way Agnes flirts is a little too racy and Max gets aroused way too quickly (he just looks at her and BOOM!).

There's also too much drama, the relashionship between Max and his father, the main chatracters background, the main characters present, Aggie's mother...too much on the plate.

Some events are not credible (such as the fact that Agnes manages to paint a whole office by herself, in hal a day), but hey, if those are the circumstances given by the author one has to believe them...so I just let it go.

Moreover, I think that the use of "Grandmother", "Father" " Son" and "Memaw" is a little bit too much, it's heavy to read and sometimes unnecessary (there are parts where a simple narrator voice would have done the job), I believe is custom of some parts of the US, but international readers cannot really relate to that (🙋🏻‍♀️).

The ending it's fun and looks like a movie ending, even though I'd have cut the spicy scene in the last chapter 😂 (fun but not that romantic). The Epilogue is a very nice closure though.

Now, let's talk about what I actually liked: The characters.
I think Agnes and Max are very well written, they have their own personality and have a reason to be that way (finally, I've read too many books with dull and plain characters lately).
Also, Maxwell is such a good name, great choice.

Their arc is also well written, they both try to hide the best part of themselves that comes out at the end.
The reasons why the characters behave the way they do and have the personalities they have, is much more profound than one would expect and the author explains it masterfully (they both have a painful background).

My favorite was Aggie, the best quote of the book? Hold the rocks, leave the bottle. SO FUN!
She's a force of nature and is very fun to read, maybe she could flirt in a more subtle way but she's still the "comic relief" of this book.
The grandmothers are awesome and so sweet, just as I thought a Midwestern granny would be.
Such peaches (to quote Aggie again).

So, as I said, the plot is a little bit messy and too crowded, but the characters writing balance that pretty well.
To be a debut novel I wasn't that disappointed and I hope Lisa Wells will come out with another book, her characters are truly unique and fun.

I'll follow up with a similar and more reader-friendly review on GoodReads.

Thanks for giving me this opportunity, please keep on writing great charachters.

Thank you NetGalley, Entangled Publishing and Author for this advance ebook copy!

This book was so excellent. like the blurb says, its about a lady Aggie, who shows up for an interview and she totally didn't expect to see entrepreneur Max. So now she has one goal in in mind..... To not get offered this job! Her grandmothers who are trying to play matchmaker will be disappointed because they pressured Max into hiring her. She wants nothing to do with this pity job.....

The last thing Max wants to do is give the job to Aggie. The woman is who is annoying and lets not mention how many other jobs she's has already been through! But he might have promised grandmother he would hire her. So hopefully she won't take it..... It won't be his fault... Right?
His company is is roaring and the last thing he needs is some one to screw it all up as a person assistant!

Obviously they want to disappoint their grandmother's so they find themselves stuck working together.
Aggie's only option is to be that worst assistant ever!
Max can just wait till she quits.... How hard van this be?

But no one could have ever seen what happens next!!!
Read to find out!


The writing was great, easy to read and fast paced. The characters are the best thing in this book.
I seriously couldn't have enjoyed a better romance novel!
This was seriously great, I enjoyed the way these two characters carried on, the banter was hilarious.

You'll just have to read this awesome romance!

Thank you again for this advance ebook copy!
I'll post to my Goodreads and Bookstagram account closer to pub date!.