Very cutie and romantic, I wasn’t expecting to like it that much! Such an incredible story placed in a work and office situation. The characters are <333 really liked it!

I want to start this review by giving a huge thank you to Netgalley and Storm Publishing for providing me with an e-book of The Love Hack to read in exchange for an honest review!!

The Love Hack was such an unexpectedly adorable and wholesome story. When I read the blurb I expected a lot more romance than what was delivered, but instead I got a wholesome sister dynamic and a really cute cat!

The story

Like I mentioned, the blurb kind of gave me the impression that this would be a romance centered story, instead I kind of got a story based on the relationship between a tech-savvy woman named Lucy, and her sister Amelie. Lucy, in the midst of losing her job manages to save herself from being fired by coming up with a column idea called “Ask Adam”. The column focuses on men sending in questions and looking for advice on relationships, friendships, or anything else. Lucy, tasked with the job of answering these questions, was posing as “Adam” a man who could give advice to these men.

When Lucy’s sister finds herself in trouble after getting married and moving to New York, she has no choice but to drop everything and rush to her sisters side. Playing detective, Lucy works to find out why her sister is struggling in her new marriage and how to best help her through her situation.

Meanwhile, a budding relationships forms between Lucy and her coworker Ross. While Lucy battles with her growing feelings for Ross, she has to figure out whether it’s worth hurting over if something eventually goes wrong.

The characters

I feel like I found myself relating a lot to Lucy. She reminded me a lot of Cath from Rainbow Rowell’s Fangirl that I read when I was younger, and both characters give me major nerdy vibes. Lucy, a homebody with her cat, was a funny and relatable character that I found myself enjoying reading about. She was easy to get behind, easy to understand.

Amelie was kind of all over the place but she made me adore her. Maybe it was the sisterly love of being in Lucy’s perspective, but I feel like her personality was just so bright and bubbly and I loved it.

Ross was absolutely adorable. A man that blushes? Sign me up! I feel like for a romance we definitely didn’t get a lot of… well, romance, so I’d like to have seen more of Ross and how his relationship with Lucy developed over time.

The writing style

This book was such an easy read, I found myself getting through it super fast. I’ve never read any of Ranald’s books before but I’d definitely check out some of her other ones after reading this!

Do I recommend?

Honestly for a romance, it didn’t give romance. I feel like it was a super cute contemporary read, but if you’re looking for romance this probably isn’t for you. It was an interesting story (it reminded me a little bit of those hallmark Christmas movies), but it was super cute and a super easy read!

Rating: 3/5⭐️

This was one of those excellent mindless beach read kinda books. A bit of flashback drama mostly and love triangle confusion but low on the stress meter, overall. With that said, I didn't find any of the characters particularly ...loveable? Which I guess doesn't matter but I am typically a very character-driven person so I could basically tell it would be otherwise after a few chapters.

DNF'ing because this is just not what I expected by the synopsis and the comparisons it made. Not for me, I guess. Thank you netgalley for the arc.

This was an absolutely heart warming story that makes you feel so connected to each character. Whether it is the dynamic between two sisters, co-workers, or a crush, they were all so relatable. It was so cute watching the awkward crush progress through time as Lucy steps into a new job and incredibly foreign position in life. Lucy struggles to navigate her "Ask Adam" column and needs help to understand men. She is faced with an incredibly hard dilemma when she recognizes a letter that was sent into the column. This book could have used a little bit more chemistry between the love interest, but it did start to kick up at the end. Overall, very cute story and super easy to read and connect to. Huge thank you to Sophie Ranald, Storm Publishing, and NetGalley for this advanced copy.

When I first started reading *The Love Hack*, I wasn't sure if it was for me. Initially, I struggled to connect with the protagonist, Lucy, as she came across as somewhat frustrating and lacked independence. However, as the narrative progressed and she took on the role of 'Adam,' I was pleasantly surprised to see her character evolve. She began to grow into her own, gaining confidence and self-assurance, which made her journey much more engaging.

I thoroughly enjoyed the developing tension and friendship between Lucy and Ross. Their relationship added depth to the story, and I appreciated the heartwarming moments of friendship and sisterhood that emerged throughout the book.

Overall, *The Love Hack* turned out to be a fun read with some truly touching moments. I'm grateful to NetGalley and the publisher for providing me with an e-ARC of this delightful and charming rom-com.

Thoroughly enjoyed this book - so much so I read it all in 1 day! Likeable characters, good storyline and an easy read

OMG this book was brilliant!! Absoluetly loved every second of reading it. The characters, the writing, the plot, everything was brilliant. Could not recommend it more!

Lucy is an advice columnist, except the twist is, her clientele is men, and the subject is relationships, and she is writing as if she were a man. Lucy has sworn off office romances, but then Ross starts working at the paper, and Lucy is smitten. Lucy is convinced Ross writes a letter to her advice column. Lucy, not knowing how to respond, decides to turn to AI for help.

I didn’t love this. The characters were ok. Lucy just seemed like a lonely cat lady to me, and Ross wasn’t a very interesting leading man. I thought Lucy could do better.

when i started the love hack, i genuinely wasn’t sure if it was for me, because it took me a while to get invested in lucy and quite honestly i found her a bit frustrating at the start and she lacked a lot of independence.

however, as she took on the role of ‘adam’ i found that she grew into herself and found her own confidence as the story progressed.

i must admit that the side story with her sisters husband wasn’t particularly relevant for me personally.

i loved the tension and friendship that grew between lucy and ross and overall it was a really wholesome read with some very touching moments of friendship and sisterhood.

thank you to net galley for providing me with an e-arc of this one, it’s a light hearted rom com that gave me similar vibes to lindsey kelk’s writing.

This book started off great. I was enjoying reading it. The sisters' bond was precious and I liked the details of Lucy's life. However, the romance element was highly lacking for a romance novel.
However, I did like the writing style and will be looking forward for any other novels by the author.

I had a hard time getting into this book. I was excited to read it, but it wasn't what I was expecting. I liked the writing, but I feel like it talked more about Lucy's past and bad experiences in her life. It wasn't much of a rom-com as I was expecting.

I couldn't get into this book. I had a difficult time enjoying the characters. This story seemed to really process Lucy's healing from bad past experiences. This book focused less on the potential romantic partners but more on Lucy's other ongoings - her sister, her ex. For a romcom, I didnt find myself laughing or smiling to myself as much as I would expect. Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for this eARC in exchange for my honest opinion.

3.5 🌟

I like Sophie Ranald's writing style and The Love Hack was another cute and fun read from her.

I enjoyed the premise of Lucy, a bit of a geek and single for a while, taking on the role of an agony aunt for men and learning so much about them and herself whilst trying to solve their problems.

There are no big surprises, just a good escapist summer read.

With thanks to Netgalley and Storm for the ARC

This is a fun romance. Lucy has an office crush on Ross, and she’s just taken a new job as “Ask Adam”, the agony aunt column for a men’s magazine. Lucy had a terrible experience with a previous office romance and she’s not sure she can come up with advice as Adam. She’s terrified she’ll be exposed as a fraud, and won’t go farther in her relationship with Ross because she’s afraid of being hurt.
I liked Lucy’s journey as she became more emotionally aware.

Thanks to the publisher and NetGalley, I received a complimentary copy of this book. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.

This book had a very fun premise however I found it quite slow to get through. I really enjoyed the characters and they had a really sweet romance, there was just something missing for me.

Thank you NetGalley and Storm Publishing for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

The Love Hack by Sophie Ranald was an a-okay book. It's not quite a romance, not quite a comedy... More like a slice of life of the main character, Lucy. We follow her from being made redundant from one magazine to getting a job at another, where she pretends to be an Agony Uncle and writes the Ask Adam column, where men write in to get relationship advice. At times it was somewhat funny. At times there were hints of romance between Lucy and her coworker Ross. But overall it wasn't heavy enough on either to be called a romcom, in my opinion.

Ross was a likeable character. Not a dick, unlike a lot of the men who wrote emails to Ask Adam. I also liked the side character Chiraag, and I wish we'd got to see more of him. Lucy was... Annoying at times. She was clearly still hung up on her past relationship which ended badly, and I feel like at times there was way too much focus on her past than her present. I liked how her job as Adam got linked to her relationship with her sister. There were quite a lot of references to contemporary things (Covid lockdown, Andrew Tate, #BeKind, Hinge, Brexit, Fenty Beauty...) which I didn't really like myself; it'll be okay for contemporary readers but I do feel like it wouldn't age very well because of it.

All in all, this was an okay story, but not a very memorable one. Every time I opened the book back up, I struggled to remember what had happened the last time I read it, even if it was only yesterday, and none of the characters had enough depth to them for me to really are about them or what happened to them. It was an okay story but not much more than that. ⭐⭐️⭐️/5, and I'm being generous.

This book took me a long time to read, it felt predictable and it was boring. I didn't really enjoy it! I didn't connect with the characters or the story line very much, and I didn't like that I could see where it was going. I felt like the FMC was immature and it was a frustrating book to read.

It was just okay, I was expecting a lot more but it just fell short for me. It wasn’t good and it wasn’t bad, but I wouldn’t read it again.

I always want to start my reviews by thanking the author and the publisher for giving me the opportunity to read this book early. Cute, but predictable book that I enjoyed.