"The name is still there, clear as day. Jack Carlson."

3.5 Stars rounded up.

A slow building romance that does play upon the trope of miscommunication/misunderstanding.

I loved the premise. I loved that the characters had the dynamic of working together and travelling together with their shared history. It allowed for great moments of tension, and flows in their dynamics with the obligations to their jobs and their believed obligations to the past. I enjoyed the main characters, I think they are two differing personalities that allowed for the tension and mystery to work well.

I think the highlight of the story, overall for me, is the depiction of grief and how individuals choose to address and work through what is causing them harm. I think the main female character, whilst I understand for many people may be frustrating, shows quite a human way of dealing with grief and feeling entirely overwhelmed. As a reader, you fall very easy into the feelings of wanting her to go through development for the betterment of herself and for the happiness of the character. I think whilst romance is definitely present and a central focus of the story, I find that the themes of grief, self-sabotage & acceptance are more of the shining factors in this story.

What I would have to love to have had sooner in the story, or at least some sprinkles of, was the initial misunderstanding. I think because there was such little information given to the readers about this initial incident, I think I felt a bit disconnected to the actions and motivations of the main female character. I felt that I needed a bit more justification for her behaviour because the motivation = response wasn't there for me - I understand that it was better to allow the story to fully unravel with the character development but sometimes the connection between the main female character and myself, as a reader, felt a bit frayed (especially in the beginning).

I think the story moves and flows very well, I was able to finish this book pretty much within one sitting. The pacing of the book is good and moves fast - there are moments that I would have liked a slower pace just to have greater depth in the scenes of the tour. I really enjoyed the scenes we were given and I would have loved to have had more.

Thank you to Bloomsbury Publishing for this eARC, I am voluntarily leaving a review.

Until her first day, when she discovers that her biggest author is Jack Carlson – the same Jack who ruined her life in university. Who she hasn’t spoken to in five years. Who is not only still infuriatingly hot but incredibly successful. And whose campaign she definitely cannot mess up, if she wants to keep her job.

An excellent rom com from Bianca Gillan. I adored this story and thoroughly recommend this to anyone

This was a really delightful rom-com. I loved the premise and the chemistry between our two characters. I had a lot of fun with this one.

I don't usually read many romance books because I get bored really easily, but I absolutely loved this book!

Loved the humour, bookish setting/theme and the range of locations visited by the characters. The grief element was a great addition which really gives you a better delve into the main characters life and emotions (although quite sad in parts).

A fab book for this authors debut!

I was given an ARC of Bad Reputation by Bianca Gillam through NetGalley, and I couldn’t wait to dive into it! Two exes being forced together for European tour? A bunch of tension and unspoken history? Sign me up!
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I immediately became obsessed with the main character, Andie, a PR agent living in New York. Andie is a drama queen (in the best possible way), and I found her so funny. She is so stubborn - often to her detriment - and she is the queen of repression (ALWAYS to her detriment). I found her very relatable, although there were times when even I was exasperated by her lack of communication. It’s definitely not one to read if you hate the miscommunication trope!
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The book had so many wonderful moments of vulnerability - between Andie and Jack (her client/ex), Andie and Sara (her best friend), and Andie and her mum. Each character had their moments of smashing down walls and letting their loved ones see their grief or their insecurities. It also helps that the exposition was slid so well into the first few chapters that it never felt clunky, nor did it leave us with any questions - aside from the big mystery of what happened between Andie and Jack all those years ago.
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Despite Andie’s years of repression, however, some of the healing felt a little too rushed for my taste. They’d be half way through a conflict, and Andie would have a wave of clarity, which for me felt a bit too simple. As much as I love a healing moment, I do enjoy reading some higher-stake conflicts. Andie was a bit too self aware in a way that made her (very very occasionally) annoying. That being said, for the most part I loved her.
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I enjoyed reading the dynamic between Jack and Andie, and it was great to see where they would push and pull away from each other at various stages on their tour. It made for a really fun read, where I found myself both smiling down at my phone and wanting to close my eyes in frustration.
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I had a great time reading this book. Bad Publicity will be released in January 2025 - so keep an eye out for it!

This is another great holiday read for this summer! This book scores 4 stars from me❤️

A quick synopsis of the story:
Woman with a terrible past spends a month touring Europe with a man she hates.

I really enjoying reading this book on my adventures in Bosnia and Croatia. It was a great story to get back to between exploring new places and relaxing. The first chapters were super quick to read and kept me wanting to read on! I especially enjoyed the shortness of them, as the book developed however I noticed that chapters became much longer and paragraphs were rather long. It was definitely a lot more effort to finish the book than I expected, although the story was really good and nothing stopped me from finishing the book!

I really loved the speed of the story at the start, lots was happening and the story had a very good flow. The characters are very unique and work great within this book. Strong but sad story line, with a good ending. Definitely recommend for all my reads to preorder this book.

This book seemed like the classic enemies to lovers trope that I love, which it was - but with a unique spin that I think sets it apart from other similar books. I loved the publicist/author angle as it's not a pairing I've seen before in a romance novel, so the story taking place over the course of an international book tour was really exciting!

There was a point around halfway through where I felt things were moving a little slowly - we still don't know why Andie and Jack don't get along - but it really picked up again around 70% and I can see why we were left waiting for so long!

Despite the slow burn, this was a book I enjoyed and would definitely recommend. It's got everything you'd want from a modern romance - tension, drama, emotion and spice - but what made this book stand out for me was its characters. The book is about real human relationships, growing up, building a life and dealing with everything that being an adult throws at you. The feelings of burnout and overwhelm that Andie feels while trying to cope with her burgeoning career, her history with Jack, the loss of her Dad and her guilt over losing touch with her Mum are things that many readers will be able to relate to.Unlike similar titles I've read which have felt quite surface-level, this had real depth and warmth and I loved reading it.

This such lovely rom com book. Reminds me of likes of Emily Henry and Amy Lea. Such fun and cute book. Recommend it.

4⭐️
I flew threw this one almost as fast as she took flights! Andie has her dream job in publishing, an apartment in NYC and a great best friend. She’s even secured a promotion and all is going swimmingly until she gets told who her first celebrity author will be, and it turns out they have history. A great read for those who enjoy the friends to enemies then to lovers trope, or for a rekindled romance. I found it interesting that the issue with Jack wasn’t revealed until the latter parts of the book, leaving you guessing for the rest of the time but secretly willing Jack to succeed. The character had a huge amount of emotions to work through, with an unsurpassable grief that overwhelms her and threatens to take over at any time. This book does deal with this aspect of grief, and losing a parent, so just a word of warning about that for those it might impact. That being said, I enjoyed the book, the reality check Andie needed and her changing feelings and actions towards Jack.

rounding this up to 3.5

when two enemies from university end up working together.

as cute as the story was, it was a tad too fast paced for me so at times it felt underdeveloped.

however - the book was still enjoyable for any fans of the romance genre.

the author depicted grief in such a beautifully realistic way, that it was my favourite element of the book.

A fun, light-hearted rom-com that didn't take itself too seriously.
The characters are reasonably likeable, though Andie can be a little questionable at times - since her actions don't always make sense.
Overall the book was enjoyable, well written, and fun to read.
The pacing was a little uneven but nothing that disturbed my reading.

3.5
I really enjoyed this book. We follow an author and a book publicist (who doesn’t love books involving books) who had a fling back in university and are now on a PR trip together. The book covers themes of grief as Andie, our FMC, lost her father around the time of the fling and still struggles processing this loss.

A variation of the miscommunication trope definitely plays a central role in the story, which I tend to dislike. I found it not as annoying here compared to my usual feelings because the miscommunication is deeply intertwined with Andie‘s grief. While it is frustrating to watch her metaphorically bang her head against a wall, it is mostly understandable.

Overall, the book is not the most unique of stories as a frequent romance reader, but it is very well written, grief is discussed very beautifully and both of our main characters are adorable.

Thank you so much to Netgalley for providing me with an advanced copy of this book.

Andie lands her dream job in publishing, then learns that her first job is to accompany best-selling author Jack Carlson on a book publicity tour of Europe. What Andie's boss doesn't know is that Andie and Jack were at Edinburgh university together, they share a past and Andie has never forgiven him. The idea of spending a month travelling with him is unbearable, but the only alternative is to tank her first assignment - ain't never gonna happen.

Jack tries to apologise and explain but Andie's righteous anger burns bright and she refuses to listen, in fact she take great delight in being as mean as she possibly can to him, until she realises how unprofessional her anger is making her. The trouble is, Jack's betrayal came just before her father's terminal cancer diagnosis and so the two events have become defining moments in her life, things she is desperate to push to the back of her mind.

I enjoyed this, but it wasn't anything I hadn't read before. Mortal enemies due to an 'event' in their past which is kept mysterious until near the end, forced proximity road trip, 'reasons'. TBH Andie wasn't a very likeable character, she wasn't a very good friend, she only called Sara to moan about her own problems, she was petty, and put her own feelings above everyone else's.

I received an ARC from the publisher via NetGalley.

After reading the blurb for Bad Publicity, I was looking forward to a fairly light-hearted romcom based around the world of publishing, with a road trip thrown in, but that was not what it turned out to be. After five years in New York, Andie has just landed her dream job of senior book publicist and is looking forward to working with the authors assigned to her. Imagine her shock when she recognises the name at the top of the list – none other than her nemesis from her time at Edinburgh University, Jack Carlson. She must put on a brave face at the prospect of a month-long European tour for his first novel, or jeopardise her career.
I did enjoy some aspects of this debut novel, but I have a big problem with the main female character, Andie, and the story is told mostly from her point of view. She is not easy to empathise with, and her behaviour is, at times, very hard to understand, particularly the effect it has on those who care about her. For a large part of the story, it is hinted that Jack did something utterly unforgivable when they were at university, but when it is finally revealed it is more nuanced than you might expect. Bearing in mind that Andie has never let Jack tell his side of the story, her attitude seems a bit over the top.
Bad Publicity is well written, with believable characters, insight into the workings of the publishing industry, and a trip round Europe, but Andie is her own worst enemy, and I found myself constantly frustrated by her self-destructive behaviour. I know she was hurting, and had not come to terms with her father’s death, but her actions leave a lot to be desired. Thanks to Bloomsbury and NetGalley for providing a digital copy to review.

This was a fun romcom, but it lost a star for me because firstly I'm always a bit dubious of situations which could have been solved if people just talked to each other, and secondly I think we needed to know the reason for the tension between the two main characters earlier. It would have made the tension/getting together much more realistic. It also made no sense to me that they didn't just have the conversation as adults as soon as they met. But this is a fun read, and I enjoyed it.

I absolutely loved reading it. The story was cute, and I liked the character dynamics. The book touched on important matters like grief and life in general. I loved the multiple plots and the part of the book that gives more detail about the world of publishing. It's a book that teaches you about loss, real love, friendships, and is a very easy and smooth read.

Thanks to Bloomsbury for the arc!

3.5 stars: I loved how this book was a cute and fast-paced read, and it ended at the perfect time. There were no redundancies, it was short enough to not get tired of the plot and long enough to understand the character dynamics. It's refreshing to read a story that location hops to various places seamlessly, and where character dynamics do not follow a linear healing process - as the book touches on grief after loss. It's also insanely detailed in getting an understanding about the publishing industry.

I would also say that this book foreshadowed the reason of the tension between the two characters throughout, giving me a very different impression of their backstory than what was explained at the end, which could've been developed better or clarified earlier.

Thanks again to Bloomsbury, Bianca Gillam & NetGalley for an arc in exchange for my honest review.

This was such a breathtaking read. It’s about finding your place, loss, real love, friendships and the magic of both of those things. I definitely enjoyed reading it.

Ever been made to work with someone that you don’t like, or have a history with, well Bad Publicity takes the cake!

Bad Publicity is the debut novel of Bianca Gillam, set to be released by Bloomsbury in January 2025.

Andie is an up-and-coming publicist in New York City, recently promoted to Senior Publicist, her dream ever since moving from London as an intern five years earlier. The office is perfect, her team are delightful, even the local coffee spots are incredible, cloud nine would be an understatement… until she discovers who her first client is.

Jack, a non-fiction author turned novelist, is about to embark on European tour to promote his debut fiction novel. He is Andie’s first client, and they have history. A history that means Andie hates him.

A reminder of not only their shared experience, their shared negative experience, Jack’s resurfacing brings with it a resurfacing of other experiences she had around the same time. The main one being the death of her father after a brutally short battle with cancer, two weeks after she last saw Jack.

Grief and trauma as baggage, Andie embarks on the tour with Jack under the guise of professionalism, but as they arrive in Berlin, Andie begins to realise that the feelings she’s having to deal with may not only cost her her career, but her friendships, her relationship with her mother, and even herself. Can Andie learn to process her past in time to protect them all and stop herself ending up alone? And can she work out where Jack fits amongst it all?

The book has all the tropes of a standard rom-com, and with locations like Berlin, Dublin, Edinburgh, Paris, NY and London, it is very easy to read this book and visualise it in film form.

That being said, there is something extremely refreshing about the character of Andie. Grief is rarely linear, and oftentimes, people expect you to process it immediately after the death. Anything beyond a year post-loss is attributed to a change of personality and identity. Having experienced loss myself, I can tell you that this is rarely the case. At this time of writing, I’m almost eight years after the fact and I’m aware that there are still things I need to work through and relationships that are tarnished from that time. Therefore, I found Gillam’s writing of Andie incredibly realistic. Those powerful emotions of loss and trauma do burn away inside and can leave a person’s view of their world negative, so Andie not immediately being a carefree, over it, happy-go-lucky protagonist relayed as fantastically refreshing!

Additionally, there are some other key topics integrated into the storyline, such as revenge p***, nepotism, work/life balance, love after loss, love found through shared grief, separation from parents, and more that added to the depth of the novel, and made it seem the right level of complex that real life can be.

The relationship between Jack and Andie is perfectly flawed, as any relationship depicted post the event reveal in the final act of the book should be (No spoilers here!). I had a slight trepidation when reading some other reviews of the book that this was going to be quite a toxic relationship, with all the traits of gaslighting and narcissism. However, this is why I always insist on reaching my own opinion, because their relationship flourishes and develops in a manner that appears healthy despite the event.

Some of the location-based references in the book appeared detached, and is one area that I think could’ve been slightly more developed. In Berlin, besides being told the characters were in Berlin, the descriptions of buildings and place could’ve easily been applied to locations in any major European city. For world building and readers who may prefer complete realism in location-based reads, this may be a detractor. Nevertheless, the location hopping does help in keeping the pace of the book fresh!

Bad Publicity is a book that I hope to see on screen, and is an ideal post-holiday read when the Christmas highs have dropped and the reality of the New Year hits. It’s also great for city break ideas for the year ahead (I say as I plan a trip to Dublin asap). Therefore, it is ideal that Bloomsbury have set Gillam’s novel at the high point of the year!

I had seen ads for this book all over my TikTok so when I saw it on NetGalley, I knew that I wanted to read it. I find the publishing industry so interesting so the fact that this was written by someone that previously worked in publishing, it felt like Bianca was the perfect person to write a story like this.

Unfortunately, I found the FMC a little unlikable. For someone that works in a very professional job, she wasn’t very professional. This story felt like grumpy x sunshine, but to the point where Andie felt so grumpy that I got annoyed with her quite quickly.

There were also elements of the writing that I didn’t really like. Some parts of the story felt too wordy and too action descriptive, if that makes sense. It sometimes just didn’t feel natural to read which I struggled with a little.

But onto the things I really liked!
I loved seeing Andie and Jack travel together and getting to see new places, meeting new people etc. It just made me want to go to Paris even more!
We love to see a woman with goals and with a great career!!! It was clear that Andie was good at her job, like when she had to interrupt the interview as the journalist was asking personal questions. You could tell she enjoyed her job, despite not always enjoying the guy she was stuck with on tour (!!).

I would definitely read Bianca’s future books, and although this was a good debut novel, there were elements that I struggled with. If you enjoy second chance romance, you’ll enjoy this. It was quite fast paced and felt that the story continued moving at a good pace. Congrats to Bianca on her debut 🎉