3.5 stars

There was a lot about this book that I really loved. Firstly, the FMC Emma was incredible. In the romances I read, it is so rare to have a woman that starts the book knowing her worth, knowing what she deserves, and fighting for herself. Emma was an absolute force of nature and I loved how she stuck up for herself and fought for herself, and how powerful she became through her relationship with Charlie. She wasn't a character that was empowered by external forces, in fact she was constantly squashed by them until the relationship with Charlie began. Before that, she empowered herself and I truly loved that about her. As for Charlie, he was such a sweet hero. He had a lot going on in his personal life, but the way he made time for Emma and put her first was something every girl wishes for. She came to him with a very vulnerable issue and he gave no judgement and had a focus on her that is just so rare for most women in the bedroom. However, when it came to the more difficult moments of their relationship, his back-and-forth was incredibly confusing. It did jump to this need to push her away really quickly after he had been talking so long about trying to be with her forever and convince her to give him a chance. I felt like I couldn't really get a proper read on him, and that may have been helped by more time thinking about himself rather than her when I was in his internal monologues. Their relationship gave me everything The Hating Game couldn't, at least at first. The Hating Game had oodles of immaturity and incredibly toxic and petty hatred between the two main characters. This book had general dislike, but they weren't actively trying to ruin each other, which was appreciated. It just goes to show that a hate-to-love story doesn't need to have the two main characters inflicting hell on each other in order to create a believable hatred between them. I think the development of their relationship did get confusing though. There were a few moments throughout the story where it felt like things jumped ahead in time. For example, the jump from hatred to "let's have sex" and the later jump from Logan making a move on Emma in the cellar, to all of a sudden the heart to heart between Charlie and Emma. I think in the latter, Logan never officially exited the scene so there was a good period of time where I thought this big confession was happening with Logan standing right there and I thought that was just incredibly awkward. The only other issue I had with this story was the really obvious hinting at a sequel. There was a whole scene where Emma's best friend meets Emma's next-door neighbour and then later is made redundant from her job. None of that had any relevance to this story, in my opinion, so it felt really obviously planted to set up a sequel and it did take me out of the story. But other than those two things, I really did love this read. I thought the writing was amazing at pulling out the tension between Emma and Charlie, and then building the sexual tension that turned into this really supportive relationship. The smut was incredibly hot to read, especially the scene where Emma achieves her first orgasm. The build-up to that was incredible, and it truly did feel like a momentous occasion because of how it was written, so massive credit to Dani McLean for not making that moment feel awkward (as I've seen happen with other authors writing a scene of that nature). This was a truly addictive read and I had such a good time reading it. It does have me intrigued to read more from Dani McLean, so I'll be adding some new books to my never-ending TBR!

Emma and Charlie are pitted against each other for a promotion. Emma has been slaving away diligently at her job for years but never progressing thanks to being a woman in a male dominated industry. Charlie wants the role but recognises that Emma has what it takes to succeed. Will he play fair?

This workplace enemies to lovers romance was so fun. There is a fair bit of work talk however it is all justified in the storyline and I actually enjoyed the professional banter between our two characters. If you like your romances steamy, this is definitely the book for you!! There were quite a few detailed spicy scenes with the chemistry between our characters sizzling hot. I'm excited to see what Dani McLean writes next.

This book was a really mixed bag. In no particular order here are my pros and cons.

Pros:

-Charlie and Emma have excellent chemistry. Funny banter and the spicy scenes were spicing.
-Emma is a competent FMC which is really refreshing and I appreciated that Charlie not only saw it but stood up for her at work.

Cons:

-SO. MUCH. SHOP. TALK. and yet I still have no idea what their jobs actually were. It was tedious and confusing to wade through all the work details.
-There were several plot points that could have been interesting but felt disconnected. Work drama, parental drama, childhood trauma, their agreement…all could have been interesting but weren’t woven together in a satisfying way.

Overall this book wasn’t my favorite but I would definitely pick up another of Dani’s books in the future!

Thank you to NetGalley for providing me with a free copy in exchange for my honest review. All opinions are my own.

Super fun, with great banter - the characters really sell the story, they are really well portrayed, they feel like real people! I've never heard of Dani McLean before, but based on this I want to read more. Only thing is the corporate jargon was REAL - and I didn't get half of it and skimmed those bits, but it added to the realism so swings and roundabouts.

It was difficult for me to get into the story was I first started reading but as the romance progress it became easier. I loved the chemistry between the two main characters and the spice was great.

5 ⭐ 4 🌶

I have always loved Dani's stories and spice, but they took it to a whole new level with Take It Offline. This storyline was so much fun and the spice was amazing. We get a chastity cage. A ROOSTER CAGE MY FRIENDS! And it was insanely fun (although I forgot to go incognito on chrome when trying to find out what they look like, so I'm sure my ads will be interesting for a bit 😂).

The hate to love, albeit one ish sided, was freaking fantastic. The banter was so amusing and I loved getting to see Charlie play the game while secretly pining for Emma.

Logan is the worst and while I do wish we got to see a bigger downfall, him simply ceasing to exist was pretty amazing too 😂 The way Emma felt so broken because of her issue made me want to commit serial things against the men of her past and give her the biggest hug ever. Charlie was just so perfect for her, especially in this regard.

I'm really hoping Dani feels inspired to write Ivy's story next because I feel like there was a definite setup for it and I would absolutely adore more from this world. Regardless, I know I'll be picking up their next story and loving it to bits.

🖤🖤🖤🖤🖤
5/5 ♾️

𝙄 𝙙𝙤𝙣’𝙩 𝙬𝙖𝙣𝙩 𝙡𝙤𝙫𝙚 𝙩𝙤 𝙗𝙚 𝙚𝙖𝙨𝙮. 𝙄 𝙬𝙖𝙣𝙩 𝙞𝙩 𝙝𝙖𝙧𝙙𝙚𝙣𝙚𝙙, 𝙛𝙤𝙧𝙩𝙞𝙛𝙞𝙚𝙙, 𝙖𝙗𝙨𝙤𝙡𝙪𝙩𝙚. 𝙒𝙝𝙖𝙩 𝙪𝙨𝙚 𝙙𝙤 𝙄 𝙝𝙖𝙫𝙚 𝙛𝙤𝙧 𝙛𝙚𝙚𝙡𝙞𝙣𝙜𝙨 𝙩𝙝𝙖𝙩 𝙘𝙤𝙢𝙚 𝙖𝙣𝙙 𝙜𝙤 𝙖𝙨 𝙦𝙪𝙞𝙘𝙠𝙡𝙮 𝙖𝙨 𝙢𝙞𝙡𝙚 𝙢𝙖𝙧𝙠𝙚𝙧𝙨 𝙤𝙣 𝙩𝙝𝙚 𝙝𝙞𝙜𝙝𝙬𝙖𝙮?

53 annotations. Do I even need to say more? (Do I need to explain how long it took me to figure out my quote above?!) DANI MCLEAN does it again!! I LOVED this book so much. I didn’t want it to end, but also devoured it so fast because I couldn’t help myself. Charlie & Emma were 👩🏼‍🍳💋….

Here’s everything I loved:

💻 this is a workplace romance with women in STEM

💞 enemies to lovers…my FAVORITE trope of all time

❤️ Dani & I share our love of supernatural….I pictured Felicia Day (aka Charlie) as Reese!!

🐶 loved that Charlie was a dog lover & helped at his sister Reese’s animal rescue

✨ Emma’s tough exterior & warm gooey center…I fell in LOVE with her!! Charlie stood no chance from the get go. Obv, he falls first. (I pictured Margot Robbie as Emma)

☀️ “Morning, sunshine.”

💋 Charlie is my new fav book bf! (my fan cast for Charlie is Chris Evans)

🖊️ the sides stories in this were realistic & so well written. It felt like I was watching the next hit romcom movie!

🧀 it’s okay, Charlie…I also eat cheese right out of the bag when my anxiety is bad

🖇️ how women are treated in the workplace is real in this…I used to work in the restaurant industry in management & I was never treated as equal to my male counterparts. I’m so thankful & lucky to no longer have to work in that toxic environment, but I feel seen reading stories that represent this struggle. 𝘈𝘭𝘦𝘹𝘢, 𝘱𝘭𝘢𝘺 “𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘔𝘢𝘯” 𝘣𝘺 𝘛𝘢𝘺𝘭𝘰𝘳 𝘚𝘸𝘪𝘧𝘵

🧟‍♀️ “How long would you last in a zombie apocalypse?”

📺 the reference of The Boys

💞 okay, I could truly go on & on. JUST GO READ THIS BOOK!!

💜 Take It Offline is available September 24th! And will be available on KU!!

Ya’ll these two are so hot.
Like 10/10 chemistry.

Dani never ever fails with their writing. Ate the whole thing up and left no crumbs. I loved every second of it.

Fighting the patriarchy and prejudices with women in STEM.

Bondage, toys, a cage (? never knew that before), audio play, and so much more.

This was my first book by Dani McLean and it won’t be my last! This was the perfect read especially for those in the corporate world (lots of businesses talk). I devoured this Take It Offline and loved the tension and banter between Emma and Charlie!

Thank you Dani and NetGalley for the read! I look forward to seeing what Dani writes next!

I'd recommend this book if you like:
- an intelligent, kind-hearted fmc
- boy obsessed
- a bit of wine talk 🍷
- unconventional families
- dynamics of office work at a large corp

This is my first read by this author, and I was pleasantly surprised to read about characters working in operations like myself 😅

Charlie was willing to take Emma any way he could and he was a man obsessed. I also love that he was an animal lover and a fierce protector of his younger sister 🩷

Emma comes across as very intelligent and professional in the workplace. What I liked most was that she was human enough to snap at others when frustrated, but kind enough to turnaround and apologize for it. It's always validating to read about the extra hurdles women go through in the office, even if it's equally as frustrating.

The characters had good communication, the story was paced well with a nice balance between the plot in the office vs their romance, and there was some top notch groveling 🙌🏻

I'd recommend this as a fast, fairly low-angst, modern and relatable romance!

Another sleepless night, that's how good it was. A thousand ways heartbreaking as heart mending and lest not forget the steamy scenes, that are just perfection.
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Dani writes they characters in a way that it is impossible not to get under your skin. In my case, I fell for Emma, ​​every part of being a woman in the corporate world or having a job surrounded by chauvinistic men in higher positions, grr..yes, I felt it in every fiber of my being bringing back memories of another time in my life.
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So at first I had my doubts about Charlie, but page by page he showed that he was so much more and it make me change my mind.
Also the banter of two enemies to lovers in the same work environment, competing for a position that can change their lives drastically. And this book is a pure fireball ready for any fan of the trope.
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Charlie works in a large company and is surrounded by bosses who question every step she takes, but not only does she have to fight every coma in her work for being of a different gender, she also has a last name for which she is typecast as a nepobaby.
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But the truth is deeper, and she got to her position through many hours of hard work. That's why when her boss tells her that a new position, a promotion, is opening up, she doesn't expect it to be so easy.
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But she hadn't imagined having to compete with Charlie Walker. Favorite of the bosses, another man in an elegant suit willing to take credit at every opportunity. And even worse, having to share the office with him for six months while they work as a team.
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My only questioning, and that's why it's four stars, is that the breakup or third act conflict appeared out of nowhere, or at least that's what it seemed to me in the conversation they were having. I don't know if it was necessary for him to roll into such a big ball just with words. I always thought I was going to circle around who got the promotion.
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The level of spice and the scenes were perfect as always in their books, Dani Mclean writes the chemistry and connection between they characters so well and they always leaves me intrigued with the rest of the characters and what things are going to happen with their stories, I hope one of them is Ivy…pleaseee, can it be Ivy?!!
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Thanks to Dani Mclean and their team for give me a copy of this beautiful book in exchange for my honest and voluntary opinion

Thanks to Netgalley for the chance to rate and review this book.

Rating: 4 stars
Spice: Low to medium depending on your preferred smut level
Tropes: close proximity, enemies to lovers, office romance.

Emma (FMC) is a used to be rich girl, working in a corperate tech company that undermines her consistently and dismisses her constantly.

Charlie (MMC) is one of those office boys with a good suit who can play the game and seems to be the golden boy of the office.

Both are only seeing the surface and neither shows any inclination to dig deeper until their boss makes a competion for a promotion they both want. But instead of competeing separately they are being forced to work together.

Emma believes she will do all the work and Charlie will take all the glory. Charlie believes working with Emma may kill him, because he doesn't hate him, in fact she drives him to distraction.

So I liked the book don't get me wrong. The characters were engaging and it hooked me from almost the first page. The story flowed well but in the last few chapters it lost its flow. It felt very rushed to finish the story.

The conversation between Emma and Charlie and her confessing her feelings, went south very quickly and seemingly out of nowhere. The make up scene, where the hell did Logan go. He was there, he never left and seemed to be forgotten about, granted he was an ass but still. Then the last two chapters that were like 2 epilogues jumped wildly and to be honest, did either one of them get the promotion? I know there were redundancies but ????

It left me with a few questions and I went back to where I had gotten confused a couple of times, wondering if my eyes skipped over anything, but no, I am still a little bewildered. Maybe it was just me I just felt things weren't really tied up in the end.

As I said though the story moved well and I very much liked the characters and I hope McLean writes a second because I really, really want to find out more about Ivy and I really hope she gets a book.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 3.75-4/5 🌶️🌶️🌶️ 3/5

Tropes:
📌 Enemies to Lovers
📌 Office Romance
📌 Opposites Attract

Emma Conway is a trust fund princess until she isn’t… her family is secretly not as well off as everyone assumes and she is left picking up the pieces. Emma is strong and knows exactly how capable she is, while faced with a misogynistic boss that micromanages her at every turn, she handles it with grace and continues doing her job #boss.

Charlie Walker grew up in the foster care system and his whole life has been dedicated to finding a level of comfort and safety for himself and his sister. Charlie is well respected at work and admired by his coworkers for always going the extra mile and helping everyone out so when Emma asks him to enter into a “ friends” with benefits situation with no strings… of course he can’t say no.

Emma and Charlie had their wires crossed from the start, they both had the complete wrong idea about the other and I really enjoyed both characters being vulnerable and revealing that actually everything the other person thought about them was wrong, it made me admire them both and I really wanted them to get together.

The only reason this wasn’t a 4+ star was I struggled at the beginning with the pacing, there was a lot of work lingo and information I couldn’t tell you what it meant ( except they worked on a group project together to fight for a promotion) but I do think it was necessary to illustrate how important both Emma and Charlie were to the company and that they were pretty darn good at their jobs.

The spice was ✨chefs kiss✨ and was open door,once things started heating up between Emma and Charlie it went from 🌶️ to 🌶️🌶️🌶️ real fast. I really enjoyed this book and if you like a good office romance with a tonne of spice…this book is for you.

Ivy and Lincoln’s story has to be next…right?
(please)

Thank you to NetGalley, Victory Editing & Dani McLean for the ARC, I thoroughly enjoyed this book and cannot wait for book 2.

3.75 / 4 ⭐️

I feel like alllll the reader corporate girlies should read this because they’ll definitely identify with the FMC!

Dani truly writes the most relatable and fun characters! I really enjoyed getting to know our MCs and watching them fall for each other.

I am NOT a corporate girly and while Dani includes lots of corporate talk, i wasn’t confused or deterred. It gives what it needed without going over the top to make it unenjoyable.

THE SPICE. this is absolutely Dani’s best spice book! The spice is SPICING & def well done.

While i really enjoyed this book, it definitely wasn’t my favorite Dani book! It was a fun, quick read but didn’t resonate with me too much so i think that it will be a bit forgettable for me. BUT i think if you’re a corporate girl you’d ADORE this book.

If you’re looking for rivals to lovers, workplace romance, he falls first, & friends with benniesss!

I would definitely recommend it to my audience! & I will always go back to read alllll that Dani puts out!

Thanks to NetGalley for this ARC in exchange for a review.

This is the perfect read for any corporate girlie who's looking for a break for their normal day to day. So much of this book and the characters were so relatable and the terminology was always correct. Emma and Charlie were so fun to read and while some of the issues facing Emma in her job were too relatable it made the story more interesting cause I felt like I could be talking to one of my coworkers or friends.

If you are a woman who work in a corporate world before, today, or even curious, this book is for you! As a corporate girlie, I felt so represented in this book.

Emma and Charlie were forced to work together to be promoted. They were enemies in the office because of their own assumptions of one another but as they both continue to work, they saw a whole different side.

I love both of them as a characters, and they are proof that there's more than meets the eye. Emma's resilient and so strong amidst all the misogynistic encounters in her job. How she stood tall, worked the extra mile to achieve her goals is how I wanna be when I grow up. I resonate so much towards her.

Charlie, I get him and with his background as a foster kid, he made a name for himself and he worked very hard to lift himself up. He deserves everything and more.

I love their dynamic, their banter and the flow of their story. The pacing from hostile, to reluctant coworkers to being friends and eventually lovers was great! Dare I say, I might read this author's works from now on.

This book really gave me The Hating Game vibes!

Ahh I absolutely adored this book, I think I devoured it in about 3hrs!

It all starts in the workplace! It's more than a workplace romance - It very much showed the very real scenarios some women face in a male dominated career. I don't often hate a character within a book, but I very much did hate Karl.

Both Emma and Charlie were well written, and I would say the development of Emma from the start to the end was great, she already was a smart, hardworking, and capable, but by the end her confidence in dealing with different situations was great to see. Not saying that Charlie wasn't any of those as well... he just had other issues to work through. The chemistry and intense attraction between Emma and Charlie leapt off the pages and the steamy scenes... well...

My only thing I would say I felt the end was a little bit rushed - like we jumped from one thing to another... but other than that, it was such a great read. This eas my first by this author and it won't be my last

This was a lovely and refreshing love story!

I liked how honest it was about such a sensible topic like money and family and how nicely it built a charming love story. An office enemies to lovers, through very hot encounters and heartfelt ones this story got its solution without much drama.

At times it felt like the chapters were a bit sketchy and small, which would make this perfect to be transformed into a movie.

What I liked the most about the whole story, other than how well defined and likeable were the characters was how full of love and deep understanding they get over their issues. Even the money issue gets such a heart warming solution.

Overall, this was a nice read, which I'm grateful to have received in order to share my view of.

AHHH WHAT A DELIGHTFUL AND ALSO 🌶🌶🌶 READ

Charlie and Emma's chemistry and banter was so fun and hot. It literally had me squeaking while reading.
Workplace rivals having to fake date will never get old and this was such a good one. Charlie is a perfect book bf and Emma is who i want to be when i grow up!!

Read it. Really tho, trust me on this!

*arc kindly provided in exchange of an honest review

‼️My review might contain some spoilers‼️

Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Spice: 🌶️🌶️🌶️ (the second and the last spicy scene🥵)

Emma Conway comes from old money. But nobody knows that her parents made several bad investments within the last few years and she had to help sell paintings and summer houses to pay off their debts. And she’s working and living paycheck to paycheck, while living in a run down apartment complex. She works hard and even has a hand in the changes around the office, but sadly her nemesis gets the accolades and again she’s overlooked.

Charlie Walker, a foster home kid that didn’t go to college, now has a good job, great apartment and designer suits that he likes to wear to work every day. He works hard and has been for 8 years. So when he gets the change to climb the corporate ladder, he doesn’t say no. If only he don’t have to work with her…

Sparks of hatred fly between Emma and Charlie, as their boss puts them on a project together to see who will come out as the winner and get promoted, while still working normally in their own departments.

At the beginning we learn a lot about the company Emma and Charlie work at. It’s a lot of stuff I didn’t really understand as to what exactly they were working on. This goes on throughout the book and at the end it kind of fizzles out to where we are told about redundancies and that he should put his notice in…I didn’t understand who works there anymore.

Noticing the way Emma gets treated by their boss and other men in charge, Charlie gets the feeling that it’s already a done deal that he’ll get the promotion. So he offers a truce and that they work together and be friendly. But Emma has a more pressing (very personal) problem that she thinks Charlie might be able to help her with….to get her ex Logan back.

The way he falls first but is also the scared one is heartbreaking. I loved Charlie in his suits 😍
Emma and her “issue” is a very common one and I want to thank the author for shining a light on this and that it’s ok, but also not and that the typical Logan reaction to it, is really sad.

Thanks to NetGalley, I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.