Title: Loathe at First Sight
Author: Suzanne Park
Rating: ★★★

ARC provided by Avon through Edelweiss.

Let me start by saying that Loathe at First Sight is not a romantic comedy and I’m not sure why it’s being marketed that way. It’s actually women’s fiction with a very subtle romance that occurs within the pages. However, the story focuses on sexism in the workplace and women making a name for themselves.

Loathe at First Sight centers around Melody, who recently started a new job at a prominent video game company. As a male-dominated area, she unfortunately deals with a great number of misogyny and harassment from her coworkers and boss. I appreciated her struggles and the author’s intent to bring these issues to light.

The biggest issue with the book is the marketing. Loathe at First Sight is being unfairly marketed as a workplace enemies-to-lovers rom-com. It’s not. I was hard pressed to figure out why Melody was so hostile with the male lead, Nolan. Other than accidentally breaking her favorite mug, he does nothing to warrant any kind of hate and I would hardly describe their relationship has “enemies”. More like, lukewarm dislike at best. Nolan was nothing but pleasant to Melody the entire course of the book, and Melody’s biggest issue with Nolan was he was her boss’s nephew. Not only did I find the enemies-to-lovers description inaccurate, but as I stated earlier the romance is barely present.

Loathe at First Sight is not a bad book, it was just not the book for me. Women’s fiction is not a genre I typically navigate towards so I feel like I was falsely lured into reading this with the promise of an enemies-to-lovers romance. If you’re looking for a workplace hate-to-love, skip this and stick with The Hating Game.