I’d wanted the woman since I’d first laid eyes on her on a casual Friday. Somewhere over the course of the past six months, every little encounter we’d had, every ridiculous story I’d overheard her tell Margot, every unnecessary, long-winded word she’d used to insult me, had me infatuated with her. ‘
Meet Hate Love by Stevie J. Cole is just what we needed and quite different from what we’ve read from this author before. It was hilarious swoony fun with a fabulous and entertaining storyline and wonderful characters we fell in love with. We honestly couldn’t stop laughing, many times out loud as we read with permanent grins on our faces. It was hilarious steamy fun with situational comedy that tickled our funny bone all the way through. Bloody hilarious in its own addictive, ridiculous, and bizarre way which felt unique and was so well written!
‘Blake was practically a living, breathing omen of bad luck and misfortune, and I was about to be joined at the hip with her and all her bad juju for fourteen days.’
Blake is adorably eccentric and the situations she gets herself into are just too much but in a good way! Calamity Blake more like. Her banter with Vance and her bestie, Margot, is spot on and had us chuckling out loud. Blake has a real issue with Vance, her annoyingly attractive and dry humored work colleague who has a tendency to hijack her assignments as well as her thoughts and saucy fantasies. But when he tells her in a heated clinch that he heard she’s easy, the gloves come off. Even worse when he swipes her Paris trip from under her nose, a work assignment that was meant to be her eat, pray, love moment, Blake’s had enough. Blackmail shenanigans begin with a traveling pierced peen and together they fly on a ‘how to survive a trip with your nemesis’ holibobs. We all know how this old chestnut will turn out right? Well, the way in which Stevie J Cole wrote Blake and Vance’s story felt refreshingly unique and without question turned out to be one of the funniest rom-coms we’ve read in a while.
Blake: In order to keep things from being weird, I booked a different hotel.
Me: You realize this makes it extra weird, you weirdo?
What starts off in Blake’s mind as a hate-hate relationship soon turns into a hate-love, enemies to lovers, work romance with a sexual tension you could cut with a knife, and a fiery and steamy passionate affair. Oooo la la…Vance…..no way we could resist him either. Je voudrait un grande baguette avec Vance….Our French sucks but if you know…you know!
‘Sure, he could whip up a witty line of dry sarcasm about cheddar cheese, but Vance was the guy I fully expected to grow old and yell at kids for riding their bikes across the corner of his pristine lawn, not having a pierced dick he paraded around like the Olympic torch on a Lonely Fans account. This could not be real life.’
Stevie J Cole really outdid herself with Meet Hate Love, she managed to cheekily give a nod to ‘book moments’ we love but would be utterly ridiculous in -real- life and she wrote them in such a witty and clever way. She nailed the balance of heat and comedy and wrote a story and characters that had depth, personality, and a strong passionate connection. Every romcom book lover should one-click this beauty and prepare for one hell of a crazy-arse ride that’ll have you laughing, shaking your head, cringing, fanning your face, and falling hopelessly in love!
‘Seemed she liked long-haired bad boys who would use a gun to get her off and make her call them Daddy? I had a lot to live up to.’