“Pages in her day planner flipped this way and that. He didn’t know if she was truly looking for notes. He couldn’t make heads or tails of her system with all those Post-it flags, page separators, and various colors of ink. ‘What is that thing?’ he finally asked.
[…]
She turned to another page. ‘My day planner.’
It was like something out of the Jurassic period. ‘It’s paper.’
She shot him a sideways look of surprise that slowly narrowed. ‘I know. I write on it with this thing. It’s called a ‘pen.’”
Spencer is the new security hire for Afire, and part of his job is working with Josie, the program manager for Start ‘er Up, Afire’s startup accelerator. While he doesn’t appear to be particularly socially inept with most people, when he first meets Josie, he can’t even get a word in English out – he greets her with “Hi-lo” (instead of “hello”) which becomes their own private joke. He’s completely bowled over by her at first sight, and while obviously he doesn’t make a great first impression with Josie, his expressive puppy-dog eyes and sweet goofiness soon have her thinking about him in a different light. I enjoyed that Spencer was the ugly duckling in this book, though after a few weeks of working out and a haircut, suddenly he’s beefcake material. Josie, on the other hand, prides herself on her organization and problem-solving skills, interfacing between the various startups at the accelerator, venture funds, and Afire itself. Cutely enough, Spencer loves the managerial way she handles things, and calls her “Strawberry” because of her red hair. While it’s obvious to everyone else that Josie is the essential piece in Start ‘er Up, she constantly feels the need to prove herself – Afire is a geeky company, and she isn’t a geek, and she’s a woman in tech, on top of that.
“’I’m not so different from you, Spencer,’ she said in a quiet voice. ‘I’m geeky in my own way. I like structure and schedules. I work with people and form connections, but I’m about as far from a party girl as you can get.’”
One of my main problems was that Spencer was a Big Bang Theory kind of geek. He’s a good guy, just completely socially awkward, especially around the woman he’s interested in. At one point, he talks about reverse-engineering his boss’s relationship to figure out how he, as a geek guy, can be in a relationship with a “normal girl.” It was initially charming and funny, but after a few jokes about hacking his relationship, it got a bit old. Some of the “geek jokes” were a bit too twee for me. For instance:
“‘Oh God, Spencer.’ She clutched his muscled back. ‘You’re too good for me.’
For a moment, his hips stopped plunging. ‘You’re sweet, Strawberry, but I’m the one who’s leveling up.’”
If you can’t tell – that was in the middle of a sex scene, and it was jarring enough that I put the book down for a while.
Overall, this was enjoyable, but hit somewhat short of the mark for me.
I received this book for free from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.