The Hating Game: A Book Review

I bought the book, The Hating Game some time earlier in the new year when there was a big sale on #BookTok reads. The cover looked cute and so did the synopsis of the story about two employees who, not only hate one another, but are also vying for the SAME job position.

Joshua Templeman and Lucy Hutton both work at Bexley & Gamin and they clearly can't stand each other, as the book synopsis says. When at work the two of them resort to kiddish games, such as, "The Staring Game" to see who will break first. She wears bright red lipstick called Flamthrower and Josh crunches on mints all day. Josh also has a panache for wearing different shirts for each day of the week.

The story starts off cute with their constant bickering, since they both work together in the same office. Josh, from description, is buff, tall and intimidating (based on his working out on his breaks and his cold demeanor at work, that terrifies everyone) and Lucy, is definitely a people pleaser, always being polite and such when around others at her job. She also has a big collection of various Smurfs.

It's clear, after Lucy's hot dream about Josh, and Josh's constant grilling of a 'date' she had planned, the two were liking one another. Josh's feelings became evident when the company paintball game took place. His territorial attitude regarding Danny (who clearly, in my opinion sounded like a complete square) at the paintball game proved that Josh had feelings for Lucy, especially when he shoots Danny with his paintball gun for merely saying hello to her.

I liked Josh a lot more than Lucy and this is why:

• Josh instantly has a big soft spot for Lucy after she gets sick during the paintball game, so much so he takes her home, gets her dressed in her pajamas and gradually nurses her back to health (with the help of her brother, Patrick, who is the opposite of him).

• I loved the back story in terms as to why Josh was not particularly ready to head back home to a family, whose father looked down on him the majority of his life. The sheer fact that Josh was supposed to be pre-med explained a lot in terms of the care he provided Lucy during sick spell.

• Josh is the most level-headed when it came to his interactions with Lucy and he put up with quite a bit of antics and freak-outs from her.

Lucy wasn't a bad character, but toward the end, she became exasperating to me. She would freak out over the most trivial things and when Josh and she did finally establish that they liked each other, she was always questioning it. She was always under the impression that Josh truly hated her, even when everything that he was doing proved otherwise. It explains a lot in terms of her always wanting to be the best or be first in something; because she wanted others to take notice and to like her for it.

I loved the elevator scene (not the one with their first kiss) where they are racing one another to get to Josh's apartment first. The whole set up was so sweet. Her calling him and hanging up; his calling her right back, stopping his workout to meet her at his apartment; the whole race to beat the other there. It was cute.

I didn't pick up on the fact that both characters had their own little vice. Lucy liked red lipstick and used pink Post It notes, while Josh liked to crunch mints and used blue Post It notes. I also didn't pick up on how everything in his apartment was in shades of off-white and browns, except for his bedroom, which was painted blue, the same color of Lucy's eyes.

Out of all of those things that I did like about the book, the only critique I had about it was how it dragged on toward the end and the constant hang ups with Lucy always overthinking and freaking out about every little thing. That drove my nerves. I do give Sally Thorne credit for writing a good book, just don't have the chapters be so long (toward the end, I felt it was all filler just to hype up the ending). 14 pages in one chapter made me want to put the book down after a while.

Overall, I rate this book a 4 out of 5.