Reviews

There were things I liked and things I disliked about this book.

Liked:
Asa and her story line
The sex scenes were really hot
It's well written

Disliked:
The pacing felt off. The first half of the book was really slow and there was way too much information about their professional lives.

Natalia never confronted her parents for how terrible they were. She never confronted her father for his misogynist views. She sat silent every time she had the opportunity to speak up

I'm not a super huge fan of "the pregnancy brought us together" storyline

ellinorreads's review against another edition

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1.0

Had to read this for my summer course.
Jesus christ it was terrible. And I read all the Twilight-books back in the day. This was almost at the same level.
I will never get the time back having to read this book, it literally made me roll my eyes at least twice a page.

mirareadsbooks's review against another edition

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emotional funny hopeful inspiring reflective medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

schokifan01's review against another edition

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4.0

Nach einem misslungenen Mädelsabend geht Lexia Vikander in eine Bar. Sie hat schon einige Drinks konsumiert, als ihr Blick auf einen attraktiven, fremden Mann fällt. Dieser setzt sich zu ihr, hört ihr aufmerksam zu, als sie von sich erzählt und wirkt ernsthaft an Lexia interessiert. Auch sie ist ihm nicht ganz abgeneigt und da sie sich genug Mut angetrunken hat, küsst sie ihn. Adam Nylund ist ein erfolgreicher Geschäftsmann und übernimmt auf den Auftrag seines Chefs die Stockholmer Marketingagentur „Sandelman & Dyhr“ – ausgerechnet die Agentur in der auch Lexia als Werbetexterin arbeitet, wie sie am nächsten Morgen feststellt. Adam mimt weiterhin den kalten Chef, doch bald muss er feststellen, dass Lexia auch ihn nicht ganz kalt gelassen hat…

Die beiden Protagonisten sind ganz klar Lexia und Adam. Ich finde es toll, dass die Autorin mit Lexia einen etwas außergewöhnlichen Namen gewählt hat, den man nicht so oft hört. Das hat aber durchaus auch damit zu tun, dass Simona Ahrnstedt aus Skandinavien stammt. Man erlebt die Geschichte abwechselnd aus der Sicht der beiden Protagonisten und kann sich so gut in ihre Gedankenwelt einfühlen und ihre Charaktere kennenlernen.

After Work ist mit seinen 519 Seiten ein ganz schön dicker Schinken. Mir ist das beim Lesen allerdings gar nicht aufgefallen, da der Schreibstil mir einen sehr leichten Lesefluss beschert hat. Die Seiten sind nur so dahin geflogen. In einem positiven Sinne außergewöhnlich finde ich, dass Lexia als Protagonistin kein Mädchen mit Modelmaßen verkörpert, sondern ihre Kurven hat. Obwohl sie sich damit nicht immer leicht tut, findet Adam ihren Körper genau so wie er ist perfekt. Der Schlankheitswahn unserer Gesellschaft wird in diesem Buch ebenfalls aufgegriffen und des Öfteren in Frage gestellt, sodass der Roman auch eine Komponente beinhaltet, die einen zum Nachdenken anregt.

“ Unseren Blick auf Menschen zu richten, die von der Norm abweichen, wäre ein erster Schritt in die richtige Richtung“ – Seite 507

Ich fand After Work wahnsinnig angenehm zu lesen, es war nicht so übertrieben romantisiert, wie es in New Adult Romanen oft der Fall ist und das Augenmerk der Autorin lag definitiv nicht bei den Bettgeschichten, sondern darauf eine Geschichte zu erzählen, die sich durchaus auch in der Realität hätte abspielen können.

After Work bekommt von mir 4 von 5 Sternen.

malin12ccf's review against another edition

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dark emotional lighthearted mysterious medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

Nowhere Book Bingo: First in a finished series
CBR16 Sweet Books: New (new author AND first time reading romance in Swedish)

Financial bad boy and seemingly ruthless venture capitalist David Hammar is a self-made man and has acquired his wealth and power for one purpose, which he is close to achieving. He is determined to take over Investum, one of the biggest companies in Sweden, owned and controlled by the powerful De la Grip family. Since the takeover might go smoother if his company has at least one member of the family on their side, he arranges to meet the daughter of the family, Natalia De la Grip, for a business lunch.

Natalia is extremely good at her job and keeps getting great references from current and previous employers. Working as a financial analyst, she desperately wants to prove herself capable and skilled enough to earn a place on the board of Investum. After her fiancée left her, she more or less lives at her work. She has no idea why David Hammar, considered a dangerous young upstart by her father, would want to meet with her, but is curious enough to go to the appointment (especially after her best friend Åsa goes on about how handsome and sexy David is). It doesn't take David long to conclude that Natalia is far too eager to please her father to ever betray the family name and join his revenge plot. The two have undeniable chemistry, however, and although he knows it's a terrible idea, he goes out of his way to do her a personal favour, even though he should forget about her and continue with his takeover plans.

Natalia knows her father and brother consider David Hammar some sort of personal nemesis, but when he claims to have double-booked so he won't be able to attend a concert (this is a total lie), offering her the tickets instead (an intimate concert with her favourite artist), they start texting, and soon he's invited her to dinner, which ends with them spending a passionate night together. It's only supposed to be one single night (the Swedish title of the book, in fact), but despite both knowing it's a terrible idea, they keep meeting and gradually falling for one another. David's best friend and business partner, Michel, is deeply uncomfortable about the rapidly escalating situation and keeps asking his friend to let Natalia down gently, before she discovers he's been lying to her the whole time, and his major personal and professional motivation is to ruin her family.

So this book has been on my actual physical bookshelf since 2016. I tracked down a copy and bought it in paperback after reading a very favourable review over on Smart Bitches, Trashy Books, and since then it's lingered unread. More fool me, this book was a cracking read, with so many soap opera elements. It not only kept me up far too late at night reading after I started reading it, but I spent most of a Sunday doing almost nothing but reading to finish it.

I'm trying to severely limit my reading challenges this year, after a few years of having most of my reading choices dictated by them. Nevertheless, I need to set myself SOME guidelines, especially to keep chipping away at my TBR list, and one of the goals I've set for myself is to read at least one of the Swedish or Norwegian books on my shelf per month. I barely ever read anything but English, which I'm starting to feel rather guilty about, especially considering how many Norwegian and Swedish language books have accumulated on my shelves. I've made some attempts at reading Norwegian contemporary fiction, much of it very critically lauded, and with very few exceptions, I'm bored senseless. One would think the answer would instead be to read the genres I enjoy in my first and second languages, especially since I literally already bought and paid for the books. Romance, fantasy, historical fiction - it's all there, being ignored because of all the shiny English-language books I let distract me.

TL, DR - I decided to finally read this book, and should clearly have done so sooner. Ahrnstedt started out writing historical romances (must see if I can track those down as well) and it clearly made her good at research. I don't know all that much about high finance or corporate shenanigans, but all of the stuff included in the book felt very realistic. It probably doesn't hurt that I spent much of the second half of last year finally watching all four seasons of Succession. So many deplorable rich people, intrigue, double-dealing, and betrayal. It made all of the stuff that happens in this book seem highly plausible.

Being used to reading English-language romance, I'm used to there being only one or maybe two POV characters. We usually only get the story from the heroine and/or hero's perspective. Here, Ahrnstedt gives us insight into quite a few characters, not just Natalia and David, our protagonists, but also Natalia's best friend, Åsa; David's best friend and business partner, Michel, occasionally also one of Natalia's brothers. There's a also very slow-burn secondary romance developed between Åsa and Michel, who used to be friends in their university days.

Because of some seriously bad stuff in his and his family's past, David's anger towards Gustav and Peter De la Grip (Natalia's father and eldest brother) is understandable, but even his best friend and partner doesn't know the full extent of his animosity and why he's so determined to take over their company and ruin their lives. He keeps being told by his best friend and mentor that vengeance won't actually give him the satisfaction he thinks it will, especially if it means absolutely devastating a woman he clearly cares for. It takes him a long time to realise that they are correct.

Natalia is a very engaging romance heroine. She's driven and very competent, and while I don't know anything about high finance, the author clearly did her research and shows us in a number of ways, rather than just telling us how capable Natalia is. She really wants to work for the family business, unfortunately, her father, the CEO of Investum, is infamously sexist and doesn't believe women can hack it in business. He keeps proving this to himself by occasionally hiring women, making it so difficult for them to do their jobs, ending with them quitting, usually utterly crushed. The only one of his children he even vaguely has to have time for is his eldest son and heir, Peter, and only because he wouldn't dare do anything to piss off dear old dad.

Both Natalia's mother and Peter's wife are women who support Gustav's old-fashioned and draconian view of gender roles, happily staying at home and expressing disbelief over women like Natalia who want careers and professional recognition. Why can't she just find herself a nice, rich husband who will support her, so she can live a life of leisure and settle down to have babies?

Basically, if Natalia wasn't so likable, I think I would be entirely in David's corner, cheering on his plan to take down and humiliate the De la Grip family, who are also part of the Swedish nobility and pretty much perfect examples of selfish and clueless rich assholes. Natalia has always felt like the odd one out of her family. The only one who seems to care for her at all is her younger brother Alexander, the handsome wastrel son who revels in drinking and carousing and never seems to stay in one place for very long. Her only friend is another driven career woman, who due to terrible personal losses early in life, seems to have difficulties showing affection or closeness to anyone (and hence acts like a b*tch a lot of the time when Natalia could use support).

Becoming more socialist with every passing day, a plot to take down and humiliate rich people very much appeals to me. The fact that David is a superwealthy venture capitalist tarnishes his halo a tad, and he ends up really breaking Natalia's heart. I do not think he groveled nearly enough towards the end of this novel and that Natalia was far too quick to forgive him for his many thoughtless actions, which is why I can't rate this higher than four stars. That, and the book just felt too long. I'm very glad I have the next two books in the series on my bookshelf, though. The next one is about Alexander, the playboy who is apparently haunted by mysterious shit, and a beautiful doctor lady who works in wartorn countries, and who from their encounters in this book seems to loathe him. So that promises to be fun.

Judging a book by its cover: It's not that the red evening dress on the cover isn't striking, and I love the way it flows down like some lush wave to the bottom of the cover image, but our heroine wears exactly one red dress over the course of the story, and there is a detailed description of how much leg said dress shows. This dress, for all its prettiness, shows absolutely no leg.

aivija's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional funny hopeful informative inspiring lighthearted medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

2.75

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