Kira Archer - 69 Million Things I Hate About You

After personal assistant Kiersten Abbott wins sixty-nine million dollars in the lotto, she suddenly has more than enough money to quit her impossibly demanding job. But where’s the fun in that? She decides to stay and exact a little revenge on her insufferable ass of a boss.
Billionaire Cole Harrington quickly figures out something’s afoot with his usually agreeable personal assistant. When he finds out about the office pool betting on how long it’ll take him to fire her, he decides to spice things up and see how far he can push her until she quits.
The game is on, with everyone waiting to see who will crack first. But the bet sparks a new dynamic between them, and soon they realize they just might have crossed that fine line between hate and love.

Comment: I got interested in this book because it would feature a plot that isn't that easy to see, after all in real life winning the lottery or big amounts of money in games isn't that likely. Added to this, the story would have boss/employee and opposites battling it out (not exactly enemies though) so I was in for a sweet but fun romance.

Kiersten Abbott, along with her two best friends, win the lottery and that means, as soon as the paperwork is done, she can do whatever she wants.

In the last months she has worked as personal assistant to Cole Harrigton, the millionaire owner of the company and someone ruthless in every aspect of his life. Their relationship has been purely professional although both admire the other silently.

When Kierstan wins the money, she decides it's time to quit but since her boss has been obnoxious and a jerk many times, she decides to play a trick on him to see if he can fire her and she will do this by being the opposite of what she has been.

Cole has admired his employee's dedication and work ethic so he is stunned when she starts to behave like a careless person but then he finds out why and decides to hold the fort anyway, until one of hem cracks...

Seriously, in real life, in the cutting edge world of multi millionaire companies and their CEOs, is there any likability this scenario could ever work out?

Despite the ridiculous premise, I still felt like reading because I kept imagining the author would give an emotional tone to this story and the (foreseen) comedy scenes would be cute. At least, this what I imagined but the reality was severely disappointing.

There wasn't a lot I liked about this book but I confess it was easy to read, the story isn't too big and the hints of what could be gave me will to carry on.

However, going at this annoyance by annoyance would really bring the grade down. I suppose I just felt like putting this one in the middle of the road because some parts were readable and acceptable.

There were several details that made me really irritated with this book, so wasted was the plot on silly stuff. But the biggest issue, that truly made me disappointed was the childish pranks these two did on one another and how unprofessional their behavior was, especially the heroine's. Having a more than comfortable cushion to rely on if things went very wrong is no excuse to behave in such a way and from then on I never felt sympathetic towards her.

Cole isn't such a hero material anyway but despite him being a jerk, I wasn't that surprised when he fought back, I mean... something had to develop this plot.

In the beginning, the story felt promising. The girls would win the money, I thought this would focus on funny scenes when Kiersten tried to escape her job but not on her initiative. I bet there could be ways to do so (all the rom-coms out there prove it) while she still debated on her new possibilities, on her change in status. The book doesn't address this at all. The whole book is about the office pranks, the so-called relationship which, in my opinion, never really reached such level.

The Kierstan we meet in the first chapter seems competent, analytical, compassionate but steady and I liked her, I rooted for her. Then she wins the money and even before she has it, her personality seems to change completely. It just didn't feel realistic.

In fact, none of the book did. There are several situations that are so cringe worthy unlikely and wrong, I can't imagine this being acceptable.The office pranks don't feel possible, even in such a fictional scenario. The romance between Kierstan and Cole is non existent! They go from employee/boss to revert to their childhood and playing games on one another. They kiss twice and their feelings change radically (although none confesses this) until the end, when over the top melodramatic declarations of love are supposed to convince us they are in love forever.

It's very sad this story had no real depth. The characters don't feel realistic nor does the way they behave and there isn't even personality or characterization to show us how they evolve.

There are also some secondary situations which were used to show us another side of them but it felt rushed and out of place and placed there only to prove both Cole and Kierstan had more depth than what they showed during the whole novel.

I'm sorry to say this book was not a good one and although.... Ok, you know what, on second thinking while writing this, I have to say the book really didn't convince me. I'm downgrading it one point because there isn't a lot that would redeem it to me. Instead of 5, it's a 4.

Grade: 4/10