The Rule Book by Jennifer Blackwood

Title: The Rule Book (The Rule Breakers #1)

Author: Jennifer Blackwood

Publisher: Entangled Embrace

Release Date: May 9, 2016

Source: ARC from Publisher

Buy the Book: Amazon / B&N / Indigo

Starr Media Second-Assistant Survival Guide

1. Don’t call your hot boss the antichrist to his face.

2. Don’t stare at hot boss’s, um, package or his full sleeve of tattoos. (No. Really. Stop!)

3. Don’t get on the malicious first assistant’s bad side.

4. Don’t forget to memorize the 300-page employee manual.

5. If you value your cashmere, steer clear of boss’s dog.

6. Boss’s dimples are lust-inducing. Do. Not. Give. In.

7. “The elevator ate your clothes” is not a valid excuse for showing up to important meetings half dressed.

8. Don’t break seven of the rules within the first week of employment if you, ya know, are in dire need of money to support your sick mom.

9. Whatever you do, don’t fall for the boss. See rule eight about sick mom.

10. Never forget the rules.

You know how sometimes you just want to read a fun romance that’s just going to put a smile on your face, maybe even make you laugh, and take you out of your own head for a few hours? I was looking for exactly that when I picked up Jennifer Blackwood’s The Rule Book and it did exactly what I hoped it would.

Lainey Taylor has never really been one for rules. But working at Starr Media means having to abide by a specific set of rules, each one more ridiculous than the last. But Lainey is determined to follow them, because without this job, she won’t be able to keep helping her sick mom. She needs this job and if to keep it she has to follow a ridiculous set of rules, then that’s what she’ll do. But everything that could possibly go wrong in her first week of work goes wrong and by some miracle, Lainey hangs on to her job. And if that wasn’t enough, there’s also Brogan Starr, CEO of Starr Media and Lainey’s very hot boss. She knows the last thing she should be doing is think about Brogan in anything less than a professional way. But how is Lainey supposed to help herself when the more time she spend with Brogan at the office, the more time she wants to spend with him outside of work.

Jennifer Blackwood’s The Rule Book was such a fun story. Like a lot of the romance books I’ve been reading these days, I hadn’t really heard anything about it until I came across it on NetGalley. But once I read the description, I knew that it was going to be my kind of story. And it absolutely was. Beyond being a fun and flirty romance, I found The Rule Book to also be a really relatable story. Or at least it was for me (well, not quite the romance with the boss part, but the rest). I totally understood what Lainey was going through, trying to find her footing in a new job after just having finished school. Thankfully, I didn’t have someone like Jackson in my first post-grad job, but even without someone like that who’s constantly trying to get you to screw up finding your rhythm after graduation can be hard. Especially when you have as much going on as Lainey did. All that to say that, in that aspect, The Rule Book was really relatable. Though I couldn’t exactly relate to the romance part of the book, it didn’t stop me from really enjoying it. Though I sometimes disagreed with one or both of them, I really liked the dynamic at play between Lainey and Brogan which absolutely made me root for them. Even when they were being stupid. But I’ll get to that. 

Much like Lainey’s work storyline was a relatable one, Lainey herself was a really relatable characters. Or at least she was for me. I connected with her right from the start and got completely caught up in her life. So many of the thoughts she has, whether about having inappropriate crushes or about having trouble resisting the lure of the one-click purchase button, are ones I’ve had myself and it’s those little things that often had me smiling throughout the book. What I loved about Lainey? Her sassiness. Lainey was definitely not afraid to say what was on her mind and I loved her for it. Even if sometimes I wished she would actually chew Jackson out for real and not just in her head because he so totally deserved it. And Lainey’s sassiness also came in handy with Brogan. Because Brogan sometimes (often) needed someone to give him a reality check and Lainey was great at doing just that. Because despite being swoony in all kinds of ways, Brogan sometimes was pretty clueless about some things. Namely how he felt about Lainey. And that having too many rules is not really living. But thankfully he came to his senses.

Though I might have randomly come across it, I’m happy that I found out about Jennifer Blackwood’s The Rule Book. It was a story that was fun and put a smile on my face while I was reading. And I’m just going to put it out there that I wouldn’t be opposed to reading a story all about Zoey...