Faker by Sarah Smith

*Spoiler free*

Emmie Echavarre is a professional faker. She has to be to survive as one of the few female employees at Nuts & Bolts, a power tool company staffed predominantly by gruff, burly men. From nine to five, Monday through Friday, she’s tough as nails–the complete opposite of her easy-going real self. One thing she doesn’t have to fake? Her disdain for coworker Tate Rasmussen. Tate has been hostile to her since the day they met. Emmie’s friendly greetings and repeated attempts to get to know him failed to garner anything more than scowls and terse one-word answers. Too bad she can’t stop staring at his Thor-like biceps… When Emmie and Tate are forced to work together on a charity construction project, things get…heated. Emmie’s beginning to see that beneath Tate’s chiseled exterior lies a soft heart, but it will take more than a few kind words to erase the past and convince her that what they have is real.

I’ve been reading and wanting to read more romance books, and it seemed like this one would be one that I liked. A woman working in a construction company staffed by mostly men and she has to fake her toughness to get people to take her seriously. She has a coworker who she intensely dislikes, but is forced to work with. It seemed like something I would really like.

I think I’ve realized that I read romance books in a kinda weird way. As long as I don’t absolutely hate the writing and I like the characters just a little bit, I don’t really mind anything else. I read them because I want something light and fluffy and if I get that, I’m willing to look past a lot of things. It makes it kind of hard to review them, but I’m still going to try since I do like reading them!

I did end up really like this one. It was super fluffy and cheesy, in a really good way. Though, sometimes it borderlined on cringey. Overall, it was super cute!

From the synopsis, I was expecting Emmie to be a construction worker. Like, building houses with a group of men and she has to prove that she can handle it. She’s actually a copyeditor for a construction company. I was a bit disappointed, but she still turned out to be a great character. I thought the emotional plotline would be more prevalent, since Emmie have to fake her tough persona seemed like it would be a big part of the book. It was there, but it was more in background. I honestly can’t complain too much, since it was a ton of cuteness that took the forefront.

Tate was also a really great character. He was such a sweet a guy and he’s an introvert! I loved seeing a male character who’d rather stay home and is exhausted by social interaction.

The enemies-to-lovers trope was done really, really well in this book. The simmering hatred, the banter, and the anger towards each other was fantastic. It also laid the groundwork for the relationship in a weird, but really cool way. It don’t think I’ve read a lot of books where it’s done this way, but I really liked how it built on everything.

I would have liked for a couple emotional aspects to be fleshed out more and there were times where things felt a bit too cheesy (and that’s saying a lot for me haha). But, I still ended up really liking this book!

This feels more like a mini review than anything haha, but that’s alright! Really, this book was really fluffy with characters that had a lot of layers. It was just super sweet!

You can add Faker on Goodreads and order a copy of your own!

Thank you for reading!