3 Rue Rue Rue Stars ⭐
Spicy Level: 🌶️🌶️🌶️.5/5

This one was a little unusual because it is NOT LIKE any of the other Ali Hazelwood books that I have read. She does give a little "warning" in the front that this is going to be leaning more into erotica than just rom-com-y and boy was she not kidding.

𝙎𝙮𝙣𝙤𝙥𝙨𝙞𝙨:
Rue Siebert is a chemical engineer working for a biofuel company, working on a project at the company to preserve food. But she has an interesting "little sexual appetite" and uses a hookup app to meet strangers for a one-and-done fix. She matches with Eli Killgore on the app and the two agree to meet up at a hotel to get down and dirty but don't as Rue's brother plays "angry cockblocker" so Eli just takes Rue home... BUT BOTH ARE STILL VERY SEXUALLY ATTRACTED TO EACH OTHER. So she's pretty shocked when the next day she rocks up to her company to find out there's a Hostile Takeover in progress, she could possibly lose her research and job and Eli's company is the one doing the takeover. Now Rue needs to battle her loyalty to the company while also dealing with the fact that she really really really wants to fuck Eli.

𝙏𝙝𝙤𝙪𝙜𝙝𝙩𝙨 𝙖𝙣𝙙 𝙁𝙚𝙚𝙡𝙞𝙣𝙜𝙨:
So I'm not sure if I like Ali Hazelwood as an author. I've tried a couple of her books and they always seem to end up mediocre for me. They're not the type of books that will ever make it on my ride-or-die romance list. They always seem a little bit problematic and I guess I just read them to pass the time. She's like nothing memorable and just something for JIT entertainment... but when it's done I am not going to ever wanna go back. From an entertainment perspective, they deliver exactly what I need. They keep my ears busy while I happen to be watering my plants or doing some crafting and sewing.

There's not much in this but sex and it's basically just vanilla sex with maybe a little bondage and edging. I think most of the interactions between the two of them is Eli just saying Rue's name 17 times in one sentence, 100 times in that chapter and then ending up with them having sex. Now I don't mind that too much, characters are horny but they are totally giving off vibes that that is all there is to their connection. There is NO CHEMISTRY AT ALL! NO CONNECTION!

Obviously, Eli is attracted to Rue, and sometimes a little bit creepy how attracted he is to Rue. The way he thinks about her and talks makes me think he has some sort of DaddyXDaughter kink because he "wants to just take care of her". But then he turns into a bumbling fool and can only really say her name when in his presence. Like the word "Rue" was used 441 times... LET ME REPEAT THAT... 441 times!!!! and her POV is in FIRST PERSON... WHICH is also a little strange - like why have a dual POV book but then one of them is first person and the other is third person? Why are we watching Eli but we are in Rue's HEAD?

Rue and Eli are both very damaged characters so deal a lot with the effects of this trauma throughout the book as they explore what they mean to each other and what each other's presence means in their lives. Eli was actually sweet in everything that he did and besides the weird name thing, he was the favourite of the two - he was very besotted with Rue and fought to make it work. His determination to get her to crack her "no-second" rule was admirable and his tenacity to continue to break her walls down and help her explore new boundaries was sweet. Rue felt like sandpaper without a personality. She is very robotic in her thoughts and does not have "traditional" feelings. It's never explicitly stated in the book, but it's pretty clear that Rue is neurodivergent tending to autistic with her actions and stilted emotional connection to things. She breaks things down so clinically and battles to build connections with people and doesn't always have a filter... I really did not like her as a person and felt her actions were very selfish.

I do want to give kudos to the narrators. I love it when Callie Dalton reads romances. She does such an amazing job. She was joined by Jason Clarke and I swear every time he did an accent, my panties might have melted off right there... The one thing I REALLY loved about the Audio was it did my FAVOURITE THING. Most dual narrations are split into chapters where one narrator will do all the voices in that chapter and the other narrator will do the second POV. However, when Eli spoke in Rue's POV he would be voiced by Jason Clarke even though it was Callie's chapter and this just added such an extra level to the performance.

𝙏𝙧𝙤𝙥𝙚𝙨 and 𝙈𝙞𝙘𝙧𝙤 𝙏𝙧𝙤𝙥𝙚𝙨:
▶ Dual POV but its First Person POV (Rue) and Third Person POV (Eli)
▶ Instalust
▶ Strangers to Lovers
▶ "Out of Our Systems"
▶ "Fuck It"
▶ Steamy Water Scene
▶ He Fall's First
▶ Forced Proximity
▶ Workplace STEM Romance
▶ "Use Me"
▶ Good Girl

Overall this WASN'T THE WORST ALI HAZELWOOD I have read... but it wasn't the best... It was just sex...