Two Can Play - Ali Hazelwood

Viola Bowen has the chance of a lifetime: to design a video game based on her all-time favorite book series. The only problem? Her co-lead is Jesse F-ing Andrews, a.k.a. her arch-nemesis. Jesse has made it abundantly clear over the years that he wants nothing to do with her–and Viola has no idea why.

When their bosses insist a wintery retreat is the perfect team-building exercise, Viola can’t think of anything worse. Being freezing cold in a remote mountain lodge knowing Jesse is right next door? No, thank you.

But as the snow piles on, Viola discovers there’s more to Jesse than she knew, and heat builds in more ways than one. (link)

Review: 2/5

This was a short story (novella) written by Ali Hazelwood about two gaming developers who are snowed in and forced to work together on a big project. Obviously our lead has a personal tie to this project and is therefore possessive of doing it right. Now, I don’t wanna brag *cracks knuckles* but I’m a bit of a gamer myself… I FINISHED Mario Bros on my Nintendo DSI when I was in elementary school, and I recently finished Hogwarts Legacy on my Nintendo Switch. What can I say, I’m a Nintendo girl with commitment issues at heart. So trust me when I say I understand the possessiveness of doing a game right; I’m not-so-patiently awaiting the release of Hogwarts Legacy 2.

However, the Ali Hazelwood-ification of enemies to lovers with a petite nerdy girl and a man the size of a fridge is… boring. (To my friend, Allison, if you’re reading this; I’m sorry to say I’ve outgrown this phase of my life based on enjoying published Adam Driver fanfic) It’s only currently available as an audiobook.

Quick research break: What’s the difference between a short story and a novella, by the way? From MWEditing;

• Length: The most obvious difference between a short story vs novella is their length. Short stories are typically much shorter, ranging from a few hundred to a few thousand words. At the same time, novellas are longer, ranging from 20,000 to 40,000 words.

• Complexity: Novellas have more room for complexity in terms of plot, character development and thematic exploration compared to short stories. Short stories focus on a single plot or idea, while novellas may have more subplots and character arcs.

Now to my beef about the actual storyline; it was so unbelievably cringe. It was performatively feminist (as with most Ali Hazelwood writing), flossing was mentioned VERY quickly, I’m pretty sure I remember the use of “doggo”, “why do families not have HR departments” is a DIRECT quote… and it was overall extremely horny for a day/weekend at work. And by that, I mean EVERY character was horny (again, not surprising for a Hazelwood story).

During the classically Hazelwood trope of miscommunication, Viola (our main female character) says “I know him better than that” and all I have to say is “girl, no you don’t?” These characters have known each other for years, but Viola was always under the impression that Jesse hated her since they met. And then they screw around because of the tension of being in a shared cabin… So girl, do you really know him? I think my logic-focused brain hates rom-coms these days. I need to stop picking them up.

Techy and nerdy playlist incoming!

Spotify: LINK