Book Review: Once Upon an Algorithm

The setting: STEM but make it SaaS

Let's start with the setting. Leonie, our main character is a senior product manager, while Jack is a lead developer (or so she thinks) working on a new app. They're surrounded by other developers and a UX/UI designer, working in sprints, doing sticky note brainstorming sessions, all that jazz.

As someone who works on a SaaS product in real life, although as a marketer, it was almost weird (in a good way) to be placed in a setting that's so familiar. I'm used to not understanding much of what they professionally talk about in STEM romances, so it was fun to be on the other side this time.

The characters of Once Upon An Algorithm

Leonie. I have mixed feelings about her.

Overall I liked her character, especially when she decided to hear Jack out towards the end to make decisions after hearing both sides of the story. MCs so often get stubborn and do the opposite that it was very refreshing.

But having been so hung up on the age difference, and falling for Eric's gaslighting and manipulation still annoyed me quite a lot. I know she needed the latter for the storyline's sake, but it still annoyed me a little.

Jack. He was an emotional rollercoaster in himself. First I was all "oh I somehow trust him as Leonie does" then I went "how could I think that he's such a jerk" and it kept going up and down and up and down. Until the very last page, and in the end I think I still don't like him.

Eric. Just eww. The most awful asshole with his manipulation and gaslighting. Since his character was written very well, he and his audacity and entitlement made me so mad I almost threw my Kindle across the room a few times.

The girls. They were so fun to have around and I just wish we could have seen more of them and their friendship dynamics. I'd love to even read a whole separate book starring this group as a whole.

Mia & Mike. They're the good characters that are unfairly looked over, but whom our MC reconciles with at the end. I felt like their relationship with Leonie wasn't very well done, as the author scratched the surface but didn't go deep enough.

This way Leonie does sound more like a priviliged girl complaining, as Jack also saw her, making it harder to justify the strain in her relationship with her wonderful mother and actually really nice stepfather.

Is Once Upon An Algorithm spicy?

I feel like the categories and the blurb made this book seem more spicy than it actually is. Whatever spicy scenes it has are very nicely written, but not as explicit as I expected them to be.

They complement the book nicely but I definitely wouldn't call this a spicy romance -it's about the same level as The Love Hypothesis and all these other STEM romances are. Maybe even a little less?

The story and my overall impression

Overall, I really liked the author's writing style, which made it really easy to read. It was fun to read a contemporary romance in a STEM setting so familiar to me with a storyline not as straightforward as they usually are.

With that said, I wasn't the biggest fan of the romance between the main characters. It felt too messed up and the resolution of their conflict was too hasty. I wish there was more time spent on the romance and that we got a better MMC.

Since it's a quick and easy read though, I give it 3.5/5.