Thank you to NetGalley for this copy. This is a really good book, kept me entertained throughout and I would thoroughly recommend to all.

This book was a romance romance, so not quite what I expected when I read the blurb however I was pleasantly surprised. I enjoyed the character development and how the plot unfolded.. I wouldn’t say that I was gripped, however I did keep picking it up which is a good sign.

Oh wow this books starts fast and just keeps going. It grabs you with the story of a disaffected young woman, Katie who has just been let go from her pa job in the city and thrusts you into this amazingly ethical world of Byrsa where she finds herself not only liking her job but also liking her boss. The story unfolds with exquisite pace and I really didn’t want this book to end. It’s about self discovery, friendship, thoughtfulness and caring. A really great read. Without giving anything away the reason why I can’t give 5 stars is the transformation which was never fully explained or really delved into.

Catherine Daly, otherwise known as Katy, works in the City of London as a personal assistant but when her job disappears because her boss changes she has to find a new one. Despite being gauche and lacking in self-confidence, she’s taken on by a female CEO called Riley and a company called Byrsa.

Byrsa is a shadowy company but it appears to spend most of its time collecting confidential data and holding it in store for clients. It is therefore more than a little odd that Riley apparently employs Katy on a whim but, as it turns out, there is a mutual attraction between them which, for a long time, neither owns up to.

Then, there’s a crisis and a dramatic security breach and things happen and Katy does the wrong thing but it turns out to be right and she thinks Riley is going to sack her but in fact she promotes her and they own up to their desires!

A lesbian romance set in the City of London makes for an unusual plot but it takes a stretch of the imagination to believe in Reilly’s idiosyncratic control of huge amounts of confidential data, to understand how her company got where it is, and why she employed Katy in the first place.

Having said that, it is nice to see a novel of this kind making its way into the mainstream and there’s some impressive description of the City and how it functions. It’s even possible to imagine that there might be companies which operate like Byrsa – even if you wouldn’t fancy a job there!

I’d describe this book as realistic fiction. The author has done an amazing job at creating imaginary characters and situations that depict the world and society. The characters focus on themes of growing, self-discovery and confronting personal and social problems. This is a first for me by the author and one I enjoyed and would read more of their work. The book cover is eye-catching and appealing and would spark my interest if in a bookshop. Thank you very much to the author, publisher and Netgalley for this ARC.

3.5/5.

In some ways, The Manager was exactly what I expected and in a lot of other ways it wasn't. I thought this was a gripping, thought provoking read that kept me on my toes all the way through. There was mystery, there was suspense, there was a range of characters with exceptional development all through the storyline. I also really enjoyed the writing and writing style. I am very excited to see what A. K. Wilson does next.

I wasn't rea!ly sure what to expect from this book but was pleasantly surprised. Read the whole book in one sitting, it was a compelling story and I wanted to know more about the characters and liked the way the story unfolded.
I was given an advanced copy of this book by netgallery for an honest review.

a slow start but a great ending. I was not sure what was going to happen in this book as it was a standard office/boos start, but then there were lots of twists and turns that I did not see coming..Definitely worth reading to find the back story of the CEO of Byrs and how the relationship builds with Kate. Its an unusual book, but well worth reading

This was an enjoyable tale of a woman who conditioned herself not to care about work and anything really until she takes a high powered job as a personal assistant for a highly driven woman who has mysterious secrets. Their 2 worlds collide putting everyone in danger. Some good twists and turns and a few surprises along the way.

Money, power, secrets...love?

Katy grew up seeing how the first three could shatter everything--including the fourth. She wants no part of the games and the chase, but that seems to have left her with an empty life.

After being suddenly thrown back into the job market, her new boss, Riley, seems to be a channel to all of these things. And Katy is increasingly finding herself overwhelmed by attrcation. Can she let this all in? Should she? And what price might doing so extract from her?

Katy is our narrator, and it's immediately a fascinating experience. She's smart, and also a smart-ass. She's observant, insightful about herself as well as others. But she's also lost, hiding from herself and everyone else in a stoic mask. When the rug sweeps out from under her, she simply steps off it and onto the next one with a barely broken stride; except inside, where she's trying to figure out who did that, why, why then, and what this new rug is.

As you can probably tell, I liked her right away.

Riley enters the story as some sort of icy goddess, immediately churning Katy's brain. But it's quickly obvious that Riley is much more than that, and getting to know her better as we go is quite a treat. All too often the balance on this type of character is wrong, they're usually too tightly wound, too clammed up. But Wilson finds a sweet spot here and it works very well.

Watching things unfold from behind Katy's eyes is entertaining, not just for her observations, but also for the way we learn through her perspective, and how we see her change–usually before she does.

I'm going to slightly bend my usual no-spoiler rule here, so skip this bit if you don't want anything:
[There's a major character who is trans. Yaaaaay. Even better - the bad guy from her pre-trans days doesn't misgender her. Double yaaaay.]

I enjoyed this. It’s nice to read a queer story that both centres queer characters, and doesn’t make their queerness central to everything.

Pick this up if you want cute lesbian smoochies, lots of twists and turns, and an enjoyably paced story.

On a drunken whim Katy applies for a job at a secret tech company. She gets more than she bargained for as the assistant to CEO Riley. Intriguing but a bit far fetched, the relationship between the two main characters takes many different directions. Not quite a thriller or a romance.

In the City of London, the scent of money and power lingers in the corridors of the shiny office buildings and clings to the suits of the men who work in them. Chasing that scent is the only thing that matters.
But not to Katy Daly. She has spent her life working in the City, but wealth and power are things granted to other people. Her childhood was shattered by the pursuit of them, and since then she’s coasted along on a course of risk-avoidance and underachieving.
Then Katy starts working for Riley Daniels, the beautiful and charismatic CEO of Byrsa, one of the most successful yet secretive tech companies in the world. Katy can’t help but be fascinated by this clever, fiercely ambitious woman making it in a man’s world. Riley has a way of making her wonder if there could be more to life than letting other people shape your destiny.
But power comes at a cost. As Katy is drawn deeper into Riley’s intoxicating world, she is forced to confront who she is, who she has become, and how far she will go to protect Riley’s secrets – and her own.
I have worked in the city my whole life and really have seen all sort so was intrigued to read this novel. It was not quite what I expected in terms of the love interest side of things but I really liked the characters and the relationships between them and how they evolved. I also found the tech company concept very interesting. It started perhaps a little slow then I was gripped and couldn’t wait to see how the story developed!
Definitely true how its described – a timely, though provoking debut about gender, power and identity in the City of London. Well recommended
Thanks for NetGalley and the publisher for a chance to read this book in exchange for an honest review.

An office romance that i actually liked and found charmin?? YESSS.
Many thanks to the publishers and Netgalley for the arc.

Katy Daly works in the City of London, amongst the money in shiny offices. But she's faced with shattering news - and not for the first time in her life. She starts to work for the charismatic Riley Daniels, the CEO of a very secretive business within the City. Katy is drawn into this powerful, ambitious and secretive world, but how far will she go herself to obtain what she desires, and at what cost?

It is always pleasing to read an author's first work - and this was certainly not a disappointment. It is intriguing from the start and moves fluidly and at a fast pace from the first page. It is a world that we may have been in, or certainly heard of and as a reader we too are drawn towards it and Riley Daniels, like Katy Daly. I was hooked from the first sentence.

There is so much to unpeel here. Office relationships, the intricate dance we have with our work colleagues, wanting to fit in, in so many areas of life and work. The balance of family with a career or job that you are enthralled in. The need to feel that you are in the right place, doing the right thing, with the right people. We can all relate. I particularly liked the way the writer explored the way that your own identity (be it your name or gender) has to be manipulated in this 'City' world. 'Cities eat you'. They do indeed.

I liked the way this is written with no superfluous descriptions or long and turgid, irrelevant passages. It is pithy, and all the better for it, in my opinion. Every single paragraph you read is required. There's some great editing here.

One thing I would suggest to anyone considering an interview - learn to play chess. Read the book!

Would I recommend it? Absolutely. It is without a doubt 5/5. Can't wait for their second novel.

Katy Daly has spent her entire life working in the city as an Executive Assistant. Wealth and power seem to belong to everyone else and they tore her family apart in pursuit of it. She starts working for CEO Riley Daniels at Byrsa, a secretive tech company. Katy is fascinated by Riley. She’s clever and ambitious by it it seems power comes at a cost. As Katy is drawn into Riley’s world, she’s forced to confront who she is but how far will she go to keep Riley’s secrets and her own.

This book is both interesting and intriguing. It kept me entertained and moved along at a good pace. Thank you to NetGalley, WBE Creative and the author for the chance to review.

This book was not what I expected at all. I thought it was going to be much darker and sinister but actually it was refreshingly different. I liked Katy and Riley and their relationship. I thought the book was well crafted although the Las Vegas bit was a bit confusing. More romantic suspense than thriller but very enjoyable and I would certainly read this author again. Nothing explicit.
Because it was so enjoyable and a refreshing surprise I'm giving it 5 stars

A very well-written high level office romance where nothing is quite as it seems. Many thanks to NetGalley UK and the publisher for the ARC.

I wasn't sure what to expect from this book, but I did think it would be much more of a thriller than it was. I would say it was much more of a romance than I thought, but I did enjoy the storyline itself. I would have liked to have heard more from the point of view of the Manager herself, but I think I was just frustrated by some of the opinions and choices of the main narrator. Overall, an interesting read and I did manage to escape to a different world for a while.
Thanks to Netgalley, the author and publisher for an advanced copy for an honest review.

Not the book I was expecting, but enjoyable nonetheless. It felt like it started off as kind of an edgy HBO thriller and then progressed to more of a melodramatic young adult show on the CW. Having said that the unexpected focus on the romance was thoroughly enjoyed as well as the general writing throughout which was scrumptious!

“They say you have to be a psychopath to succeed in business. So some people might say my lack of emotion would have meant I was ideally suited to a career at the top. I disagree. My stoic demeanour made me perfect for a job as someone’s emotional punching bag.”

“Dressing for the job you want is a conspiracy aimed at making women so worn out that they have no energy to put into the job they have, thus rendering them useless for any corporate ladder climbing.”

“I didn’t know what to say. It’s a universal truth that women around the world struggle to accept a compliment appropriately, and it’s even more difficult than ever when that compliment is coming from someone you fancy a ridiculous amount.”

*** I received an early complimentary copy of this book. The opinions expressed in this review are completely my own

The main character Katy originally works in London City as a PA to Giles. Giles decides to move on and has no use for her so she needs to look for another job. During her thought process you can see she doesn’t have much confidence in herself as she only wants the kind of role where she can just blend into the background and not actually use her initiative and enjoys to blame the fact that men are holding back her opportunities when in fact it is her mindset. It isn’t until she meets with Riley CEO of Byrsa she becomes mesmerised by the fact that she has her own company, and how she goes on and so forth. It later becomes an obsession where she is falling for her.
I thought this novel was going to explain the differences between falling in love with someone and admiring a person for being good at getting what they want.
This novel didn’t really grip me as it was not that clear. I dislike novels that just obsess over a person instead of showing there is more to it.
Thank you for the book in exchange for an honest review.