Hot Work by Kate Cole

 

Published on July 11, 2025

342 pages

I read the paperback version

Back Cover

Violet Thomas has everything figured out.

Fearless and over forty, she’s been a commercial diver for almost two decades and has mastered work at dark and dangerous depths. Cutting, welding, and inspecting offshore platforms and power dams with flawless execution, there isn’t much that fazes her anymore.

Except Cooper Brooks.

Bold, bright, and larger than life, he’s full of youth and BDE (Big Diver Energy). He’s the last thing the lone female on the dive team expects to find on a derelict oil platform set for decommission.

In the high-stakes world of diving, the pressure is intense, and safety is paramount. But maybe it’s time for risk-averse Violet to take a few chances. In a place where lives and careers are so easily set adrift, will the biggest plunge she takes be one she makes with her heart?

My review

Since my 40^th birthday is coming soon, I was curious to discover Violet’story. Spoiler alert: she is different from the one in Fourth Wing! It didn’t take long before I had a girlcrush on her. She is more mature than some character I met in romance, but not perfect just like everyone in real life. Even though, she is doing a job that most of woman didn’t even hear about, the author found a way to make her real and I could relate on some of her personality.

It's the first book I read from Kate Cole and it’s the second she wrote. Since I like water and the backcover catched my attention, I choose this one. You can read them separately, but I have to admit that after reading this one, I want to read all her universe.

I give my start to Violet, just because she kicks ass, but the mysterious Cooper is really close to get it. I like how Violet jokes about how young he is when he is in his 30^th. Sometime age gap can be a turn off in romance, but not this time. I thought they fit well together and they are both mature.

I liked JT too, he brings humour in the story and he is the character that made me laugh the most. Violet is funny too, but JT have a little something more.

There is one character that I didn’t like and it’s Charles, I understand why the protagonist forget easily about him. I can’t let you know why, but I was like huh, I don’t wish for a man like him in my life.

Excerpts

After fifteen years of routine work travel, I’m an expert minimalist. Like every other aspect of my life, my gear is reduced to the bare essentials: everything I need and not a single thing I don’t. (p.1)

"It’s a book by Rebecca Yarros. Her female main character is named Violet, and her main character likes to call her ´Violence’.” (p.8)

His words should fill me with warmth: they’re ones I’ve been waiting to hear. Instead, they leave me cold. Something makes me pack away my phone, leaving him hanging like he’s done to me so many times. (p.42)

I’ve read enough romance books to know all the tropes. This one wasn’t on my radar. (p.60)

I’m old enough to know everything that could possibly go wrong if I do, and still young enough to fear that it will. (p.75)

Am I destined to live out my entire life alone? What’s worse is that I can’t even have cats because of this ridiculous career I’ve built for myself. The absentee lifestyle is not conductive to pets. (p.146)

Everything except that he told Cooper about an old pop star from Quebec named Mitsou, and her song "Bye Bye Mon Cowboy” has now make it into the yellow speaker’s rotation. (p.278)