First Down by Grace Reilly (2022)
Contemporary sports romance. Book 1 of the Beyond the Play series. College senior and football star James transfers to a new university after some drama at his previous school. Luckily, he gets to go to school and live with his brothers (who feature in later books in this series). Unluckily, he has to take a writing class that he’s very bad at and needs a tutor in. Bex is also a college senior stuck taking the same writing class and dealing with an ex-boyfriend who won’t leave her alone. Somehow James and Bex exchange tutoring for fake dating, which pretty quickly turns into real dating. High on the steam and also lots of family drama for both James and Bex (but especially Bex). This was a fun and easy book to read and I’m looking forward to reading the rest of the series.
Ebook and audiobook borrowed from my local library via Libby.
Breakaway by Grace Reilly (2022)
Contemporary sports romance. Book 2 of the Beyond the Play series. Cooper is the second son of a famous football player who is often overshadowed by his famous football player brother, but is a talented college hockey player. He’s well-known for his skills with women, but he’s hit a bit of a dry spell and feeling frustrated because of it. Somehow, he gets assigned to assist with skating lessons for little kids and meets Penny there, who he does not realize is his coach’s daughter. Penny is a former figure skater who seems to have had a traumatic sexual encounter (though we don’t find out what it is until much later); she’s wary of guys and has a list of things she’d like to try, but doesn’t want a boyfriend to do it. Ultimately, Penny and Cooper comes to a friends with benefits agreement where he helps with her list and she helps with his frustrations. But being actual friends with each other leads to a lot more emotional connection than each person was expecting. This book was high on the steam, and humor, and caring. Cooper is basically the best not-boyfriend ever.
Ebook borrowed from my local library via Libby.
Stealing Home by Grace Reilly (2023)
Contemporary sports romance. Book 3 of the Beyond the Play series. We get to see hints of a Sebastian-Mia relationship developing in the previous book of the series, since Sebastian’s brother and Mia’s best friend are a couple and the social spheres have overlapped. Except that Mia is basically running away from any type of serious relationship and Sebastian is heartbroken when Mia stands him up for a date. We start the main story here during Summer semester when college baseball is still going for Sebastian, and also a Summer lab internship for Mia. When her dorm floods, Sebastian offers her a room at his house that he normally shares with his siblings (who are all conveniently out of town for the Summer). These two are clearly still pining for each other and quickly restart their physical relationship, even though they’re not anticipating anything more serious. They’ve each got their own career struggles, with Mia being a scientist and dealing with her family’s disapproval, and Sebastian trying to live up to his late father’s baseball reputation. There’s a lot of individual growth that both people need to deal with, in addition to their relationship issues. This book has a lot of fun spicy scenes, along with the interesting plotlines. And I loved Sebastian’s show of support for Mia in this big grand gesture at the end.
Ebook borrowed from my local library via Libby.
Wicked Serve by Grace Reilly (2024)
Contemporary sports romance. Book 4 of the Beyond the Play series. We get to catch up with little sister Izzy and her summer fling with her brother’s rival Nikolai. He somehow gets expelled from his own school and transfers to Izzy’s. Nik’s got his own tragic backstory with an abusive father, overbearing grandfather, and an emotionally detached mother, but he’s a very charming flirt who is very good at pleasing our girl Izzy. While they rekindle their relationship, they’ve got to keep it a secret from Izzy’s brother (and now Nik’s teammate), Cooper. And really, they’re just friends with benefits anyway. (Sure, they are.) Izzy has her own feelings of inadequacy of being the youngest sibling in a group of pro athletes, but she’s working through it. I liked the writing style of this book and how Nik and Izzy each independently deal with their own insecurities. High on the steam!
Advance ebook provided by Avon Books via NetGalley. Advance audiobook provided by Spotify Audiobooks via NetGalley.
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