At thirty-four, Sophia Lindstrom is one of the veterans of
South Melbourne women’s Australian Football League (AFL)
team. She has something of a protector-nurturer instinct so she is a kind of
big sister/mentor to the rookies of her team and she also volunteers at a
shelter for homeless. Personally, she has an issue with getting into a close
romantic relationship because she’s convinced that everyone leaves. A
conviction that has come from having lost her mother at fourteen and father at
thirty.
Cam Weathers is a junior reporter in a paper that she doesn’t like and is headed by someone who is rather misogynist. Cam would love to write for a publication with a heart, soul and conscience but that paper seldom has openings. So she’s stuck with doing summaries and putting up content on the website. Can gets an unexpected break when she is assigned to do profiles of the ladies in the South Melbourne AFL team while the competition is on. The assignment comes with a rider – she’s expected to write fluffy pieces that just sex up the athletes or present them as bimbos.
Cam Weathers is a junior reporter in a paper that she doesn’t like and is headed by someone who is rather misogynist. Cam would love to write for a publication with a heart, soul and conscience but that paper seldom has openings. So she’s stuck with doing summaries and putting up content on the website. Can gets an unexpected break when she is assigned to do profiles of the ladies in the South Melbourne AFL team while the competition is on. The assignment comes with a rider – she’s expected to write fluffy pieces that just sex up the athletes or present them as bimbos.
Can starts off her assignment and immediately meets Sophia.
Much as Cam is attracted to Sophia, she wants to steer clear. In a previous
relationship with an athlete, Cam was badly burnt plus Sophia’s entirely too
overconfident approach is not appealing to Cam.
As Cam and Sophia spend more time together, they get closer.
Also, they both notice some weird things going on with the rookies in the team.
We totally loved Cam. Sophia is also thoroughly loveable,
though her whole thing about everyone leaving doesn’t have any real
justification for it to be such a roadblock in her relationship with Cam. This disorder
largely based on over-reaction was a minus point. The relationship between Cam
and Sophia is built beautifully. KJ always writes great dialogues and the MCs
have great connection and chemistry. The secondary and supporting characters
are awesome. Each one of them has a personality of their own and are all
utterly loveable.
With all that is so great about this book, we are somewhat
unsure about how we feel about it. On one hand it is really excellent as a
romance and in truly developing the characters and the relationship. On the
other hand, there is a whole other story of sabotaging the women’s AFL which we
feel should’ve been treated with greater urgency. We felt the Cam and Sophia
were rather lackadaisical about the creepy things that they noticed happening. This
should’ve had the urgency of The Pelican
Brief and maybe would’ve been a more compelling read if the focus was the
sabotage of the women’s game rather than the romance.
That said, it still is a superb read as is.
⭐⭐⭐☆★
