Official Synopsis:
Life loves a good curveball…
Seventeen-year-old Annie Lucas’s life is completely upended the moment her dad returns to the major leagues as the new pitching coach for the Kansas City Royals. Now she’s living in Missouri (too cold), attending an all-girls school (no boys), and navigating the strange world of professional sports. But Annie has dreams of her own―most of which involve placing first at every track meet…and one starring the Royals’ super-hot rookie pitcher.
But nineteen-year-old Jason Brody is completely, utterly, and totally off-limits. Besides, her dad would kill them both several times over. Not to mention Brody has something of a past, and his fan club is filled with C-cupped models, not smart-mouthed high school “brats” who can run the pants off every player on the team. Annie has enough on her plate without taking their friendship to the next level. The last thing she should be doing is falling in love.
But baseball isn’t just a game. It’s life. And sometimes, it can break your heart…
Rating: 4.5/5 Stars
Review:
Julie Cross has created a sweet and swoon-worthy novel about love and what happens when life throws you a curveball.
This is the third baseball related book that I’ve read this year, and surprisingly, it’s the first one where the girl isn’t the one playing baseball. Regardless, she’s still a great athlete when it comes to track. She has a strong personality which really shines throughout the book, especially in her first interaction with Brody. (He goes by Brody throughout the whole book, always, never Jason, which I thought was kind of odd. I get the whole sports team last name thing, but I just found that to be an interesting choice. Not bad! Just intriguing. I liked it that way.) I love reading about confident and relateable characters!
I also really liked how multifaceted all of the characters were. That’s how they should be, but I still want to give credit where credit is due to Julie for writing a great book. This was the second book this week that had me up until 2:30am because I wanted to keep reading it so badly.
I thought that Annie and Brody’s relationship developed nicely, and that all of the supporting characters were awesome too, especially Annie’s new friend, Lenny. If I’m being totally honest, I kept waiting for Lenny to pull a 180 and stab Annie in the back in some way, but she didn’t, which I’m super happy about! Definitely here for strong female friendship representation.
Annie relationship with her Dad transformed a lot throughout the book, but aside from the ups and downs, they still kept their strong bond. As for parental relationships, I would’ve liked to see maybe one more scene between Annie and her mom, or between Brody and his mom, but overall I thought that Julie handled those relationships well. I also really enjoyed her relationship with Savannah, who was in charge of the PR for the Royals.
Overall, this is a great read that I’d strongly recommend to readers in their late teens or older. Some parts of the book are definitely on the older side of the young adult spectrum. I really enjoyed reading it, and it’ll definitely make me pick up another Julie Cross book in the future.
If you love books and baseball, make sure to also check out Kris Hui Lee’s ‘Out of Left Field’ and Karole Cozzo’s ‘The Game Can’t Love You Back’!
Connect with the author!
You can follow Julie Cross on Twitter at @Juliecross1980!
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