This was such a great time. I enjoyed their banter and the storyline kept my interest. There were certain scenes that had me laughing so loud I nearly woke up my niece. Overall I really enjoyed this book!

Thank you NetGalley for providing me with the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Thank you for the ARC! Not that steamy of a rom-com which is usually something I would go for. This book needed a bit more to it to get me to rate it higher. Quick read, able to finish it one day. There were moments I was laughing out loud. It seemed like there needed to be one more proof-read but maybe that is because this is an ARC. The romance and plot were great but I wish there was more smut.

3.5⭐
Genre ~ contemporary romance
Series ~ Grand Slam #1
Setting ~ Florida
Publication date ~ book ~ September 2, 2021, audio ~ April 11, 2023
Est Page Count ~ 250 (39 chapters +e)
Audio length ~ 6 hours 1 minutes
Narrator ~ Jamie Renell, Holly Chandler
POV ~ dual 1st
Featuring ~ pro baseball player, PR consultant, insta-lust, secret relationship, workplace romance, minimal steamage

Sophie & Seb meet in a bar during her best friends bachelorette party when she gets drunk and plants a smooch on him. Hello tequila, nice to meet ya. Then the next day they see each other again her first day on the job as a PR consultant for the team that Seb plays for.

How Seb interacts with his fans that are children is absolutely adorable. I thought Seb was actually pretty great for most of the book, except for not telling a secret to Sophie that was really a pretty lame one. Since there's the word truth in the title I'd except the characters to speak it and not skirt around it, especially when you're already feeling the feels for someone and it seems it's a deal breaker for them. Some might say he's a bit overprotective right out of the gate, but I didn't mind it so much. Although I do feel it was a bit over the top in one instance. Sophie is big on independence and she certainly proved she can take care of herself.

There's a side plot about sexism and sexual harassment that took away from the natural progression of our main characters getting together. I understand it has to do with the whole reason behind her taking the job with the team, but for such a short book I could have went for a little less of it. And, also, this is a temp job for her, so why can't they keep their hands off each other for a few short weeks until it's no longer forbidden?

There's a mix of good side characters and some you wish would run their toe into coffee table.

Overall, a quick, mostly enjoyable, read that's light on the steamage for a book marketed as steamy. I need more than one scene for this to ring true. I loved Donna's book The Runaway Bride of Blitzen Bay, so I'd for sure read her work again.

This book was a quick and fun read. The characters did seem to fall for each other extremely quickly, but I still enjoyed the story regardless of the fast pacing. This book also wasn't as steamy as I was expecting, but overall the book didn't really need it.

This was a cute, steamy easy romance book that had me flying through it in less than a day! I can't wait to read the rest of the series!

This was a great start to a new series by Donna Schwartze and I will be reading the rest of the series for sure.

the characters lacked chemistry, the side characters weren’t very likeable but i did like the representation

Sports romances are kind of my niche little love in life and I generally tend to stick to hockey ones but I was lured in by the synopsis for this one!

It was an okay read, the pacing was off, but the romance was cute. I’m just not a fan of insta love.

This book was pretty mediocre. I struggled with how controlling the male lead was at times as well. There was not much depth to the story.

This book was … nice. I wanted more character development than I got. It started off promising but I felt like the characters never quite matured.

as a baseball fan, this book is what i needed, there’s not many baseball romances out here, and i LOVED the representation for this book (LGBTQ+, etc)

it was cute and gave some major rom com vibes!

This was a light easy read that can be read very quickly. It is an insta love book which I'm not a fan of and I felt mid way through the book the pacing was rushed to make them both have feelings for one another in order to reach the HEA ending. This book is cringey but entertaining. I think the epilogue was a bit boring but overall was a decent read.

This wasn’t my favorite, but it was a fun casual read. It took me a while to get into it because it’s not very deep and I didn’t get a lot out of Seb and Sophie’s connection. I’m not an insta-love fan so this might be better for someone who is!

I enjoyed it. Nothing special though. The story was kind of surface level and lacked that kind of depth that you need to really feel with the characters. Overall the story touched on a lot of topics like sexual harassement, sexism, abuse of power and so on, but most of the time not in a way that brought up much emotion. The main character Sophie also suffers a bit from "I'm not like other girls" syndrom.

I really loved the premise of this book, but there was some chemistry lacking between Seb and Sophie. It's quite insta-love heavy, which means there was no real build up which is a true hallmark of a good romance for me. A great concept but just not executed in a way I'd have liked.

This was kitchy and cute and a good time. I loved the banter but I could've done with a bit more development between them...it didn't feel as realistic to me as it could've.

Very cute book and made me laugh along the way when reading it. Very fast read and the characters were easy to like and was a heartwarming story.

Oh but I absolutely love this book! I’m not usually a fan of the insta-love trope, but man… this was good!
The fact that we have both Sophie’s and Seb’s point of views makes you like them even more - and also, thank god we have Seb’s p.o.v. because I swear sometimes he’s kinda creepy (could be just me tho!) but knowing exactly what he thinks and how he feels does makes us like him and understand him!
Sophie. Damn, I love her! Basically the definition of strong independent woman!!
This was so fun, romantic and heartwarming! And the hurricane scene?? Damn, my heart…

I'm not going to lie I picked this one up for the title alone. And I ended up loving it. I want to read more by this author.

This was so cute and fun! It was a little too insta-love for me and the pacing was off. However, it was a quick easy read and I will definitely check out the next in the series!