Book Review:
3 ⭐️’s

This was a really enjoyable easy read for the summer months. It had some fantastic tropes that included:

• forced proximity
• disabled lead
• rheumatoid arthritis representation
• bisexual woman lead character
• marriage of convenience
• sports romance

What this book did well was provide representation and inclusivity. We had a woman lead who was bisexual and not afraid to discuss it. Her sexuality didn’t seem like just a way to throw in “gay diversity”. I also REALLY appreciated that when characters were introduced and described, the author didn’t leave us to believe white people were the default. There was a lot of intentionality in the inclusiveness here.

The story felt a little insta-love for me, but in a way that I think lovers of that trope would find really endearing and lovely. For me, I prefer just a little extra tension and back and forth in my fictional relationships. While I wasn’t super invested in Erika and Nate as a whole I think many people would really enjoy this story. Especially as Erika is a famous soccer player and Nate is a longtime fan, and not the other way around. Easy 3 ⭐️’s.

Thank you to author Liz Lincoln for emailing me this arc when the file Netgalley provided had disappeared. I reapply appreciated that! 🧡

A very endearing and charming story which has all the winning elements like love, passion, romance, found family, friendship and sports.
I loved that heroine Erica was a superstar athlete. It’s always fascinating to read about them and their hard-work, determination and struggles. My heart went out to her so many times. But she was strong, knew her mind and bold. But for me, star of this story was hero Nate. He was such a good man. He did EVERYTHING for Erica without her once asking for it. Their small small moments were so cute. I also loved his friends and Erica’s friends. They all were great characters and complimented the story nicely.

I did feel that Nate gave so much of himself to Erica, selflessly and she could’ve reciprocated with a little more care. But I don’t begrudge her.

Epilogue was cute and I really want to know about Maggie’s book.

Recommended and safe.

This book follows a marriage of convenience plot. The book follows Erika, a professional soccer player and Nate, a wealthy tech executive. Erika’s career is on the rise when she’s diagnosed with arthritis, a career ending diagnosis. She is adamant on continuing her career so she keeps this diagnosis quiet whilst trying to pay for very expensive private medical care. Nate owes everything to his grandmother who took him in when he was young, and her one wish before she dies of heart failure is to see him get married. Enter a marriage of convenience between these two strangers. Nate’s grandmother gets to see him get married, Erika gets her medical bills paid what could possibly go wrong?

I adore the marriage of convenience / fake relationship trope. I also adore the sports romance trope. So this book is the best of both worlds. Most sports romance books I read revolve around a male sports star so I loved that this book paid respect to the amazing female sports stars there are. It was so refreshing to see a woman’s sports career be front and centre of a romance book.

I adore Erika and Nate’s chemistry despite their best attempts at keeping the arrangement strictly platonic. Their relationship was definitely cheesy and predictable but that was what I loved about it. I’m a sucker for a bit of cheesy romance. I also loved that Erika’s character was bisexual as this type of representation is severely lacking in mainstream media. Bisexual characters, if present at all, are often given a bad rep with bad writing and are inherently over-sexualised, however I felt this book gave an amazing portrayal of a bisexual female character. I thoroughly enjoyed this book and definitely recommend it!

Thank you NetGalley and Liz Lincoln for providing this e-ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I was immediately intrigued when I read the description of the contemporary sports romance Scoring a Spouse by Liz Lincoln! Erika Parker-Ward is a professional soccer player trying to stay at the top of her game and on the US Women’s National Team while dealing with a recent diagnosis of rheumatoid arthritis. She just wants to focus on her game but needs help to pay for her treatment - enter Nate Simmons. Nate is a wealthy businessman who would do anything to make his dying grandma happy, including agreeing to a marriage of convenience.

The plot gets going right away. Erika and Nate’s have undeniable chemistry but they work hard to keep things platonic for their arrangement. I really loved the fact that our female main character was the sports star instead of the male main character like we commonly see in sports romance books. As a lifelong soccer player and fan, I enjoyed the accurate USWNT mentions like the 99ers, She Believes Cup, Mia Hamm, Abby Wambach, and more. The dual POV was done well. I enjoyed getting to see both Erika’s and Nate’s perspectives.

Despite starting off quickly, the book seemed to drag on in some places. Some of these parts were repetitive - like getting an explanation on Nate’s friends and their company multiple times. When I finished reading, I was left with a couple of unanswered questions. One question being about one of the biggest moments of the plot. A couple timeline jumps and gaps also created a couple questions for me.

Overall, I enjoyed reading Scoring a Spouse. I would definitely recommend this book to soccer players and fans! ⭐️⭐️⭐️/5 stars from me. Scoring a Spouse by Liz Lincoln will be published on August 16!

This was so cheesy, but that's exactly what I loved about it. At the beginning I was unsure if I would vibe with the writing style and while it wasn't my favorite, it definitely didn't hinder my enjoyment of this book.

While the romance definitely could have used more communication, what I truly loved about this book was the friendships. They were so genuine and supportive.

Overall, this was really cute, which makes me want to round this 3.5 star rating up to 4 stars.

ARC generously provided via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Goodreads review posted 7/4/22: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/4824287326?book_show_action=false&from_review_page=1

Sweet, inspirational and brimming with tension, Scoring a Spouse is a sport romance, with a twist.

Stepping away from conventional romance characteristic and giving us a different take on the fake-marriage, sport romance trope, this book is unique in all the right ways.
Giving representation to an illness usually disregarded and kept in the shadows and it's impact on everyday life, and more over, a professional athlete's, alongside highlighting the interpersonal relationships between the main characters and their respective groups of friends, and especially Nate and Oma, this story shows so much strength, heart and humanity.

3.5 stars and a post-nup

Scoring a Spouse by Liz Lincoln is a marriage-of-convenience, slow-burn, sport romance.

Erika is a professional soccer player who has recently been diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis and Nate is a video game developer and a fan of Erika for a long time. Both are workaholics and, after randomly meeting at a bar during one of Erika's away-game, they decide to get married. They agree to this marriage of convenience for very different reasons: Erika to financially help her moms and to access Nate's medical insurance (in order to keep her diagnosis from the League and risking her place on the team) and Nate to grant his Oma's wish to see him married, settled and happy before she dies.
Despite the undeniable chemistry and palpable attraction between the two, Erika and Nate decide to keep things completely platonic in order to avoid complicating and already risky situation. However, the forced proximity and the intimacy that blossoms between them make it really difficult to stay the course, and soon they give in and sparks fly (STEAM ALERT!!).

100% would recommend to anyone who loves:
- marriage of convenience
- forced proximity
- good chronic illness / disability rep (rheumatoid arthtritis)
- sport romande
- bi heroine
- found family
- slow-burn (but so worth it!!)

Trigger warnings:
- death of a loved one (on page) due to a terminal illness

***Thank you NetGalley, Victory Editing NetGalley Co-op and Liz Lincoln for the e-ARC of Scoring a Spouse in exchange for a honest review***

I absolutely loved this! The chemistry between them was FANTASTIC, all the side characters were amazing, and I loved that when they argued, they just talked it out. There was no drama about it, they just openly communicated and worked it out together. Definitely would recommend!

✨Book Review✨

Scoring A Spouse
Liz Lincoln
Pub Date: August 16, 2022

⚽️ Synopsis:
Erika Parker-Ward is living the dream--her professional soccer career is on the rise, and she's got her sights set on making the World Cup team for the US. But all of that could be over in a blink now that Erika's been diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis. Her plan? Keep the diagnosis hush hush by paying for private medical care, but the cost is threatening to bury her alive. Nate Simmons owes all his success as a wealthy tech exec to the grandmother who took him in when he was orphaned at two. So when she wants to see him married before she dies of heart failure, he is ready to move mountains to give his beloved Oma her dying wish. A chance meeting on the road brings these two desperate strangers together, and an evening of commiserating makes a potentially terrible plan seem pretty perfect: A marriage-of-convenience will give them both what they need. It's strictly business, and everybody knows you should never mix business with pleasure. Erika and Nate have plenty of secrets to keep--from the press, and from each other--but the biggest secret of all might be their true feelings.

⚽️ Thoughts:
I have mixed feelings about this book. I enjoyed both of Erika and Nate’s characters, but at times I felt they fell a little flat for me. The marriage happened very quickly and didn’t seem as big a deal as I would’ve expected it to be. The meet-cute was well written. That’s one of my favorite parts of a romance story. This was a fun, steaming read that I enjoy overall.

Recommend if you like:
❤️ Marriage of convenience
❤️ Sports representation
❤️ Steam

I really enjoyed this book! I absolutely love the modern marriage of convenience trope. I also was happy reading about LGBTQ+ and chronic disorders being represented in this story.
Ericka and Nate's relationship was sweet and oh so hot. One of my favorite features of this book was not only is it a romance but Erica's sports career is almost front and center. It was a breath of fresh air to me. All in all, I enjoyed this book and I look forward to reading the next book in the series.

*ARC courtesy of the publisher via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review. All thoughts and opinions are my own. I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book. I want to express a thank you to the valued author, the publisher who took a chance on the author, and Netgalley for providing a copy.*

Thank you NetGalley and Liz Lincoln for this e-ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Scoring a Spouse is a novel about Erika Parker-Ward, professional athlete, and Nate Simmons, business tycoon. The two enter into marriage of convenience when Nate, who also happens to be a soccer fan, "needs" to marry someone since that's his grandmother's (Oma) dying wish and Erika needs to have private insurance because she has rheumatoid arthritis and she can't use the insurance she has without her team finding out, which she doesn't want, plus she need.

This book is amazing. One of the few things I love about this book is it's the FMC (female main character) who is the famous sports player and the MMC (male main character) is the fan instead, since it's usually the other way around.

Love, love, love the LGBTQ+ rep here. Not only do we have a bisexual FMC, but we also have two lesbian mums, and lesbian and bisexual besties. It always warms my heart to see representation, especially ones that are done correctly. Aside from the LGBTQ+ rep, there's also disability rep (rheumatoid arthritis / RA)!

I love the romance between Erika and Nate. I'm a sucker for marriage of convenience and sports romance. Their relationship is so cute and smooth. Their personalities definitely suited each other. Plus, Erika is such a badass, my gosh!

SCORING A SPOUSE By Liz Lincoln

Erica is a professional soccer player, who recently gets diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis (Which can end her career if it came out in the open. Her plan is to keep paying for private care to keep it under wraps, but the cost is barely keeping her afloat. Enters Nate a successful tech executive who wants to give his ailing grandmother her dying wish to see him settled.

😊What i liked -

✔ Sport Romance/Marriage of convenience/Bisexual Heroine.
✔ I liked Erica's and Nate's chemistry.
✔ Loved the support and equation both Erica and Nate shared with their respective group of friends.
✔ Erica's character build up was done very well. Actually felt like a she's real and not a fictional character.
✔ It's a nice, easy read with a tear jerking moment.


🤔What could have been better -

✔ There were times that the story fell flat.


📚Who Should read :
👶 beginner
💘 Romance lover's
💕Sports romance trope
💞Marriage of convenience trope


📈My Rating : 3/5

P.s - I really liked Lauren's character and felt a little bad for her. I hope the next book is about David and Maggie.

I didn't know what to expect when I started this but I loved it. They do get married very fast after meeting each other but that's part of the point of a marriage of convenience. The book is very fast paced but I loved that. Seeing them fall in love was a lot of fun. I do wish that Erika's love declaration was done a bit better, but that's just my opinion.

I received an arc through netgalley.

I adore marriage of convenience romances. They are one of the most elite tropes to me. It brings together two unlikely characters that may not have come together otherwise. It was lovely to read the story between Erika and Nate. I found myself rooting for their individual growth as well as them as a couple. I also grew up playing soccer so reading about Erika's journey playing the sport with her disability was wonderful! Highly recommend!

This book has: chronic illness rep, a bi heroine, and the marriage of convenience and forced proximity tropes!

I absolutely adored this book! I was immediately intrigued by how the heroine is the famous one (she’s a pro soccer player) and the hero is a longtime fan. Erika and Nate meet in a bar and have an instant connection neither can ignore. When they meet, Erika is struggling to pay for medications for her rheumatoid arthritis and Nate is dealing with his grandmas illness. Erika needs to pay for her meds and Nate wants to make his grandma happy by showing her that he is happily married and so they decide to enter into a marriage of convenience to solve both of their problems.

The chemistry between Erika and Nate was off the charts. I’m a sucker for characters having undeniable chemistry but not wanting to ruin the way things are so they agree to keep things platonic. This book also had AMAZING side characters and strong women friendships which we love to see. Nate and his best friends are the definition of the found family trope and I’m hoping we get Maggie’s story in the near future!

Thank you to the publisher and Netgalley for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

3.5 stars

Scoring a Spouse is a new contemporary, sports romance which starts with a marriage of convenience/fake relationship situation and centers around a women’s soccer player.

Erika lives for soccer. At 31, she has been playing elite-level soccer since the age of 9. And she’s currently, secretly dealing a recent diagnosis of rheumatoid arthritis. She is wanting to desperately keep it under wraps from everyone so it doesn’t come into play with her career. Nate, CCO for a corporation he founded with his 3 best friends, is at a hotel bar one night when he spots his favorite soccer player, Erika. He has followed her career for more than a decade and can’t believe she’s in the same place as him. They get to talking and he quickly admits he needs a wife, his Oma raised him and is now 91 and told him the one thing she wants to see before she dies is Nate married and settled. That same night, Erika decides to jump in and go for his bonkers plan, as she needs access to another medical insurance (that she can hopefully keep under wraps/keep her diagnosis and meds secret) and money set to help her moms.

Nate and Erika quickly form a friendship but decide to keep their fake relationship, but very real marriage, platonic. Soon though that line starts to blur and real feels get involved. Nate is very sweet to Erika, giving her massages and ice packs after practices. Family is a very big theme in this read. He is very close with his grandmother/his Oma. And then Erika is close with her moms, who were also both professional soccer players. This was my first read from the author. The story did have its cute moments, but I did want a bit more from the story and romance. I wasn’t super pulled into the characters, although I really liked the rheumatoid arthritis rep in the story with the sports player!

I received an e-ARC via NetGalley. All thoughts in this review are my own. Scoring a Spouse has a release date of August 16, 2022.

“He slid his lips across hers, marking the official beginning of their future”
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trope: fake dating, sport romance, found family
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rating: 4,75/5
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Thank you to the publishers and NetGalley for an eARC in exchange for an honest review.
This book follows Erika Parker-Ward, a professional football (soccer) player and Nate Simmons, co-founder of a company that develops and designs video games. Erika and Nate meet one night and talk about their life, Erika needs more money for her treatment of rheumatoid arthritis and Nate wants to marry to fulfill his dying grandmother's biggest wish. They realize that getting fake married will solve their problems.
I really loved this book. Sport romances are always something that I always like to read and this was the first time the female character is the athlete. I also like watching football, so I loved reading about a female professional football player. Nate and Erika are both characters that I loved and their personalities were great. I also really liked the friendgroup around Erika and Nate and how they supported them or gave them a little lecture when needed. 
Review is currently posted on Goodreads and will be posted on Instagram @readsoflaura in a few days
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Rep: bisexual mc with chronic pain disorder (rheumatoid arthritis), queer side characters 
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 genre: Adult Romance
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#ScoringaSpouse #NetGalley

I would like to preface this review with the disclaimer that I have a chronic pain disorder similar to the heroine, and (despite its many prose and storytelling flaws) this book DOES have good disability rep.

This book had the potential to be an easy, cheesy, and fun romance worth a solid three stars (maybe more). I enjoyed the friends to lovers trope more than I thought I would, the heroine’s personal growth storyline was well done overall (learning to set aside her pride and rely on others when she needs help), and I do think the hero/heroine had good chemistry. However, large swathes of this book’s story structure and prose felt amateurish, closer to breezy, flirty YA than an adult romantic drama.

This is not a rom-com—there’s not a single joke in the entire book—and the stakes are so disjointed on the hero’s end that at times it feels like there’s nothing to mitigate what feels like a very large power imbalance between h/H. Multiple plot threads are dropped or skimmed over, including 1) a major confrontation between heroine and her moms, 2) the subplot of heroine’s mothers’ business, 3) Lauren vanishing for 1/2 the book despite the fact that we’re told she’s the heroine’s best friend, 4) the tech company staffer subplot.

Some of the steamy scenes also felt… strange, as well, with detailed descriptions that then abruptly fade to black near the climax, almost like the author could not decide how smutty the book should be and either backed out in the middle of writing scenes or added embellishments to fade-to-black scenes during a round of edits. I also feel that the author chose to replace dramatic moments with steamy moments, which detracted from the gravity of the story. Additionally, the tension pacing felt very off throughout the book, with our h/H having such a whirlwind insta-love at the beginning that there was almost no will they/won’t they tension buildup. Our heroine chooses not to tell Nate about her condition—arguably the only person in the book who SHOULD no—for so long that the entire conflict felt fourth-wall-breakingly convoluted. Several major events happen in quick succession in the last 1/3 of the book with very little downtime between, so by the third event I found myself counting what plot threads were left to guess what the next chapter would be. I think the huge timeskips between events contributed to an overall feeling of disjointedness—we are only ever given the “high tension” moments, particularly toward the end. The continued emphasis on conflict instead of resolution (which often seemed hand-waved away off screen) or normalcy made those conflicts feel hollow, and by the end I didn’t feel much investment in seeing those conflicts resolved.

And finally—while I realize this is an ARC copy, I do feel that it should have been polished at least once more before going out to reviewed. I found multiple spelling and grammar mistakes, and there was a note to the editor still embedded in the text that ripped me RIGHT out of the book. Additionally, there was a major timeline error that I had to flip back and double-check. I have pulled a few quotes that demonstrate some of the larger issues with the book:

Ch. 6, typo: Jane smiled, deep lines appearing around her eyes. "That's little idea. People want romance. It sells."

Ch. 7, typo: "I, the…" Nate cleared his throat. He really hated the idea of continuing to lie to Oma.

Ch. 20, fourth-wall break: So she continued to rock against his cock—ha ha, that rhymed—and let the sensations fly through her.

Ch. 29 vs. 30, timeline discrepancy; more time has passed between quote A and B, yet characters seemed to be moving backwards in time at first glance. A: She’d been gone almost three weeks now, longer than any of her other trips for camp and games. B: Because of Oma and the massive time difference, what should’ve been a short argument had been festering for more than two weeks now.

Ch. 30, heroine sends a devil-horn emoji after watching hero breakdown in sobs onstage at a funeral…? (Nate: I miss you. Erika: Tell Donut I miss her. 🍩 Erika: 😈 And I miss you too.)

Ch. 34, one of MANY instances throughout the book where the author breaks up sentences with a period instead of a comma, making the prose feel utterly robotic: It was again past midnight when the match against England ended, and he was still at his office. With Donut, who now came with him to work every day.

Ch. 36, aforementioned note to the editor: In the next moment, he licked her. (tk is this scene redundant? Cut it?)

Ch. 36, h/H have had sex multiple times before this and always emphasize condom use, but an IUD is suddenly mentioned—feels like an afterthought: “I have an IUD,” she said, almost desperate now.

Ch. 38, why would you offer to pay to have your ticket refunded? That seems counterintuitive: It didn’t seem to matter how much he offered to pay, his current ticket was nonrefundable—thanks, Maggie—so he planned to go to the airport and buy a one-way ticket there.

Ch. 38, minor continuity issue, as there’s no mention of heroine stopping her manicure and I pictured opened bottles of nail polish flying all over the hotel room: She shoved Erika’s manicure tools out of the way and put her arm around her friend’s shoulder.

I don’t mean to be unduly harsh, but I am somewhat unsure if this book is ready for publication in its current state. It has too many fixable flaws to be a semi-finalized ARC, and several major plot issues that need more concrete fleshing out to be anything more than a 3-star if the rest of the book were perfect. I was unfortunately very disappointed, and the excellent disability rep was not enough to save it.

I really enjoyed reading this ARC of Scoring a Spouse.

Nate and Erika are both great characters, who brought their own hang ups and issues to the relationship that they had to deal with and I enjoyed their growth through the book.

I adored that Erika was so passionate about her career as a professional football player and that Nate was so proud and supportive of that right from the start.

The support characters were good and actually brought a lot to the table in terms of moving the story along.

Where it falls down a little for me was the start was a little bit too fast (they were married 24 hours after meeting) and the middle dragged a little bit. But this was a really easy and mostly enjoyable read and I'm always into a fake marriage story.

Thank you to NetGalley and Victory Editing NetGalley Co-op for providing me with this arc!

Scoring a Spouse follows professional football player Erika Parker-Ward and Nate Simmons who’s a co-owner and co-founder of a company that develops and designs video games.

Upon a chance meeting at a hotel bar, Erika and Nate talk and discover that a fake marriage would benefit both of them for different reasons.

I wanted to like this more than i did, but sadly it just fell flat for me. I couldn’t connect with either of our two main characters or the story. Their relationship felt too insta-love for my taste.

2.5 stars!