Not going to lie, I'm obsessed. For gay fans of the USWNT or NWSL, this book is especially going to tick all the boxes! I've already recommended it to multiple people.

I adored all the characters, even when I was internally groaning at their miscommunications. I also appreciated that the "drama" between the two main characters stemmed from realistic conflicts. Readers who are looking for the outside world to exert pressures on the characters may think this book falls short; I appreciated the opportunity to have the characters wrestle and grow in a realistic environment.

The chemistry between these two characters was palpable immediately. Sometimes I have trouble "believing" in the romance but there was no doubt that these two are PERFECT for each other, even if they have to learn how to be each other's perfect partner. Also, neurodivergent representation is sadly lacking in most novels, so I was thrilled to see it here!

Cleat Cute truly knocked it out of the park, and I cannot wait to yell about this book to everyone who will listen. Thank you for the opportunity to read the e-ARC!

SAPPHICS AND SOCCER?? SIGN ME UP. Thank you to St. Martin’s Press and NetGalley for this ARC in exchange for an honest review! Opposites attract in Grace and Phoebe, who, when the former suffers an injury, has the latter replace her the golden girl of the USA’s Women’s National Team. Opposites to rivals turn to benefits with this incredible new romance by Mary Wilsner. I’m so glad to see an incredible sapphic book enter the realm of sports romances with so much force. Not to mention, it was incredibly diverse and did not feel forced at all. This book is equal parts soft and equal parts funny, and all around, such an incredible time. It made me so, so giddy! I genuinely enjoyed this book from beginning to end.

absolutely loved this sweet little sapphic romance novel!!! The way the author had the characters blossom together and individually kept me hooked the entire book. It was a light and sweet read. Highly recommend!

I mean, what can I say? This book was even better than I could have imagined! Sexy, sweet, heartwarming, and delightfully fun, Cleat Cute is the sapphic soccer rom com we needed!

The plot looks really interesting and even just first reading the blurb, I can totally see the potential for a new and exciting story. It had good LGBTQ+ representation, especially in the world of professional sports! I love a good grumpy sunshine main character relationship, and this one definitely hit the bill. Women do not get enough credit in sports and they have to fight even harder to get respect when they are part of not one but two minorities.

So... I'll just be honest... I had a hard time with this one. I just got stuck in some of the details! The main characters just did not do it for me- I was annoyed with both of them by the end and I think that their relationship is confusing to me throughout the entire book. I just don't see them together, and, in my opinion, the story gets a little overrun with the the strength of the LGBTQ+ theme versus the romance.

Overall, it's a good book and I think if you're looking at it unsure about whether or not you should read it- go for it! It just didn't hit for me but I think the strong theme and look into the world of pro soccer could definitely hit different with you!

There's so much to love about about Phoebe and Grace's love story, but my favorites are probably the ways in which the two experience the necessary-for-conflict misunderstandings and work through them, like the stellar teammates they are, learning about themselves and their own emotional strengths and areas needing support along the way. Also the ways their relationship is impacted by their interactions with their friends, family, and colleagues. Plus lots of hot hot hot consensual sex!

I was drawn to this book because I love soccer and played growing up. Then having it be a queer teammate romance?! Yes please. Overall I enjoyed the story and the goals (ha) of some of the characters. But there were parts that fell short for me. For one I think Grace definitely spent a lot of time in her own head to the point that almost cost her a lot. Especially telling Phoebe she might have ADHD. I think there was actually a lot of the other subplots that if they weren't there I would have enjoyed it a lot more. Overall cute and fun read just a few issues that book me out of it sometimes.

Full review can be found on my blog here: https://theweatherwriter.wixsite.com/blog/post/book-review-cleat-cute-by-meryl-wilsner

This book was a sexy sapphic, tender romance between two soccer-playing women. Phoebe is the ambitious rookie whose chaotic, bubbly charm manages to get past all of Grace's defenses, perfectly balancing Grace, she is the star veteran player who is stoic, private, and a rule-follower.

I do not watch sports, and reading this book made me interested in soccer. There are high stakes in this book, in the relationship between Phoebe and Grace as they are teammates and in the game itself, it focuses a lot on the growth and interiority of Grace and Phoebe, as well as their intense, smoldering relationship. I loved how there’s awareness of both characters’ neurodiversity and it’s represented very respectfully and uniquely to both of them.

I loved some small details in this book that had me swooning and rooting for Grace and Phoebe’s romance, like Grace braiding Phoebe’s hair, the love of soccer, and of course the side characters. They were funny and so supportive!

Cute and enjoyable enough but I think the writing style made the whole thing drag a little for me. I liked the progression of their relationship and I always appreciate when the romantic conflicts are more realistic and less contrived but as many others have said the monologuing was a bit much at times! I don't mind a character centric story but I think this could've benefitted from more of a plot also. Not much to say, not bad, not great, I just feel indifferent which is unfortunately how I'm feeling about a lot of books lately.

Phoebe Matthew’s chances of playing professional soccer is very slim as she played for a small college in the midwest. Being drafted to play for the same professional team her idol plays on is a mind blowing dream come true for Phoebe. 

Grace Henderson has played on the National team since she was sixteen years old. Everything she does is to stay in shape and be focused for soccer. Meeting the rookie for her pro team sends Grace into a tailspin. No one has ever treated her like a normal person before this. Phoebe’s youthful enthusiasm, work ethic and easy manner pulls Grace toward her like no one else has in her life.

Cleat Cute is a rivals to lovers story that is lighthearted and fun with splashes of seriousness folded in. Soccer is the setting but the story revolves around the players more than the game itself. We are inside the minds of both main characters riding their emotional ups and downs as they play out.

Wilsner captures the world of soccer beautifully in their well written and engaging novel. Yet more importantly, they offer the remarkable love story of two neurodiverse characters. This is a not to be missed read.

Available September 19, 2023

I received an advance review copy from St. Martin’s Press through NetGalley. I am leaving this review voluntarily.

Grace is a soccer star, she has been for years. Phoebe is a rookie. They meet at a camp to help coaches determine the team for the World Cup.

Phoebe is late her first day…Grace is far from impressed. After camp, they both head to New Orleans before the start of their season. It’s Phoebe’s first as a professional athlete and none of their other teammates are arrived yet. Can Phoebe win Grace over as a friend? A teammate? Something else?

Phoebe was a ray of sunshine. I’m not sure I’d call Grace grumpy though, she is more introverted and internalizes things. Watching Phoebe try to break Grace out of her comfort zone in the beginning was sweet. They made for a good main character duo.

I really liked some of the secondary characters. Teddy is adorable. I could not get enough of his scenes. His relationship with Phoebe was a delight. I liked a lot of Phoebe and Grace’s teammates, too. Gabby and Kayla, as well as Fish, added to the story.

I will admit that I didn’t love the whole Phoebe had a poster of Grace on her wall for years thing. Personally, that sketches me out but it probably doesn’t for most.

Another thing I loved was Grace saying how she learns rules by watching. Not only did she say that, but we saw a few examples, too. I related to that so much.

Overall, I quite enjoyed this book!

Thanks to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for an arc of this book

Witty banter and steamy romance meet professional sports in Cleat Cute, an LGBTQ+ rom com that's sure to be a hit. Wilsner manages to perfectly balance funny and flirty with emotional and heartwarming moments, taking care to highlight the importance of healthy communication and boundaries. Cleat Cute dives into societal pressures and mental health, includes great LGBTQ+ and POC representation, and just enough spice to make you sweat - what's not to love? Being a story based around a team sport, there were a lot of characters to keep track of - especially considering the use of first and last names as individual identifiers - however the characters were unique and definitive enough to clear up any confusion. Overall Cleat Cute is the perfect combination of athletics, strong women, and honest vulnerability that will have any and all readers cheering for the Krewe.

Pheobe Matthews is living her dream. She's just been drafted to New Orlean's women's soccer team. She's been invited to train with the National US Women's team. And she gets to play with Grace Henderson during both. Grace is a 26 year old, ten year veteran of the national team and is pretty sure that her body is beginning to show the wear of that career. When Grace is benched due to an injury, Pheobe is given even more chances to fill in on the teams. But the two women's relationship is complicated more by their own growing relationship than it is by the potential of rivalry.

This book feels like it was basically written just for me. From the soccer setting to the queer romance. The plot moves at a perfect speed and the balance between sports and romance was perfect. Not too far into the weeds of world of soccer while not simply using the sport as window dressing. Wilsner's kindness within their books continues through this novel. Characters make mistakes and are messy and human and are always treated with a softness within the novel that is so warm. An absolute delight all around.

Cleat Cute by Meryl Wilsner is another absolute must read by Wilsner!

I can't say enough wonderful things about this book.
It’s funny, steamy and oh so romantic.
The chemistry between Phoebe and Grace was fantastic and the romance and character development made it all come to life. I absolutely loved the characters in this book, even the side characters were funny and entertaining.
And not to mention the book has an incredible premise. Freaking loved it.
The story is strong, the characters are well fleshed out and engaging, the leads are wonderful and memorable, it's uber romantic and very, very sexy.
A swoon-fest with laugh out loud scenes, brilliant writing and vivid scenes that made me laugh, swoon and smile.

A delicious sapphic rivals to lovers rom-com that’s surprisingly sexy, and so heartfelt.

"I received a complimentary copy of this book. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own."

Thank You NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for your generosity and gifting me a copy of this amazing eARC!

Phoebe Matthew’s dreams are coming true. She’s finally beginning her professional soccer career with the New Orleans Krewe, and on top of that, she’s just been called up for the US Women’s National team training camp. And on top of that, she’ll be on the field with none other than her longtime soccer idol, Grace Henderson. Grace has been on the National Team for ten years, and she still has a lot of time in front of her—she hopes. If she can keep her pesky injury (not an injury, she’d like me to tell you) in check, then she can continue dominating the field for as long as it takes to tame the rambunctious new recruit. Together, Phoebe and Grace discover that they have delicious, irresistible chemistry both on and off the field.

As the season unfolds and the world cup approaches, Grace and Phoebe have to decide if they’re going to take a shot at love, or follow the playbook.

This book was sweet, and spicy, and just the right amount of sporty. I’m not a sports person myself, but the soccer aspect of this book was still very fun and approachable, even for a newbie like me. I loved the chemistry between the two leads, and the side characters were fun too! In addition, the discussions about mental health, medication, and diagnosis were well done. This author is an instant-buy for me.

On the field together, they're good...off the field together, they're better.

I ended up thinking a lot about the evolution of lesbian romance as I read this. When I first started reading lesbian fiction, I went to the library armed with a handwritten list of books carefully sourced from the pages of "Fun Home". (It was the 2000s North Carolina, so it's a minor miracle that the library had *any* of the books on my list.) When I started finding lesbian romance (definitely not at the library in North Carolina), it was so uniformly terrible—this does not mean that I did not love it, but it was terrible—that I classified almost the whole genre as Bad Lesbian Romance. I was pretty sure that Good Lesbian Romance also existed, but the more general realm of Lesbian Romance was so small to begin with that my chances of finding the good stuff were...not great.

Guess what? It's 2023. There's a whole lot more out there now, and that means there's a whole lot more good stuff. Even now I'm still getting used to the idea that I can pick up a lesbian romance and it won't be full of cartoonishly evil white men with slicked-back hair, chomping on their cigars as they leer at women and make plans to topple the gay agenda.

Enter "Cleat Cute": manages to hit some of my favorite tropes (I don't give a whit about sports in real life, but I do in lesbian romance) *and* some of my least favorite tropes (misunderstandings as conflict) and pull it off...all without threats of violence, homophobia, or violent homophobia. (What can I say—my standards have been permanently damaged by some of the drivel I inhaled in the naughties.) Even the "misunderstanding" trope is pulled off with some aplomb. I tend to grumble about plots that could be resolved dozens, if not hundreds, of pages earlier if the characters would just *talk* to each other, but what's interesting here is that Grace and Phoebe...they do talk to each other. They do communicate. And when wires get crossed, it's rarely in a Big Dramatic way, but in a "oh, these are two people who see the world from different angles" way. It's genuinely refreshing.

Quibbles, per usual: There is some setup for a villain, but that plotline doesn't really go anywhere. I'm actually glad of it—Evil Villains Who Are Evil are high on my list of eyeroll-inducing romance tropes—but it still felt like it fizzled out. I'm also curious about the choice to push some of Phoebe's "figuring her brain out" stuff (vagueness to avoid spoilers!) into the black hole between the last chapter and the epilogue, as it left me wondering in which ways her experience of the world is different, and is the same, with new tools at hand. Let's call it three and a half stars, rounded up for the sheer volume of happy energy that Phoebe brought to my reading experience.

Thanks to the author and publisher for providing a review copy through NetGalley.

I devoured Meryl Wilsner’s second novel and greatly appreciate the chance to review her third! I’m a huge USWNT fan so this book is a dream.

Thanks to St. Martin's Press, St. Martin's Griffin, and NetGalley for the advanced readers copy!

Phoebe is thrilled to be advancing in her soccer career to the pros, especially since she'll get to play alongside Grace Henderson, who she has looked up to for years. She soon finds out that Grace is a grump but also sort of sweet, and HOT. Phoebe eventually cajoles Grace into friendship, and then friends with benefits. Can she convince Grace that a relationship would be a total win?

This book was fun! A sapphic, grumpy/sunshine romance with pro athletes. I really liked Phoebe! I wondered the whole time I was reading it why her ADHD wasn't mentioned and then my question was answered toward the tail end of the book. I also thought the 🌶️🌶️🌶️🌶️ scenes were done well. A great read!

I could’ve done with a lot less of the repetitive internal monologues and a lot more communication between Grace and Phoebe (miscommunication drives me crazy!!!) but I still enjoyed this book. It probably won’t stick with me but it was fun while I was reading.

Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press for giving me access to this book!

This book was so sexy and fun that I do not know what to say other than that I had a blast reading it. The writing style was not always my favourite, but the good autism representation made up for it.