A Sharp Endless Need s a realist queer/lesbian coming-of-age novel. It follows star point guard Mack Morris through senior year, right after the death of her supportive but troubled father. She navigates grief and substance abuse alongside exploring her gender identity and sexuality through a first crush on a new teammate.

Mack is both hard and soft. She’s an elite athlete in a contact sport and she’s lived a life surrounded by addictions and dishonesty and this makes her tough. She endures self harm and substance use and it’s shocking (that is if like me, you’ve never even done *a* drug) but it doesn’t feel out of place in her world. But also, she loves and grieves and yearns honestly (and teenagerly). Although the story’s heart is about grief, first love, and sexuality, my favorite parts were actually the basketball scenes and Mack’s thought process about her future as an athlete. The author clearly KNOWS BALL and their knowledge and passion shine. But also I just really love basketball.

The story is heartfelt and honest and rarely minces words, the prose is frank: precise, humorous, and real, just what you would expect from a teen like Mack. It’s like a gritty realist indie movie, think Andrea Arnold but jock.

A book about basketball and coming of age? As a child who played basketball for years, I was all for this book. I was in high school in the early 2000s, and it was so nostalgic reading this.

There were so many layers to this book and I really enjoyed Mack and Liv. There is loss and grief, and all kinds of love.

I recognized the author’s name from their debut so I requested this book without reading the blurb which sometimes works out well. Mack Morris is a star basketball player for the Hornets, a HS team in a small town in Pennsylvania around 2004. It’s pretty obvious the author was a player and is sure-handed in writing about the mechanics of the game, the running of practices, and the dynamics of a team. This basketball know-how is Mack’s language and how she expresses her thoughts and feelings to the world so it is vital to the story. But no worries to non-sports fans because it’s integrated smoothly.

Mack’s whole life seems disjointed. She drinks and gets high as much as she plays ball. Her late father had a gambling addiction but also was the person who helped her fall under the spell of her sport. Her mother is emotionally distant and seems more worried about how Mack’s decisions might affect her than caring about her daughter. Only Coach Puck and Grayson, Mack’s buddy/drug dealer, seem to be the semi-steadying forces in her life. The town itself is another strong character. Instead of it having a storybook quaintness, the author paints a picture of Mack slowly suffocating in a dead end place, knowing that her talent is her only pathway out, but also terrified of making the wrong decision and being trapped in a small, disappointing life. To discover what makes a life meaningful is a whole journey but when you’re 18, it often feels like you need to know everything right then.

Throughout the book, Mack explores her Queer identity and her attraction to girls. When the new hot shot ball player, Liv Cooper, joins the team, the pains of first love hit Mack hard, a turbulent tug of war between longing and connection.

Mack is a character I will be thinking about for a while. It’s all or nothing for her just like for a lot of young people and the author grasps those emotions and moments in a way that feels truthful and immediate, with no apologies, and for me, their lyrical telling hits home.

Crane’s first novel, I Keep My Exoskeletons to Myself, was my favorite book I read the year it came out and remains one of my top five of all time, so I had high expectations for their second and they were all met. This one is so different—not sci-fi, about teens instead of adults, has way more sports—but maybe it really isn’t because it’s still full of grief and longing and self-discovery. I finished it this morning and I’ve been thinking all day about the passion and ambition, the so many unsaid things about being a queer teenager, that stretch just at the end of high school when you know you’re on the brink of something and the desire to be there could almost crush you. The black hole of loss at a time like that and the all-encompassing feeling of teenage love. The title explains exactly what you will feel at the end of this book and all the way through it. I hope Crane keeps writing forever.

A little exhausting but also lovely?
I don’t know. I liked the writing but the characters were hard to root for. And I had some anxiety the whole time of some dreadful ending. I definitely wanted them to never see each other again. Toxic love isn’t my jam but the story wasn’t bad.

I think if you like basketball and teen angst with high drama you’ll like it.

Thanks to netgalley and random house pub for an eARC.

Absolutely beautiful.
This story follows high school senior and basketball star Mack Morris through her final year as she picks a college to attend and falls in love with her teammate, Liv.
(Also, as a trans masculine reader Mack is wonderfully trans coded. Though this isn't explored deeply, it is so perfectly done and I am here for it!)

Crane has drafted a book so beautifully written and yet so easy to digest. I basically inhaled it.
What is most impressive is the way Crane writes about Mack's love for basketball. Through Mack's eyes, we can see its beauty. This sport is Mack's entire identity, and though I am not a basketball player (or play any sports that I particularly love), I could truly understand Mack's passion. I think that is the ultimate goal of writing a book like this- you don't have to play a sport to *get* it. Well done!

4

setting: Pennsylvania
Rep: sapphic protagonist

this short book packs many punches - it's not an easy read, charting the struggles of growing up gay in 2000s Pennsylvania and desperately in love with a deeply closeted friend. I loved the writing style and the descriptions of basketball!

I can honestly say I’ve never read a book like this one. I got a little lost in all the basketball talk (my problem not the book’s), but overall this was a quick read. I was very invested in what would happen to Mack and Liv… whether they would own who they really were.. or continue to hide it from their small town world that hated people like them.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for giving me an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review!

One of my favorite reads of the year!

I cannot even describe the feelings I felt while reading this book. All I can say is the vibes were there and it was perfect. I just felt so deeply for this story and these people. It felt like I was Mack as I was reading. I felt everything she felt, was sad and hurt when she was upset.

It was written so well. It was very descriptive. I could feel and see everything that was being described.

Every page of this book was masterfully done with a gut punch of emotions at every line.

It had a little bit of a slow start, but it didn’t last long. I think it just needed to find its footing. The first couple of chapters I wasn’t super engaged, but after chapter 4 I got hooked and couldn’t put it down!

I was devastated at Liv and Mack’s relationship. I was rooting for them so hard. It was sad to see people rooting against them. Such was the times, but it still hurt that they felt like they couldn’t be out in the open.

Another character I adored was Coach. He was such an important person in Mack’s life, and I was so glad he was always there for her when she needed him.

I wasn’t as passionate as these girls were about basketball, but I did play and enjoy the sport in high school! I liked the sports aspect of this book. It added a lot to the story. I thought the games were written very well and were engaging. I feel like it was easy enough to understand even if you didn’t ever play basketball.

It was a very deep book. It touched on grief and not being comfortable with yourself, and confusing teenage feelings, and so many other things that came together so well. The story blended together and didn’t feel choppy.

As much as I wish it was a happy ending I think it was a sad ending, but I loved the open ended-ness of it all. I thought it was an accurate, if not upsetting way to end the book.

I thought one thing was going to happen and I was so scared, I was biting my nails. It didn’t happen how I thought it would, but it still hurt terribly. I ached for these characters.

It really is hard to explain how much this book spoke to me, so you’ll just have to take my word for it and read it! There is something very special here.

I will be reviewing this book on Goodreads May 10th, 2025 and on Amazon on the release date!

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/6932831428

It is almost offensive how good of a writer Marisa Crane is. This was so goddamn funny and heart-rending all at once. It’s excruciatingly accurate to how it feels to be closeted, to be a perfectionist, to be in the clutches of first love, to be in the throes of grief. I couldn’t put it down. It will almost certainly be my favorite book I read this year.

Thank you infinitely to Mac Crane and The Dial Press for the e-ARC.

This is a coming of age story that has the backdrop of basketball. I think we can all think back to what is was like when we were teenagers and figuring out who we were. I could feel the pain and the longing and at times it broke my heart. The writing was a bit slow for me, but overall an emotional read. Thank k you to netgalley and the publisher for the arc.

I found this an interesting coming of age but the pacing went back and forth for me. At times I was very interested and at times I lost interest. The basketball was interesting, which I never thought I'd say. The relationship is a slow burn but was very genuine of adolescence

This is a very moving and emotional book about coming of age, love, and loss. It’s about Mack, a superstar basketball player whose life is turned upside down when her father dies. Then enters Liv, a new classmate at school. This was such a beautiful story about first love, discovering oneself and then the added pressure of being a star player and all the expectations of that. Mack and Liv’s relationship is sweet, raw and real, and the author brilliantly explores all that comes with first love.

The location of small-town Pennsylvania in the early noughts added some nostalgia. Remember mixtapes? Crane writes beautiful prose and characters. I loved how the characters’ struggles were portrayed and how Mack was searching for her true identity all the while grieving her father’s death. I am not a fan of basketball, but the parts with the games were amazing. I could tell how physical the basketball is and how passionate Mack is about it.

This is a very moving book with some important issues. It’s a testament to love, romantic and otherwise. It is also a reminder that even when there is loss, there is always the promise of tomorrow and healing on the horizon.

I love a good coming of age story, especially one with a sports theme, so I was excited to try this one. I enjoyed the competitive basketball aspect, the on and off court relationships, and learning more about the behind the scenes of college basketball. For non-sports fans, the detailed technical descriptions of the basketball scenes may not resonate as much. The other central theme, aside from basketball, is the exploration of sexual identity, particularly coming out as gay in a small town. I could really feel the angst and the raw emotions of these teenagers as they experimented both sexually and with substances. There were several disturbing sexual situations and having a teen of my own made these scenes even more cringey. Overall, the author did a great job fleshing out the characters and making you feel all their emotions. Unfortunately this one didn’t work as well for me. The middle started to drag, there was a lot of repetitive scenes of substance abuse that didn’t add much to the story, some uncomfortable sexual encounters, and the ending left me a bit confused. Ultimately I don’t think I was the right reader for this one but do think it will hit the mark for those who enjoy queer coming of age sports stories.

Thank you to NetGalley and Simon & Schuster for an advanced reader copy in exchange for my honest review.

Review posted to StoryGraph and Goodreads on 5/8/25. Review will be posted to Amazon on release date.

As Mack gets ready to start her senior year of high school her life is drastically turned upside down by the sudden loss of someone important in her life. She takes solace in basketball and a new girl on the team Liv. Mack must confront what she wants with her life and where she wants to go to college all while navigating her sexuality and who she is away from the court.
God this was so brilliantly written. The prose was lyrical and moved with such grace it was like watching your favorite basketball player dominate in the best game of their life. I found myself so attached to these characters and wanting to hug them and give them big sister advice. If you love basketball and coming of age stories, this book is for you

Thank you to Penguin Random House, and NetGalley for providing me with an early copy of this book in exchange for my unbiased review.

The publisher was kind enough to reach out and send me a copy of this book, which I am very appreciative of. I was really excited by the premise of this book as I love sapphic books, and especially sports sapphic books. Unfortunately I didn't enjoy this book as much as I hoped to. I don't really have any major complaints -- it just sort of fell flat for me. I don't mind books with little plot guidance but this book just felt really light on things happening (if that makes any sense). I think the writing just wasn't for me and unfortunately that meant I didn't love it.

That said, I read the book and finished it which means I liked it well enough. I would still recommend to anyone else who likes women's basketball and maybe it'll click better for you than it did me.

4.25⭐️

(TW: sexual assault, homophobia)

A gorgeous, coming-of-age lesbian story about two high school basketball teammates who fall into unrequited love. Each of our characters struggles with gender, sexual orientation, homophobia, trauma, and having no reliable parents in their lives to help them try and understand the world. This book takes place in bumblefuck Pennsylvania, which is where I’m from, so that made the scenery of this story super vivid for me.

If you struggled with your identity and queerness as a child, this book will feel like a gut punch. Marisa’s writing style is poetic but modern, with all of the early 2000s angst, and they really paint the picture of feeling claustrophobic and lost in your teen years and trying to decide what you want to do with the rest of your life. The impact in the dichotomy between Mack’s intimacy scenes with boys versus girls feels so real painful to read at times.

I will say, I do not care about basketball, so I did find myself bored during the many sports scenes, but the palpable yearning and tension between our two main characters kept me engaged, and made their basketball playing scenes together readable for non-sport fans.

Sapphics who never got over the girl who made them realize they’re gay- this book is for you!

Thank you to the publishers and NetGalley for the ARC!

This was a tough read for me and am not sure why. I loved the idea of the story....the uncertainly of being in love at a young age, made doubly difficult by being in love with someone of the same sex. (Been there so I know that feeling, that angst). The author absolutely loves basketball and you can tell that from her writing. She is very detailed in that respect. I can also acknowledge that there is a correlation between basketball and what the characters were going through in their own personal lives. I just could not connect to either Mack or Liv. Perhaps it is because of my own age and the inability to put myself back to that era.

A Sharp Endless Need is insanely overwritten. Marisa Crane makes her peers—Chloe Michelle Howarth, Julia Armfield, Bronwyn Fischer—look positively restrained (which is saying something!). This is an observation, not a critique. Hot-house-flower prose has flourished in Lesbian literature forever. See: turn-of-the-century French decadents like Jane de la Vaudère or Renée Vivien, the women’s-fiction-meets-expressionism of Weimar Germany’s Maximiliane Ackers or Anna Elisabet Weirauch, the spiritually inflected self-indulgence of Radclyffe Hall.

Like her queer forebearers, Marisa Crane seeks glory in the sparks that fly when love is pushed into the closet and public performance becomes the soul’s only outlet (the closet being, among other things, a veritable vortex of overheated emotion without vent). In other words, this novel brings some seriously camp energy to High School basketball. The intensity of the most violent scenes—and, for that matter, of the most lovely—is almost overwhelming, even as key emotions, key motivations remain below the surface for the entire book, invisible but to the careful reader.

Mack only sees the hurt done to her. She hardly registers the hurt she does.

Reading the first half of A Sharp Endless Need, I couldn’t help thinking that if you gave me a few hours and felt-tip pen, I could make this novel a hell of a lot better just by slicing off a couple metaphors per page. Reading the second half, I mostly changed my mind. It helped, I’m sure, that I know first-hand the intimacy and intensity even pick-up basketball can have—the charged contact between defender and defended, the unmatchable euphoria of a well-executed play.

This was such an intense, coming-of-age story that perfectly combined that angst of first love and sports obsession! Mack and Liv are standout stars on their high school basketball team. They’re juggling school, their social lives, and college recruiting while also trying to win their school a league championship in basketball. It doesn’t take long for them to realize that they also really like each other - and in the midst of all the college and sports pressure, they also must deal with the confusion, uncertainty, and butterflies in the stomach that come with a first love.

First, I LOVE ALL THE BASKETBALL in this book. I love sports and am currently in the midst of this roller coaster ride of recruiting with my daughter. It’s not for the faint of heart and Crane truly nails the process. In addition, I just love sports and thought the moments she wrote about an intense game landed really well…however, I could see this being a turn off for less sports-minded people. There’s no need to get bogged down in the terminology if it’s not your thing - it doesn’t take anything away if you skim through the games and practice scenes.

Second, Crane handled the relationship between Mack and Liv quite well. The book is set in the early 2000s and the town where they live seemed to be still fairly close-minded. So not only are these two girls struggling with the intensity and confusion of their first-love feelings, they’re also trying to navigate through their community’s attitudes toward queer romance. The relationship and feelings are intense and I got completely swept away while rooting for Mack and Liv the entire time.

The one thing that started to annoy me was the amount of drug and alcohol use. I’m not trying to be naive, but it seemed overboard at times, especially for two such elite athletes. As previously mentioned, I am thick in this world, and the girls are diligent about their training, their sleep, and their nutrition. Not saying it doesn’t happen, but it certainly hasn’t been the case around the girls I know.

Regardless, if you were a fan of the movie, Love and Basketball, this would be a great recommendation for you. It was such a unique premise for a love story and one that’s especially fun for fans of women’s basketball!