Game On by Tracy Solheim
Released: May 7, 2013
Contemporary Romance
Penguin

Reviewed by Mandi

This book has a great start with a hero and heroine who both appealed to me. But by the end, there was just too much drama with everyone, the hero came off as a jerk and I feel like we get cheated on the romance.

Shane Devlin is a NFL quarterback with a bad boy image in the press. Known for a hot temper and other naughty antics, he recently was let go from his team due to not only bad press, but a big interception. At 31 and still in peak performance, he heads to the tropics to get away from the media and to wait for his phone to ring so he knows he has a QB job next fall. It is on this vacation that he sees a very attractive woman that he can’t keep his eyes off of.

Unknown to Shane, Carly March is the assistant to the General Manager of the NFL team, The Baltimore Blaze. She is on vacation with a friend, but has been working on gathering all the information she can on Shane, because she knows her GM is interested in getting him. Being at the same vacation spot as him is purely coincidental. They share a hot dance together before they get pulled away. Later, Shane gets offered the job from the Blaze, and soon when they are both back in Baltimore, Shane realizes who Carly truly is, and a relationship develops.

Before I go further, let me get into just how much drama we have going on in this story.

– Shane hates his father (a former nfl player) , who abandoned his family when he was young and has lived his life to out play him. He has much anger over this.

– Carly’s wealthy, famous reporter mother was killed by terrorists when she was young, and Carly has been thrust into the paparazzi spotlight ever since.

– Carly’s sister has cancer, and is married to the head coach of the Baltimore Blaze. They have a big role in this book.

– Carly had a drink with a man who works in her building, and he is now very creepily stalking her.

– Something else quite dramatic happens to Shane and he ends up being forced to deal with his half brother who is 12 who Shane dislikes.

There is probably more but that covers the big ones. I think this author has a good voice, and I think the first 30%ish is well done. But after awhile, the drama just piles, and piles into this story. While not confusing, it becomes a little exhausting. My biggest gripe though is that because Carly is constantly dealing with her stalker, her sick sister, her job etc.. we really don’t see Carly and Shane fall in love. They have some hot scenes together and their sexual tension is well done. But that is only one part of a romance book. We also need to see and not be told that they are in love. They barely have page time together in the second half of the book for that to happen.

One other frustration I had is Shane’s relationship with his young half-brother. He treats him poorly. Since Shane doesn’t have a relationship with his father, he brings all that dirt into his relationship with Troy. Troy is just a kid going through some really hard stuff. It doesn’t reflect well on Shane at all for how he treats Troy. I don’t like it when heroes (or heroines) treat kids poorly in romance books. Want to be a jerk? Go for it, but not towards a young kid. Shane is 31 and could have separated his anger towards his father from an innocent kid.

So this one had potential but didn’t quite work out for me at the end. A supporting character gets a book this fall and I’ll probably try that one to see if I like it better than this one.

Rating: C

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