Book Smart Kate

Book: 🌟🌟🌟 Audiobook: 🌟🌟🌟 Spice: 🌶️ 🌶️

by Elena Arias

Adalyn is driven by professionalism and routine, but when a video of her assaulting her soccer club’s mascot goes viral, her club-owner father banishes her to North Carolina to help revitalize a 10U girls’ soccer team. Furious but determined, Adalyn’s assignment is further complicated by Cameron, a recently retired MLS star, coaching the team. 

They get off on a disastrous wrong foot, and Cam is determined to run her out of town, but as they grow to know each other, attraction forms, and what was hate turns into love.

This is the tale of two books – the first half is a cringy caricature. A corporate exec forced by her father to make amends for something that doesn’t seem that bad by going into hiding while helping in a remote North Carolina town. Her dad is the wealthy club owner; her peer is sexist; she can’t comprehend not wearing heels; she’s horrified about going to “the country,” and he’s a curmudgeon (you get the idea). The second half isn’t perfect but is a traditionally sweet romance with Ted Lasso vibes, smoldering romance, quirky small-town charm, and realizations about where you want your life to go in the future.

I STRUGGLED with this book. It gave distinct It Happened One Summer vibes. Many people loved that book, but I was not among them. The book’s second half is much better than the first, and, like IHOS, the secondary characters were the most interesting. As this is the first in the series, I will return to read Matthew’s story. I’m hoping that book recaptures the spark of The Spanish Love Deception.

The audiobook is well-narrated and the accents are successful. It is a traditional narration format. You don’t gain or lose from the audio format. I bounced back and forth between the two seamlessly.