From the publisher:
A disgraced soccer exec reluctantly enlists the help of a retired soccer star in coaching a children’s team in this small-town love story in the vein of Ted Lasso and It Happened One Summer —from the New York Times bestselling author of The Spanish Love Deception.
Adalyn Reyes has spent years perfecting her daily routine: wake up at dawn, drive to the Miami Flames FC offices, try her hardest to leave a mark, go home, and repeat.
But her routine is disrupted when a video of her in an altercation with the team’s mascot goes viral. Rather than fire her, the team’s owner—who happens to be her father—sends Adalyn to middle-of-nowhere North Carolina, where she’s tasked with turning around the struggling local soccer team, the Green Warriors, as a way to redeem herself. Her plans crumble upon discovering that the players wear tutus to practice (impractical), keep pet goats (messy), and are terrified of Adalyn (counterproductive), and are nine-year-old kids.
To make things worse, also in town is Cameron Caldani, goalkeeping prodigy whose presence is somewhat of a mystery. Cam is the perfect candidate to help Adalyn, but after one very unfortunate first encounter involving a rooster, Cam’s leg, and Adalyn’s bumper, he’s also set on running her out of town. But banishment is not an option for Adalyn. Not again. Helping this ragtag children’s team is her road to redemption, and she is playing the long game. With or without Cam’s help.
https://amzn.to/466pe54
This book was a….long read. It took me days to get through it. I liked it enough to stick with it, but it was definitely slow going. This was my first read from this author.
The characters were well-developed, but their chemistry was unexplored for most of the book. I just felt like I was waiting for something to happen.
The best parts of the book were the kids and the animals. The setting was a small town in North Carolina, and one of the running gags was that Adalyn insisted on wearing her Florida clothes and heels, despite the dropping temperatures of late fall.
Both main characters had interesting backstories, but again, it took too long to piece it all out. Maybe it was me? If you’ve read it, I’d love to hear from you!
9/2023 Stacy Alesi, AKA the BookBitch
THE LONG GAME by Elena Armas. Atria Books (September 5, 2023). ISBN: 978-1668011300. 384p.
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