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Friday, December 5, 2014

Lola's Blog Tours Presents: A League of Her Own by Karen Rock; #Excerpt, #Review, & #Giveaway


A League of Her Own tour banner

This is my stop during the blog tour for A League of Her Own by Karen Rock. This blog tour is organized by Lola's Blog Tours. The blog tour runs from 1 till 14 December, you can view the complete tour schedule on the website of Lola’s Blog Tours.



A League of Her Own
By Karen Rock
Genre: Contemporary Romance
Age category: Adult
Release Date: 1 December, 2014
Rating:  4 1/2 Stars

Blurb:
He was attractive, talented…and way off limits.

Heather Gadway may have been a world-class college pitcher and a top university coach, but she's a rank amateur when it comes to managing the Falcons, her father's struggling minor league team. And when it comes to managing her aggravating attraction to Garrett Wolf, their talented new pitcher. It's going to be difficult enough to make it as the first female manager in the league and prove to her overly critical father she's worthy. No distractions. No missteps. And certainly no romances with players. Everything stands between them—including their troubled pasts—even as Heather's world falls apart and Garrett's the one who's there to catch her…

You can find A League of Her Own on Goodreads.

You can buy A League of Her Own here:
- Amazon (Kindle)
- Barnes & Noble
- Kobo
- eHarlequin

Excerpt:
Garrett’s grumbling teammates filed out of the pre-game meeting, followed by the coaches and Heather’s father. Garrett, however, remained in his seat, watching the lithe young woman as she stood by the door.
At last she turned to him.
“We meet again. Garrett, right?”
He stood and strode to the door. When he stopped, her eyes widened, caution swimming in their depths.
“You mentioned having individual meetings,” he said, keeping his voice even, hiding the irritation shimmering through him. “I thought we’d have ours now.”
She blinked up at him, and her lips moved. Though he strained to hear, he couldn’t make out what she’d said.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t catch that.”
A bright pink suffused her cheeks, and he forced himself not to notice how pretty the color made her.
“I said that I haven’t finished my notes for you yet. I’ll watch you pitch tomorrow. We’ll meet after that.”
He had to give it to her. Soft-spoken or not, she had a direct way about her. He didn’t doubt that she could lead…just not professional baseball players. “That’s what I wanted to talk to you about. I’m requesting to be released from my contract. This isn’t the right place for me to advance in my career.”
Her mobile face stilled. “And why would that be?”
“Look, I’ll be blunt.” He tapped his fingers on the sides of his legs. “This team isn’t hustling, and it’ll be a long time before they come around to supporting you. Things will get worse instead of better. I have a limited window of opportunity to advance. Given these factors, my bottom-line pitching won’t look good with a losing team behind me. I’d like to help you, but selfishly, this is my last shot.”
A speculative gleam entered her eyes. “So you’re asking to be released because you think I can’t help you reach your goals.”
A long breath rushed out of him. She was going to be reasonable. “That’d be great. Thank you.”
She arched an eyebrow. “You’re wrong, and I’ll be as frank with you as you were with me.”
His relief turned to irritation. So she wasn’t going to make this easy. He held his tongue and waited to hear her out.
“I think you’re overvaluing yourself.” She nodded when his mouth dropped open. Guys talked this way to each other. Not women…especially not pretty women…to him.
“Your control isn’t where it should be, and if that's not addressed, you'll also be another reason why this team isn’t doing well. But you have potential, and I can help you.”
“Right,” he scoffed. What could a softball pitcher do for him? “No offense, but I need someone with more experience.”
She tapped her chin and angled her head, her eyes flashing up at him. “If I can change your mind about that, will you drop your request and give me your support and a hundred percent effort?”
He held in a laugh. Was she for real? There wasn’t a chance she could change his decision. “What do you have in mind?”
She stepped closer, and her subtle citrus scent curled beneath his nose.
“A contest. If I get more strikes out of twenty pitches than you do, you stay. If you have more, then I’ll release you.”
He stared at her. Processing. She couldn’t be serious. Sure, he had control issues, but he was still better than a college-level player. She was making this easy. But if she was foolish enough to offer him this out, he’d take it.
They eyed each other for a long, tense moment before he jerked his chin at her.
“You’re on.”

My Thoughts:

You’ll find that either this author is a fan of baseball or she’s done a lot of research.  If you like books with a sports theme then this book is one to have at the top of your list.  And the author shows that you don’t need to have sex in the story to have a book that will hold the reader’s attention.  It also makes you wonder which is harder to write, a story with or with out sex scenes.  This is the second of her books that I have read and I’m looking forward to reading more.

She has a way of getting her readers to be able to relate to what her characters are going through.  You get to care what is going on with them and that by the time you get to the end you want to know that everything is going to turn out all right.  I stopped over to Karen’s web site to see what she’s got in store for us next.  The good news is, the title is A Forever Home and the bad news is that we’ll have to wait for Spring.  But just think, that’s not all that far away since this year is almost over.

This would be a great book to read during baseball season – to get you into the mood.  But if you follow some of the clubs during Spring training, you could bring this book along.  Maybe you have a friend that loves romances that revolve around sports – one Christmas gift down.  This is a story that you can’t go wrong with – and there’s a young man that will steal the scenes he’s in as well as your heart.  One good thing about reading this story during the Winter season is that it will have you looking forward to Spring.



Karen Rock
About the Author:
Karen Rock is an award-winning YA and adult contemporary romance author. She holds a master’s degree in English and worked as an ELA instructor before becoming a full-time writer. Currently she writes for Harlequin Heartwarming and her first novel for the line, WISH ME TOMORROW, has won the 2014 Gayle Wilson Award of Excellence, the 2014 Golden Quill Contest and a finalist in the Published Maggie Awards. The first novel in her co-authored YA series, CAMP BOYFRIEND, has been a finalist in the Booksellers Best and Golden Leaf awards.

You can find and connect with Karen here:
- Website
- Facebook
- Twitter
- Goodreads
- Tumblr
- Quarterly Newsletter

Giveaway:
There is a tour wide giveaway for the blog tour of A League of Her Own. These are the prizes you can win:
- a 100$ Amazon gift card (INT)
- a set of signed paperback of Wish Me Tomorrow, His Hometown Girl, Someone Like You and A League of Her Own (US only)

A League of Her Own Blog Tour Grand Prize

For a chance to win, enter the rafflecopter below:
a Rafflecopter giveaway



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2 comments:

  1. Thank you so much for this beautiful review, Lynn! I appreciate it so much :) Happy Holidays ahead ((HUGS))

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