I've seen so many people raving about this book that I had really hoped it'd be a new absolute favourite of mine - after all, I love trans characters, and I love sports romance, so it should be perfect for me. Unfortunely I just felt so confused during every sports scene in this book. Like, I have read a lot of baseball romances, and I feel like I know how the sport works (it's not the most complicated sport in the world), but I was just confused the entire time with this one. And the first 20% of the book as well, I feel like the author never actually explained anything to the reader, we were only given a small amount of information as something happened. I had to learn about the characters and the world through osmosis instead of just being told something (like, for example, I had no idea if Gene had already started transitioning when he'd been in college with Luis until like WAY too far into the book).

I also saw my ebook was labelled as a enemies-to-lovers romance, and that is absolutely NOT what this book is. Like they are awkward with each other at best, and it's resolved fairly quickly. This is much more of a friends to lovers book. Publishers, please stop marketing books with tropes that are not even in the book, I beg you.

Oh, and final thing that bugged me before I talk about the stuff I actually liked: Dodger, Luis's emotional support husky? That dog NEVER got taken out for walks or to pee/shit. It never gets fed anything other than like 2 french fries. I don't expect the plot to stop every 5 seconds for them to look after the dog, but Luis gets up in the morning or goes to bed MULTIPLE TIMES in the story without ever taking the dog outside to take care of his business. And I also have no idea if a husky can be a good emotional support dog, since they're so well-known for being high-maintenance dogs.

But that all said, I did enjoy this book. I thought Gene was delightful, and he and Luis were very sweet. There were some extremely romantic scenes between the two of them that I did highlight. And I loved how they were always laughing during sex. And I liked that so many of the characters had disabilities or were neurodivergent.

I am still waiting for the audiobook from Libby (I've been on the wait list since the beginning of May and the ebook went on sale so I just grabbed that for now), but I am definitely going to listen to the audiobook as soon as I can, and maybe that'll pop this review from 4 stars to 5.

EDIT: Listened to the audiobook finally! I was less confused by the sports stuff this time around, and I enjoy all the characters, but I think this is staying at a 4 star review for me.