Thanks, Wattpadbooks, for the arc! 

 

I’m in my sports romance era, so the cover of PLAYMAKER by Deanna Faison 100% called to me with its cuteness. Maddie and Cameron staring at one another gives me all the feels of the moments they stare at each other in the book. And the book has a lot of teasing and sensual eye contact! 

 

I was invited to the Wattpad Webtoon Book Group 2024 Influencer Preview in August, and Faison was a special guest! She spoke about the novel and answered questions from those of us in attendance. I loved hearing how PLAYMAKER went from being set initially with the characters in high school on Wattpad to having the characters aged up to college in the novel published by Wattpadbooks. You can tell that Faison put a lot of work into editing her story to age the characters and tweak the plot points to make sense. I think there were a few times that language or actions seemed a little high schoolish. Still, when I was in my first few years of college, I wasn’t suddenly a sophisticated colligate speaking eloquently with the obscure words from the Oxford dictionary. 

 

Spoiler warning: The virgin trope is not one of my favorites. I’ll read them, but I don’t actively search for them. I like how it was handled in this book and how patient Cameron was with Maddie. But I HATED how it was after the fact, and it became this big thing, “but I took your virginity,” over and over again. 

 

A significant content warning is a cancer death off the page; the grief aspect from it is handled in an excellent way. Faison really shows how grief can affect people differently and how grief is not linear - one person’s ride with grief can cover all sorts of pathways. 

 

I liked PLAYMAKER. It entertained me, and I look forward to more from Faison. There weren't a lot of sportsball, but there was a lot of spice, which I’m okay with! 

 

Content warnings: cancer, familial death, gaslighting, emotional abuse, 

 

PS—On a personal note, this took me from 8/19 to 9/28 to read. It should have never taken me that long. I liked it way more than letting it take over a month to read. I’m not a fan of MMC’s name, so I just had to pace myself.