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    Play by Play
    Play by Play
    Play by Play
    Ebook110 pages1 hour

    Play by Play

    By Kate Donovan

    3.5/5

    ()

    Read preview

    About this ebook

    The blog posts and banter with his followers are all in good fun, and he fully intends to come clean with the woman he’s wooing and wowing. That is, until she confides that she grew up in a house full of jocks and even dated a few. Her verdict? Never again!

    Jake knows he needs to confess. But somewhere along the line he fell in love with Sophie and can’t stand the thought of losing her. So he procrastinates, and blogs, and digs himself deeper into a hole, until it all leads to a showdown that’s so nail-biting, not even the best play-by-play guy could ever have seen it coming.

    "Great lighthearted flirty romance that flowed well. I loved the plot!" —Valerie M., Goodreads

    "What won me over was Kate Donovan's writing . . . she's so funny! A fun, entertaining read that leaves you happy and feeling good." —Janette D., NetGalley

    "A smart, funny and loveable romantic morsel!!" —Margreet A., Ripe for Readers blog

    About the Author:

    Kate Donovan spent her childhood in Ohio and Rhode Island, where she wrote mysteries with pen and paper and stashed them under her bed. Since then, Kate has had 18 novels and 3 novellas published in genres including fantasy, historical romance, legal thriller, romantic suspense, and young adult science fiction.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherBeyond the Page Publishing
    Release dateSep 10, 2013
    ISBN9781937349776
    Play by Play
    Author

    Kate Donovan

    Kate was born in Newark, Ohio, and lived there until age nine when her family moved to Barrington, Rhode Island. They moved again to California just in time for Kate to attend college in Berkeley, which is where she met her husband-to-be, Paul. Kate and Paul attended law school together and settled down in Sacramento to raise a family: son Paul Michl; daughter Amanda; Murphy the trusty (if tiny) watchdog; and Scooter the cat/hunter. They all live in Elk Grove now, and Kate divides her time between her day job as an attorney for the state of California and her writing. When she's not writing, she hangs out with her family in the vicinity of the TV, reads or cooks the many Mexican recipes handed down to her by her late mother-in-law. Kate loves to hear from readers. You can reach her by email at katedonovan@hotmail.com

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    Reviews for Play by Play

    3.5/5

    35 ratings1 review

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    • 2/5
      The dialogue was simplistic, the relationship felt rushed, the drama too easily resolved/wasn't even existent. All in all, fairly sweet, simple, and boring to read.

      1 person found this helpful

    Book preview

    Play by Play - Kate Donovan

    Cover

    Play by Play

    Former college football star Jake Dublin’s wildly popular sports blog also details his personal life. And lately it’s all about Sophie, the pretty young woman who just moved into his apartment building. His readers know her only as Elevator Girl, and they’re all rooting for Jake to score.

    The blog posts and banter with his followers is all in good fun, and he fully intends to come clean with the woman he’s wooing and wowing. That is, until she confides that she grew up in a house full of jocks and even dated a few. Her verdict? Never again!

    Jake knows he needs to confess. But somewhere along the line he fell in love with Sophie and can’t stand the thought of losing her. So he procrastinates, and blogs, and digs himself deeper into a hole, until it all leads to a showdown that’s so nail-biting, not even the best play-by-play guy could ever have seen it coming.

    Title Page

    Copyright

    Play by Play

    Kate Donovan

    Copyright © 2013 by Kate Donovan

    Material excerpted from Trace Elements copyright © 2013 by Kate Donovan

    Cover design and illustration by Dar Albert, Wicked Smart Designs

    Published by Beyond the Page at Smashwords

    Beyond the Page Books

    are published by

    Beyond the Page Publishing

    www.beyondthepagepub.com

    ISBN: 978-1-937349-77-6

    All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this book. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented without the express written permission of both the copyright holder and the publisher.

    This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental. The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

    The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book via the Internet or via any other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal and punishable by law. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated.

    Dedication

    To sportswriters and sports bloggers everywhere:

    you guys are the best!

    Thanks for all the analysis, inside info and laughs.

    This story is dedicated to you.

    Contents

    Chapter 1

    Chapter 2

    Chapter 3

    Chapter 4

    Chapter 5

    Chapter 6

    Chapter 7

    Chapter 8

    Chapter 9

    Chapter 10

    Chapter 11

    Chapter 12

    Chapter 13

    Epilogue

    Excerpt from Trace Elements

    Books by Kate Donovan

    About the Author

    Chapter One

    Jake Dublin: THE OPINIONATED SPORTS GUY

    July 14, a.k.a. three weeks before the official NFL preseason begins

    Yep, we’re getting close, folks. For my preseason predictions, scroll down a few paragraphs, because today I’m opening with an ode to women. If you visit this blog often, you know that’s not something I normally do. Sure, I have opinions on (nearly) everything and I’m not afraid to embarrass myself by expressing them publicly. Dogs on the couch? Smoking in bars? Hybrid vehicles? Check, check and check, and the list goes on.

    But girls/women/humans-of-the-female-persuasion? I try to avoid that topic. For one thing, my experience is limited since I married my junior high girlfriend. I never did the traditional dating thing before marriage, and truth be told, we got married way too young, stayed married way too long, and broke up way too painfully. Oh, and I didn’t cheat during the marriage, so no dating there either. After the divorce, I wasn’t interested in another committed relationship (to put it mildly), and I had the good fortune to meet a nice assortment of open-minded women who weren’t looking for romance, just a good time.

    Once again, no need to date.

    That worked great until yesterday, when I stepped into the elevator at my condo building and saw a girl. Something about her activated the long-dormant dating instinct. I gotta admit, I did not see this coming.

    So there we were. She was carrying a big box of DVDs, and since I hadn’t seen her around before, I figured she was moving in. Since words are my business, you’d think I then said something witty, but it went something like this:

    Me: Just moving in?

    Elevator Girl: Yes, this seems like a nice place.

    Me: Do you need some help?

    EG: That’s sweet of you, but I’ve got it under control.

    Okay, so that phrase—that’s sweet of you—kind of threw me. Any guy worth his salt knows it has tons of different meanings. Sometimes it’s out-and-out flirting, right? Sort of like when they marvel at how strong you are when all you did was pick up a twelve-pack of beer. But sometimes it’s a put-down, like that’s so sweet of you to think you can score with a hot babe like me. And then there’s the patronizing, mom-ish meaning: That’s so sweet to try and carve the turkey at age 3, but let’s let daddy wield the big knife, shall we?

    I couldn’t get a handle on what the elevator girl was trying to say. It didn’t seem like a put-down, but not exactly flirting either. And to complicate things further, I actually am a very sweet guy (not that the ex would agree with me on that).

    So we got to the 3rd floor, she said good-bye and walked down the hall, and I continued up to my place on the 5th. Which leads to my opinionated rant of the day—how can a seemingly normal girl turn an articulate bullshitter like me into a tongue-tied idiot? Why do we put up with it? Oh, and what do I do now? Because trust me, I’m going to date her or die trying.

    Now on to the reason you stopped by—my pre-analysis of this year’s NFL battles. Everyone else is focusing on the potential Super Bowl contenders, but I’m hung up on the new expansion teams. Particularly the Rustlers . . .

    Click here for more sports from Jake Dublin . . .

    COMMENTS:

    Anonymous from SD:

    Give it up, man. She’s not into you.

    Tweetie Burred:

    Leave her alone.

    Ed the first:

    Where are the stats, man? Tall, short? Blonde, brunette? Give us facts, or at least the closest Bond girl.

    The Opinionated Sports Guy:

    She’s not the Bond-girl type. Maybe Christina Applegate in Anchorman. Except less ballsy. Or Naomi Watts in that horror film about the creepy kid stuck in a well.

    Ed the first:

    Hot.

    Tweetie Burred:

    Naomi Watts again? U really R hopeless.

    Anon 2:

    What DVDs were in the box? Chick flicks? Better run, dude.

    The Opinionated Sports Guy:

    Good question. It was sci-fi mostly, but not the

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