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Got Game?

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Oh, Yeah. Game On! The world of professional golf is rocked when the new ranking system allows Reilly Carr - the country’s best female player--to compete with the big boys. Now everyone wants to know if she will or won't play in golf's premier event…The American.

But her tough choices are complicated further when Luke Nolan - her on again, off again lover - suddenly decides now is the time to turn their friends-with-benefits set up into a real relationship!

If she's going to make the cut she'll need to battle her game, the press and most of all her heart. The stakes have never been higher.

317 pages, Kindle Edition

First published December 11, 2011

50 people want to read

About the author

Stephanie Doyle

64 books49 followers
It all started with Shanna and Star Wars. An odd combination, I know, but what people don't appreciate about Star Wars is the deep romantic element between two of the lead characters. I wasn't seven years-old when I was able to clearly spot that Han and Leia were supposed to be a couple.

Sure most of my friends, who at the time weren't nearly as mature as I was – after all some of them were still six, thought that Leia loved Luke. But anyone really looking could see that Han and Leia were the couple to beat.

That's when I discovered romance.

Then at about fifteen or so I was babysitting one night, bored out of my mind – the children were fast asleep at this point – so I picked a book from the shelf. I wasn't much of a reader at the time, but I liked the orange cover. It was Shanna by Kathleen Woodiwiss.

That's when I discovered romance novels.

Making up stories – that's just something I've always done. It's like breathing for me. But it wasn't until I began to read actively that I thought maybe I could actually write a book. The benefit of writing over reading is that I get to have everything just the way I like it. I should mention at this point that I'm a little bit of a control freak.

But I didn't go to school for writing. In fact I went to school to be the President of the United States - make that a power hungry control freak.

I attended Catholic University of America in Washington D.C. And no, that is not a school to learn how to become a nun. Although, since I'm not married yet, my mother believes that subliminal messages were piped into the dorm rooms through hidden speakers.

I strayed from the presidential track. Figured instead of running the country I would do something really meaningful. I became a school teacher and spent two amazing years in Seattle.

Eventually I came back home to South Jersey. I got a temp job to hold me over until I could find another teaching position and have been at my current company for eight years. I keep telling my boss that I'm only staying for a little while longer. But he has since stopped listening to me.

So what else is there to know about me? I write. I work. I exercise. I try not to eat. I fail. I beat myself up for not succeeding to not eat. Then I drink. It's a simple life I lead.

I date. But that's a whole other story….

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Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
Profile Image for Saly.
3,434 reviews574 followers
April 7, 2012
Rating 3.5
I enjoyed the book even though it did have a lot of golf, since I am not that familiar with the game at times I wasn't that enamoured but overall I liked the book.

The heroine Reilly is at the top of women golf but she has been feeling bored lately maybe it has to do with the fact that she has just turned 30, her grandparents who raised her and her brother since she was 2 are getting older and there doesn't seem to be any challenge in the game.

So, after her tournament is over she goes home to her grandparents along with her brother and caddie Kenny. Pretty soon Luke, her brother's best friend and once a top men's player turned commentator soon follows.

Luke and Reilly are losers when it comes to relationships, Reilly has two divorces and a broken engagement under her belt while Luke has just gotten divorced for the third time.

But more than their friendship they have been lovers, whenever each of them have been free, it started when Reilly turned eighteen and made a move losing her virginity to Luke. While Reilly is grappling with the decision if she wants to be the first woman to play in a men's tournament, Luke has come to certain conclusions about his personal life and feeling for Reilly, he wants them to try for something more and has even figured out why his marriages didn't work mainly because of Reilly and there wasn't any love when he went into them.

Beyond this plot we have someone stalking Reilly and also her brother Kenny who after a lifetime of flitting from relationship to relationship is ready to get serious and is feeling empty because his on/off relationship with Tess seems to be over. So, we see him figuring his feelings out and fighting for what he wants.

The romance wasn't center-stage and for a long time Luke doesn't tell Reilly about his intentions since she is busy preparing for the biggest tournament of her life but when he does, he forces Reilly to take a look back on her failed relationships and how now both of them seem to be mature enough to handle something deeper.

I really liked the epilogue, it was kind of sweet and set a year ahead. I also liked seeing how tough life is for a professional athlete and how much hard-work gets into it, I also loved the close loving relationship Reilly had with her family.
Profile Image for Rosario.
1,118 reviews76 followers
April 28, 2013
I'm not the biggest golf fan, but the idea of it being the heroine who was the superstar athlete, rather than the hero, drew me in.

Reilly Carr has been the best player on the women's golf circuit for a quite a while. She's so good that she's miles ahead of the competition; so much so that things have started to feel a bit boring for her. And then a new ranking system is introduced, and it turns out that Reilly's new rank automatically qualifies her to play in the top tournament, where obviously, no woman has ever played.

Whether to take that chance is a difficult decision. Will she make a fool of herself, given that basic physiology means that even the strongest female player can never hit the ball as far as the best male players? Will it ruin the rest of her career in the women's circuit, if they feel that Reilly doesn't think that circuit is good enough for her?

After some soul-searching, Reilly decides to take the chance (no spoiler, it's pretty obvious, really!). It will require her to train her ass off, but she's ready for it. However, she didn't count on the complications. First, there's Luke Nolan, a former golfer himself, with whom she's been having a sort of fuck-buddy relationship. Luke has suddenly decided he wants more. And Reilly seems to have acquired a stalker, who really isn't happy about her recent choices and wants her to know it.

There was some really good stuff here. Reilly is definitely not your typical romance heroine. She's supposed to be an elite, extremely succesful athlete, and she acts like it. She's confident to the point of arrogance, a bit jockish and very, very driven. Her personal life has been pretty eventful, as well. She's been married and divorced twice, and has an additional broken engagement. And it's not a problem. Doyle allows her to be like that and still be a romance heroine.

I also really liked the golf stuff. I was really interested in the preparation and what steps Reilly took to improve her game, and the actual playing scenes were tense and exciting. I loved that Doyle was able to give us a happy ending in that area that didn't feel unrealistic.

I did, however, like the golf more than the romance. The latter was a bit boring, mainly because there was no real tension. The problem was that there were no real obstacles to keep these two apart. Luke decides to be very devious and play games with Reilly, but I never really understood why he found it necessary, instead of just being straighforward.

I wasn't crazy about the suspense subplot, either. It felt like a very standard, typical stalker plot, and it was too easy to guess the culprit.

This is a self-published work, so I should mention that it was ok on the writing end. No excessive typos/garbled phrasing or anything like that. The story did feel a bit bloated round the middle, though, a bit too long and in need of a bit of judicious editing and trimming. It says 317 pages on the kindle page at amazon, but it felt much longer (I’ve tried to check the number of words, but I can't find the information). Still, I've seen plenty of professionally edited books with sagging middles, so I won't automatically conclude that the fact that it was self-pubbed was the issue.

MY GRADE: A B-.
Profile Image for Molly O'Keefe.
Author 107 books2,136 followers
December 14, 2011
I loved the premise of this book - women playing with the men. The heroine is great - an amazing secondary cast and some moments that felt like they were a movie. Fun book!
Profile Image for Kayla Tocco.
68 reviews23 followers
January 7, 2021
Publication Date: December 11, 2011
Publisher: TKA Distribution
ISBN: 9781937776206
Genre: Contemporary Romance- Suspense Elements
Obtained via Net Galley from TKA Distribution

The Blurb:

Oh, Yeah. Game On!

The world of professional golf is rocked when the new ranking system allows Reilly Carr- the country's best female player- to compete with the big boys. Now everyone wants to know if she will or won't play in golf's premier event...The American.

But her tough choices are complicated further when Luke Nolan- her on again, off again lover- suddenly decides now is the time to turn their friends-with-benefits set up into a real relationship!

If she's going to make the cut she'll need to battle her game, the press and most of all, her heart. The stakes have never been higher.

My Take:

I have always been a so-so fan of golf, don't really like watching it, but like to go to the driving range and hit-...errr... miss a few balls every once in a while. For me, it takes a talented writer and a great story to make me, a 24 year old bookworm, want to become a professional golfer. Ha Ha. But this story really made golf exciting for me.

Told in a very light, fun tone we get to experience the growth of Reilly Carr as she makes one of the biggest decisions of her career and as she deals with the repercussions of that decision. She loses friends from her women's circuit, gains enemies both on and off the course and struggles to redefine a relationship she's always wanted but was always afraid to pursue.

Reilly Carr and Luke Nolan are a great match, competitive enough to push the other toward greatness, but not so much so that it threatens their relationship. The sense of family loyalty in this story is great and the characters are all likable (well of course except for our stalker) That's right...stalker. Once Reilly is pushed into the limelight further after accepting the chance to play in The American, someone decides he wants Reilly to himself and only to himself. She receives threatening letters, creepy phone calls, usual stalkerish type behavior.

I loved this story, it wasn't so convoluted with golf descriptions that it weighed down the story, rather the golf action and training was weaved in perfectly throughout the story to give us a glimpse at what it's like to be a professional golfer and also to show us these wonderful characters personalities through the sport they know and love.

The sexual tension was hot, the sex ever hotter and it seemed to fit the characters to a T especially when you could see Reilly and Luke grow together even during the love scenes.

My only real complaint (spoiler alert! You've been warned!) is that, while I absolutely love when my heroine is married and pregnant in an epilogue, for me it felt like in love and married or not, this just didn't seem right for her character yet. I get that it's supposed to show that she's realized that golf isn't everything and it did and I thought the story had a good HEA and I felt it had closure, but I just didn't feel that it worked that she was pregnant yet. I feel like I would have liked to see how her life changed more in the golf world with her opponents, both male and female, in terms of competition etc. But even despite that, I'm still glad that finally after numerous divorces between them, that they finally found each other and their happy ending.

My Rating: "Fore"/Five Lattes



All My Best,

Kayla
Profile Image for Meghan.
743 reviews2 followers
September 17, 2017
This book was a good, fairly quick read. I always enjoy a book with some sports in it. I'm not really aquatinted with golf but it was still and enjoyable read. Reilly is fun and relatable. Overall good read.

**I received a copy from Netgalley and the publisher in exchange for a review**
Profile Image for Kate.
856 reviews39 followers
July 26, 2016
Reilly Carr is one of the most successful female golfers in history. But lately winning hasn't felt as good as it used to and Reilly has been slighly discontented. After returning home to Nebraska to visit her grandparents and to recharge before her next tournament, the news breaks that due to a change in the ranking system Reilly has a chance to play on one of golf's most sacred grounds and take part in the golfing event of the year - The American.

I'm not a very sporty person but I do love reading sports romances. And this one was no exception. Reilly Carr is competitive and good at what she does. But she's also romantically challenged and has two divorces and a third broken engagement to prove it. Luke Nolan, two-time winner of The American is just as flawed when it comes to marriage - his third divorce just finalized. But together they work. I loved the chemistry between them and the fact that both acknowledge that the other isn't perfect.

The supporting cast are another highlight of this novel. Kenny, Reilly's caddy and brother, has his own romantic sub-plot that adds to the novel's romance. I loved that in many ways Kenny and Reilly's romantic lives paraellel each other. Despite Kenny being a bit of a playboy and Reilly being extremely good at committing (it's just staying married she has a problem with), the Carr siblings are a lot alike. The sibling squabbles on the green amused me greatly - no matter how old you may be, there are times when a little petty sibling argument is justified.

There was a lot going on in this novel - the romantic relationships, the golf and the stalker storyline - but Stephanie Doyle managed to tie them altogether nicely. The golf aspect was not overwhelming to a non-golf fan but instead was written in such a way that it just added to the drama and story without being too much. I was enthralled by the sport angle which surprised me greatly. I really enjoyed this novel. I'll definitely be looking out for novels by Stephanie Doyle in the future.
Profile Image for Julie Barrett.
9,098 reviews198 followers
February 17, 2012
GOT GAME? by Stephanie Doyle
Golf, romance and a good story line, awesome read!
Reilly is the master and her brother, Kenny is her caddy. Love to read about what others think about while golfing. This book is a treat!
She's just won another event and now off to home to visit with her grandparents.
After their parents had drowned at sea their grandparents raised them and grandad was a pro at golf and even made his own irons still-from the machine Reilly had bought him. Their grandparents had a simple life now with her Parkinsons disease.
Water rake was another gift she had given him to get the balls out of the lake that she practiced to hit her balls into during the winter months.
I love that her grandma still bakes and knits, a woman who's content!
A new scoring/ranking system was to come out making so women to play on mens tour.
She did qualify in the top 50 to play with the men. Love this book as it is all about the rankings and what comprises them. I used to run an online golf tour where hundreds played and they got points for just playing for their team. Ah statistics!
Luke, a reporter on the tour thought she was hot stuff and was going to track down where her grandparents lived and just show up and hope his charm would win her over.
Kenny's girlfriend Ericka is also a golfing buddy of Reilly's and she's due at the homestead.
There are a lot of tangled relationships discussed through the book mixed in with the golf that people have to make decisions about what to do next.
Will the new physical training she has to go through be worth her decision?
When her family is put in harms way she rethinks her decision...


Profile Image for Rhonda.
89 reviews
March 30, 2012
I do not follow golf in any way so I was curious to read this book. I really enjoyed this book and would love to read more books by this author.

Reilly and Luke are the main characters in the story. I found their relationship interesting. The background of a golf tournament does not overwhelm their story but provides interesting information on how Reilly thinks. It was a nice change to see Luke as the one who wants to make the relationship more permanent and how Reilly reacts to this change.

The stalker aspect of the story is something that has been done before but it had a twist. I found myself surprised by the twists and turns in the story.

I would definitely recommend this book. I loved the story and want to read more by Stephanie Doyle in the future.

I received this book from NetGalley for review.
Profile Image for Kim Arrowood.
15 reviews6 followers
December 17, 2011
romance is not my normal genre but I love the game of golf. There were a few times when I felt the story dragged...will she or won't she play in the American. Overall it was a well written and enjoyable read.
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