Book Review: All Lined Up (Rusk University Novel #1) by Cora Carmack

New York Times and USA Today bestselling author Cora Carmack follows up her trio of hits—Losing It, Faking It, and Finding It—with this thrilling first novel in an explosive series bursting with the Texas flavor, edge, and steamy romance of Friday Night Lights.

(Blurb): In Texas, two things are cherished above all else—football and gossip. My life has always been ruled by both.

Dallas Cole loathes football. That's what happens when you spend your whole childhood coming in second to a sport. College is her time to step out of the bleachers, and put the playing field (and the players) in her past.

But life doesn't always go as planned. As if going to the same college as her football star ex wasn’t bad enough, her father, a Texas high school coaching phenom, has decided to make the jump to college ball… as the new head coach at Rusk University. Dallas finds herself in the shadows of her father and football all over again.

Carson McClain is determined to go from second-string quarterback to the starting line-up. He needs the scholarship and the future that football provides. But when a beautiful redhead literally falls into his life, his focus is more than tested. It's obliterated.

Dallas doesn't know Carson is on the team. Carson doesn't know that Dallas is his new coach's daughter.

And neither of them know how to walk away from the attraction they feel.

Book Information

Published: May 13th, 2014
Genre: Contemporary Romance
Age Group: New Adult
Length: 322p


Review

I'm a sucker for sporty romances. My two favorites are MMA and football. Yes -- I love the quarterback-meets-geeky-kinda-girl books. Really I'm a sucker for any kind of story with an opposites attract theme. Maybe it's because the spectrum gives the reader a pretty good chance to relate to one or the other and live more vicariously through the characters. Reading the blurb, All Lined Up had all of the elements I typically swoon over a book for. But it was different in that the main characters are actually from the same side of the tracks. He's got the potential to be a star football player at Rusk and she's lived in that Friday Night Limelight her entire life and is over that type of life. What better way to create all sorts of plot tensions than to throw together two people with pretty different viewpoints of a particular sport and lifestyle ?

What I liked

The H/h viewpoints are what initially drew me in. Dallas' dad is a High School National Championship title holder and is whisked off to the mediocre Rusk University in an attempt to revive the football program. All she wants is to be out of her dad's shadow and make a group of friends whose lives don't revolve around football or what her dad is doing. Completely understandable considering everything about her life from where she's lived, to activities she's done, and the college she attends have all been determined by her dad's coaching status. Author Cora Carmack does a great job at providing the reader with believable pros and cons of these lifestyles, all while keeping the reading fun and the cliches to a minimum.

How Dallas and Carson meet is cute, funny, and even a bit sexy. I'll admit that when I first started to read the scene I rolled my eyes because it was set up as a typical college frat party with drunken gyrating and asshole football players. I hate both stereotypes, but Carmack later redeemed herself by giving some of these "asshole" football players a real non-meat-head personality.

What I'm neutral about

I picked this book because I'm a sucker for the trope and it pretty much held true to what you'd expect. There wasn't anything wow-inducing nor did the plot stray from the initial set-up.

What I didn't like

I was somewhat in disbelief on the "I'll drop anything for you -- even give up my career!" attitude. What was interesting was that this mentality flip came more from the Hero rather than the typical heroine.

I completely understood Dallas' hesitance on dating a star athlete. And credit to Carmack for showing the struggle that Carson went through between choosing to focus on Dallas or a sport career.  But honestly, neither really had a lot to lose by dating each other. It was more so them being scared of her dad. And when some (fairly minor) shit hit the fan, instead of just talking to the dad like the adults they were, Carson just decides to walk into the dad's office and give up his scholarship and football career with no discussion. Really? I just read 200-something pages about how this means so much to this guy because of where he came from and all of the hours of training he had to put in and how he can't afford school without a scholarship, and you expect me to believe he's just going to burn his bridges just like that??


Overall, I'd still highly recommend All Lined Up to those who enjoy this type of book or are looking for a pretty light, non-committal series read.