If you only know three things about me, it’s probably that: 1- I Love women’s sports, 2- I love reading, and 3- I’m gay. It’s a rare and exciting occasion when I get to experience all three of my passions at once. That’s why I jumped at the chance to read Meryl Wilsner’s newest Book. I was already going to read anything they wrote after falling in love with Mistakes Were Made, but I quite literally screamed when I heard they were writing a sapphic soccer romance.
Cleat Cute, coming out September 19th, is the absolutely adorable dual perspective story of two soccer players, Grace Henderson and Phoebe Matthews, as they compete for the same professional team and vye for a spot on the national team roster—all while falling in love.
Grace has been playing for the New Orleans Krewe for years, and the national team since she was 16. She’s a superstar, to the point where Phoebe’s childhood bedroom has a poster of her on the wall. Phoebe, on the other hand, played in the NAIA in college (for context, this is worse than the NCAA, where most athletes played) and only gets her first national team call-up where this book begins, after her college graduation.
Despite both being roughly the same age, these girls couldn’t have come from more different worlds, nor could they have more different personalities. This leads to a chaotic “opposites attract” storyline that I could not possibly love more. While the general trajectory was a cliche for romance novels in general, the characters themselves were not, and that made the book extremely fun.
Phoebe is incredibly extroverted, constantly putting herself forward as a class clown. She’ll laugh and joke around until the whistle blows, and then she’s all focus and hard work. She doesn’t have much money or resources, but she’s not going to let that get in the way of her succeeding. Grace is the opposite, head down focused, quiet and unwilling to talk about her personal life, something that compounded after a former flame used her fame against her years before.
They bring out the best in each other, and it’s cute to watch their relationship develop over the course of the novel. They both have their own distinct issues and perspectives on the friendship turned friends with benefits, and reading the dueling chapters gave me low grade anxiety the entire time. I did, in fact, cry multiple times during the course of the book. Grace’s relationship to soccer and her own family hit me right where it hurts.
Part of what I love about Wilsner is their ability to mix in truly emotional scenes with sexy ones, and that was true of Cleat Cute as well. The majority of the book, to be honest, is sex. Wilsner writes such incredibly detailed sex scenes, and each one is so deeply hot. They excel at writing sex scenes that take communication and comfort into account. Phoebe and Grace check in with each other, prioritize the other’s happiness and enjoyment, and make sure nobody is experiencing any discomfort. It’s not just hot (although it is), it’s positive representation for queer sex and just sex in general.
While you most definitely don’t need to have any soccer knowledge to appreciate this book, you might see some parallels to current USWNT and NWSL players while reading. There’s a reference to a pair of dating teammates who posted a video of their wedding (Ashlyn Harris and Ali Krieger), there’s a player nobody really likes who didn’t kneel for the anthem (Carli Lloyd, although she’s not gay in real life), Grace being the quiet veteran player and Phoebe the louder one who comes in later mirrors the dynamic of Tobin Heath and Christen Press, who only recently made their relationship public. For those of you who watched the most recent world cup, the Krewe’s coach and his inability to adjust to player’s strengths may remind you of the most recent USWNT coach, Vlatko Andonovski. All of these references are fun for people who know about women’s soccer, but it’s most definitely just the cherry on top.
It’s incredibly clear throughout the book that Phoebe has ADHD. When in her perspective, the internal monologue is chaotic, jumping from thought to thought. As someone who also has ADHD, I enjoyed this style of existing inside her head, but I saw a couple of reviews complaining about it. The book does discuss her ADHD in a sensitive and interesting way, but that doesn’t get fully explored until the very end. It’s also hinted that Grace may be autistic, but once again we don’t go into detail there.
Phoebe and Grace were absolutely incredible characters, and I loved watching them fall in love. I would most certainly read a sequel, and I recommend this book to anyone looking for a fun, flirty book with well developed characters and hot sex scenes.
I received an early copy of this book from the publisher. All opinions are my own! Thank you to St. Martin’s Griffin and Meryl Wilsner for allowing me to read this book and write this review.
