Playing the Field
Books | Juvenile Fiction / Sports & Recreation / Baseball & Softball
Phil Bildner
All Darcy wants is to play on the baseball team, to hear her name announced, "Now batting, Darcy Miller," to play the field. Is that so much to ask? Unfortunately, it might be. In a few short months, Darcy Miller goes from typical senior in high school to candidate for Jerry Springer. Her mom has started dating Darcy's principal, the very principal whose son Darcy happened to have started a huge flirt-fest with, now brought to a screeching halt. When she decides to let her mom go to bat (so to speak) for her to play on the baseball team, Darcy thinks things are starting to look up. After all, Principal Basset caves and decides to let her play. But he has two conditions that shake up her entire game: She must pretend to be a lesbian (WHAT?) and she must join the GSA, the Gay-Straight Alliance (WHAT? WHAT?), the president of which happens to be her best friend -- make that her ex-best friend, Josh. Okay, Darcy's senior year might seem complicated at first. It's not. It's insurmountably, unforgettably, and -- most of the time -- hilariously complicated. But if anyone can handle it, it's Darcy. She'll do anything just to play the field.
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Author
Phil Bildner
Pages
181
Publisher
Simon and Schuster
Published Date
2006
ISBN
1416902848 9781416902843
Ratings
Google: 5
Community ReviewsSee all
"<br/>This entire book gave me very strong Ted Lasso vibes.<br/><br/>Ted Lasso is mostly about the game, the players/owners as individuals, and the drama within the league, with only a segment here and there dedicated to on-screen romance.<br/><br/>And that is exactly how I felt reading Playing the Field. There was so much detail in the beginning of the book about how they were starting their own team that it almost felt like reading an instruction manual. The book picked up the pace with the player tryouts, which I did find interesting because it at least provided us with more details about something other than the sport itself, but I kept waiting for the romance. For this to be a true sports romance, I feel like the characters needed to meet long before they did. By the time Ben finally walked into the picture, it started feeling a lot more like sports fiction than a true sports romance.<br/><br/>Which was unfortunate for me, as I do not love sports. I love sports romance, and the actual in-depth details of the sport had me skimming heavily over certain sections. My eyes glazed over very often, and I just never felt excited to pick it up and continue reading. A sports romance should have more giddy excitement and banter. As it was, there was not enough established tension between Ben and Lily before they got together for me to find their relationship timeline believable.<br/><br/>While there were a handful of good scenes of the two of them together, I feel like we didn’t get enough of that before the club and studying started to overshadow it. While the steam was decent, they went from staring at each other in a mirror for some post-shower coitus, to the comfort of monogamously studying on the couch too soon to feel realistic.<br/><br/>All that said, I would have still given this book 3 stars if not for what transpired next.<br/><br/>"
K F
Kaylee Fenby