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OK, let me start with saying Long Shot was the very book that had me absolutely loving Kennedy Ryan's work. She writes romance and incorporates extremely relevant topics. It makes her books more real, raw and sometimes relatable. Once Block Shot was announced, I couldn't wait to get my hands on it. I will say that this one is definitely a lot lighter and not so heavy like Long Shot was. So yes, it's book 2 in this series and can be read as a standalone. Are you ready for August's brother, Jared? No? Yeah, I wasn't either! His presense just about bulldozed me over.
Block Shot is a second romance, which was another reason I was looking forward to this. It's my favorite trope of all! Jared and Banner became very good friends during college and right when they were about to become something more, a d-bag comes along and ruins everything that was fragile, to begin with. I'm going to say that the fall of their relationship at that point was a big misunderstanding and it absolutely tore me up because my goodness, they were so close! And everything was going to be amazing, but I digress because we wouldn't have a second chance romance if that incident didn't happen. Now fast forward several years and these two are rival sports agents, so yep, add a little enemies-to-lovers trope to the storyline ;-)
My goodness, there is just so much to love and admire about Banner. I loved that we can all see a little bit of ourselves in Banner. But I loved her strength, her tenacity to be absolutely amazing at her job and to just do things the right way. She's just a genuine person. Banner is definitely someone you'll always want in your corner!
And then we have Jared! He was kind of a grade-A d*ck, but when it comes to Banner, all walls were down and he constantly made it known to her that he will always want her. And he'd do whatever he can to get her without any remorse. And that's something that I admired about him. No matter what, she would always come first to him and he'd make no apologies about it. I may not have agreed with some of the things he did, but he met his soulmate in college. She was his end game and that's, that.
Now I'll be honest, I did struggle with certain parts of this book. There's an element/trope that's a huge no for my reading list andddd it happened. I was just not on board with it nor am I ever. However, I was quite expecting it to be somewhat of a big part of the storyline, there's some drama (as to be expected) that happens in the aftermath. And it had me biting my nails because I just didn't like the way it made me feel.
But these two were absolutely consumed with each other. Misunderstandings nor time would wane their feelings towards one another. It was always this palpable from the very beginning. It's evident that there was nothing that would keep them apart.
But Kennedy Ryan (as always) does a phenomenal job tying their story in a nice bow! I may have hated that little trope, but Jared and Banner were so unbelievably well written. And this may be a first that I full-heartedly loved a book with THAT specific trope! I've never had a book confuse me so much before. "I loved it ... and then I didn't, but then I LOVEDDDDD it!". Kennedy Ryan, you are the only author that is capable of making me feel this way!
Prepare yourself to absolutely fall in love with Jared and Banner!