Pitcher Perfect by Tessa Bailey
What do you get when you combine a family of overachievers taking part in a week-long competition of dangerous and physically demanding events and a fake boyfriend? Well, you get Skylar Page’s current reality in Tessa Bailey’s new release, Pitcher Perfect.
Skylar is the only member of her family who did not get into Brown — a fact they never let her forget. She’s also in love with her step-brother’s best friend, who’s either playing it cool or genuinely has no idea. This isn’t a brother’s best friend romance, though.
When Skylar meets Robbie while pitching against him and his hockey teammates — yeah, she’s also an All-American softball pitcher at Boston University — she hates him immediately. He is the type to brag about his sexual conquests, and she’s not having any part of it.
Fake Dating and Family Games
But, there is a little snag when her best friend cancels last minute as her partner for the family competition. Robbie is all too willing to volunteer since he didn’t hate Skylar on the spot — quite the opposite. It’s his interest in Skylar that has him not only agreeing to travel out of state during hockey playoffs to be her partner, but also acting as her fake boyfriend to willingly help make the man she loves jealous.
The Page Stakes — an annual unhinged competition that was created to celebrate the marriage of Skylar’s mom and stepdad and their families combining — is my own personal nightmare. It takes holiday-5k families and makes them look completely normal, lazy even.
The events in the Page Stakes range from blind folded capture the flag to real-life rock climbing — not the indoor, padded wall variety. This family is beyond competitive.
Lovable Characters and Epic Banter
These characters are so much fun. Skylar loves a good planner, is specific about ink color and rereads her plans to feel soothed. Highly relatable for all the girlies who love the office supply section of a big box store.
She also has no idea how beautiful she is, seeing as she grew up surrounded by boys and sports, and was never seen as a girlie girl.
Robbie might be a womanizer, but he’s also a golden retriever with a protective nature and an unflinchingly honest communication style. I loved him immediately.
The banter in this book really shines. Whether it’s Skylar and Robbie riffing off each other or Skylar’s parents smack-talking the competition, aka their kids, the dialogue never failed to have me giggling. One dynamic I wanted even more of was Skylar and Elton — her step-brother. While they aren’t blood-related, they were raised as siblings, and they have the lovingly cruel banter down to an art.
If there’s one takeaway from Pitcher Perfect, it’s that Tessa Bailey writes quick-witted dialogue at a high level.
A Series You Can Easily Jump Into
It’s not often that I read dual point of view romance told from 3rd perspective, but in this case, I enjoyed the feeling of an omniscient narrator guiding us through Skylar and Robbie’s love story.
This was my first Tessa Bailey novel, and while I didn’t read the prior books in this series of interconnected standalones, I didn’t feel like I was missing an integral part of the story. It seems you can jump right in regardless of publication order, and I’ll definitely be going back and checking out the others.
About Tessa Bailey:
Photo Credit: Nisha Ver Helen
New York Times Bestselling author Tessa Bailey can solve all problems except for her own, so she focuses those efforts on stubborn, fictional blue-collar men and loyal, lovable heroines. She lives on Long Island, avoiding the sun and social interactions, then wonders why no one has called. Dubbed the “Michelangelo of dirty talk” by Entertainment Weekly, Tessa writes with spice, spirit, swoon and a guaranteed happily ever after. Catch her on TikTok at @authortessabailey or check out tessabailey.com for a complete list of books.
