Ten years after graduation, Jake "the jock" Campbell and Brandon "the nerd" Bartlett are teaching at their old high school and still living in separate worlds. When Brandon is thrown into a coaching job on Jake's baseball team, they find themselves learning more about each other than they'd ever expected. High school is all about image - even for the teachers. Brandon and Jake have to get past their preconceived notions to find the friendship needed to work together. And somewhere along the way, they discover that perceptions can always change for the better. Read a full chapter excerpt at www.dreamspinnerpress.com

2008-02-06 Too sloppy...

This is the usual "jock" falls for the "nerd" story. I'm very fond of those, maybe it's something to do with She's All That but I find the theme both charming and alluring (if done right). Now I'm a sports nut, meaning I like my football, hockey, basketball etc. Hell I can even stomach American football. But baseball is the one sport that makes me roll my eyes (Jesus it's rounders). So the fact this book was heavily surrounded by the theme of baseball, literally bored me to tears.

So the story is about two teachers, both teaching at the high school they attended as students. Jake was the "jock" and Brandon was the so-called "nerd". One good things the authors did do, was they didn't make Brandon out to be the skinny geek. Throughout the story, the authors made sure they mentioned that Brandon was just as manly as Jake (in regards to physical shape). So they got a point there.

However, the story started off very slowly and it didn't help when the story was filled with typos either. Concentration is not spelled with an "s" and for is not spelled "fir". The publisher is small, but as a business you cannot get away with obvious mistakes. As a paying customer, I do not want to see your editors sloppy mistakes. If these editors are working for free, you need to buckle up and pay someone whose job is along those lines. Run a business, like a business.

The story in itself wasn't so bad, once the characters starting merging together. Brandon and Jake together were cute, but the writing was very fan-fiction like. Both men didn't really have any arguments or anything angst worthy, but I can forgive because their relationship was something like 7 weeks (so really how much can you argue?). In the end was book was alright, the typos annoyed me, and the story was decent enough. But if I were given the chance, I'd return the book. It was still very under-par in both writing and characterisation.

However the characters of Troy (Jake's best friend) and Jonathan (assistant coach) were both very adorable. If the authors ever want to write a story about these two, I'd be more than happy to read it. As long as they structure their story more, polish up their plot and stop being cheesy. Though the authors claim that these two guys are "straight" - I don't know, but these two scream queer to me.

Since amazon has listed the publisher "unknown" the publisher is Dreamspinner Press.