Which is superior- Tennis or Pickleball?
And how do two people on opposite sides of this debate learn to get along? (Answer: mostly due to a meddlesome Grandma and a combined disdain for a mega tennis club that is trying to buy out theirs.)

I learned more than I thought about both sports without it being about the sports. The audio was good and kept me wanting to find out how it all worked it out.

It is Bex's mission to save her pickleball club and there is a pickleball tournament that just might be the answer she only needs to find a partner. Then walks in Nikolause Karras, a hothead tennis player on break from a blowup match. If only he wasn't so insufferable.

The opening scene with enemies chemistry ✔️. The slowburn sizzling chemistry before they confessed ✔️. The fire connection once they accept defeat to their feelings ✔️.

This book had everything a rom com needs. Their sexy banter was so much fun, but man, that breakup that came out of nowhere and then the competition that never was...it just didn't stick the landing for me in the end.

I still recommend it, though. Maybe some readers won't be so bothered by that chapter.

2.5 stars, rounded up to 3.

I went into this story with high expectations, especially given the pickleball and small business setting combined with grief from losing a parent.

However, I ended up DNFing it at 76%.

Props to the narrator of the audiobook who makes this story interesting as I’m not sure I would have enjoyed reading this as a physical copy.

For me, the banter and the instant attraction did not work and Nico was quite flat as a character. My favourites were the older supporting characters, who made the story quite fun.

Overall, if you are looking for a quick sports romance, it could be interesting.

3.5 Rounded up - I thought this was a cute romance with some grief plot sprinkled throughout. I did not understand the insta-obsession but I enjoyed it nonetheless. It was also spicy!

3.5 Stars rounded up!!

"But you gotta embrace the risk of losing if you want to win. And I think we can win this one, Princess. I think we can win it all.”

This was a lovely dislike-to-friends-to-lovers read. It sounds tropey when you realise it is also fake dating, teammates, and found family, however, it's blended very well and doesn't seem like a lot at all when enjoying the story! The plot and romance are a lot of fun, as well as being super sweet.

Bex is a passionate yet struggling small business owner of her family's racquet club, having inherited the business when her mum passed (check triggers - cancer) before the events of the book. She is juggling and dealing with a lot when ex-tennis pro Niko starts using her club while rehabilitating from not only a career-defining injury, but also a on-court hot head reputation. Everything gets deliciously messy and beautiful from there!

Kate Spencer blended a beautiful, fun and spicy story to make All's Fair in Love and Pickleball. It made for a great read, which I would recommend to any contemporary romance reader. The only reasons for not giving it a higher rating are that I felt that Bex's inner monologue was a bit repetitive at times, which could have been trimmed to get to the point more quickly. As I said, I still recommend, especially the audiobook, as the narration was fabulous!

What to expect:
- Small Business Owner FMC
- Ex-Pro Tennis Player Love Interest
- Fake Dating
- Dislike-to-Friends-to-Lovers
- Grumpy x Sunshine
- Teammates
- Processing Grief & Trauma Healing
- Single POV

All's Fair in Love & Pickleball
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
I absolutely 💯 Loved this fun relaxing LOL book. The Audio was really good. It is a great Beach read. Besure to crab it for your travels! Thank U NetGalley!

I can honestly say this was my first pickleball romance and I was here for it! In All’s Fair in Love and Pickleball, Bex Martin has to team up with Nickolaus Karras, a notoriously prickly former top tennis star, to save the pickleball club her mother left to her.

This was a cute, quick read! I liked the pickleball angle and thought the older members of the club were the best side characters for this romance. Bex was a sweet FMC and I loved her tenacity and creativity, especially in her handmade clothes! I enjoyed the fake dating aspect of the romance and was just starting to really settle into their story when the third act conflict kind of blind sided me. I actually had to rewind the audiobook to make sure I hadn’t missed something. I did love the ending and the way everything came together for Bex and Niko though!

Thank you to Net Galley and Hachette Audio for the audio book ARC copy! If you're a fan of Fangirl Down by Tessa Bailey, sports romance, or found family trope; then you will love this one! Thoroughly enjoyed it as an audio book.

Good Reads Review:
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/220175427-all-s-fair-in-love-and-pickleball

All’s Fair in Love and Pickleball was such a cute audiobook. I devoured it in a day & it helped me out of my reading slump!
Grumpy/Sunshine is always a hit for me. The banter was so good & made me laugh out loud many times throughout the story. The romance seemed to happen a little quickly for me, but I still had a good time.

Mia Hutchinson Shaw‘s made it enjoyable (narrator’s can make or break a book for me). Her voice was easy to listen to and distinguish characters. I would love to listen to more from her!

Since my work has a pickleball league, I knew I had to get this ALC! I thought this book would be cute but it turned out to be SPICY.

This book has so many elements I enjoy: enemies to lovers; senior citizen side characters (my absolute favorite); sports action. The ending is incredibly satisfying.

Thank you Hachette Audio and NetGalley for the complimentary ALC of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

Bex and Nico unexpectedly for both join forces in a pickleball tournament as well as pretend to be a couple. As they spend a lot of time together they get to come in terms with their past and heal their souls.

I enjoy reading romcoms like this one - main characters with heavy past work together on common goal which helps them to find their own peace and build something new. A cute dialogues and some senior citizens help to lighten up mood between some heavy topics.

Mia Hutchinson Shaw is an amazing narrator she brought these characters up to live, conveyed their emotions and more.

Thank you to NetGalley and Hachette Audio for this ALC. This was a wonderful summer listen! Now that she has passed, Bex is struggling to run her mother’s racquet club and make it into the profitable business she needs it to be. Then along comes Niko, a professional tennis player trying to get back into the spotlight. Their competitiveness and grumpy/sunshine dynamic was so charming that I breezed right through this.

3.75 ⭐️ (rounded up for NetGalley)

This was a cute + fun read! (Or in my case, listen)

I really loved their banter & chemistry. However, their 3rd act breakup felt sooo unnecessary to me and definitely was part of the reason I rated it the way I did.

Loved the found family in this 🥹🫶🏼

I did feel like the narrators voice fit Bex in my head which made this easy to listen to!

Thank you to NetGalley + Hachette Audio for the Arc🤗

(3.75/5 stars)

All's Fair in Love and Pickleball is a fun and steamy contemporary sports romance by Kate Spencer.

Bex will do anything she can to save her family's racquet club after her mother's death. Unfortunately, many of the courts need costly repairs and she's not sure where she'll find the funds. One of her regulars happens to have a nephew who is a former tennis champion who suffered a career-ending injury. Perhaps, if they team-up to enter a pickleball competition, she can use the cash prize to fix everything up. And if everyone already thinks their dating, they may as well pretend.

I had a fun time listening to this audiobook! It was easy to tell that the narrator had a lot of fun reading this one.

The banter between our romantic couple was pretty great and I absolutely bought their chemistry. Even before they truly got together, he started calling her "princess," which I always enjoy. The steamy scenes were fantastic, but I do wish that we had gotten Niko's POV along with Bex's. I especially loved seeing a neurodivergent heroine--she has ADHD and I love seeing people like me in books! There was a lovely found family element as well with the patrons at her racquetball club.

Overall I liked the pacing of the book and inhaled it in a day. I didn't know much about pickleball going in aside from reading one other pickleball romance previously. I never felt lost and that could be partly because Bex teaches Niko the game since it's very different than tennis.

There is a bad guy in this story and he is both a little too mustache-twirling, but also a little too absent, which came across oddly to me. But the biggest disappointment for me in this book was the third-act breakup, a trope I generally despise but felt especially egregious and unnecessary here. It really felt shoe-horned in.

That said, I think this is a great beach read or palate cleanser between heavier books. This was my first book by the author, but I'll definitely be picking up more from her!

the only good thing for this book is the wlw side couple, bex's grief for her mother, and bex wants to keeps her racquet club despite that the said club will be on sale.

the rest... a literal snoozefest (or more like cringefest)

the audiobook however, i'm actually enjoyed by this. aside from her narration, i like her tiny sounds she's making.

The banter between the mains is very cute, however the mmc being so quick to anger is a legit red flag for me and I don't see how the fmc wanted to pursue him.
My favorite characters were honestly Deb and Loretta I thought they were so funny and I love an older character still being out and about and doing shenanigans.

This was such a cute book. The last one I read of Kate Spencer‘s books I love to and I can’t wait to read another one of hers. I love a little cute romcom sports romance. Bex and Nico were super cute and I love the way bex continues to want to keep the Pickleball courts open to celebrate her mom.

2.75 stars rounded up

All's Fair in Love and Pickleball is a cute read if you're looking for a sentimental and steamy companion for your new favorite past time- but only if you're okay with a frustrating FMC.

This book focuses on a rival/dislike to lovers AND fake dating dynamic that was a lot of fun to read. The yearning between our two main characters was HOT and the back and forth only added to the tension. I absolutely loved the supporting cast of senior citizens and all their varying personalities. The narrator did a great job and really diversifying all the voices and giving each character their own persona. I think our FMC's exploration of grief was well done and I appreciated how it informed some of her decision making and the conflict surrounding her club.

However, I found the FMC absolutely enraging. As much as I liked her tension and felt a lot of empathy for her in her grief, she was so willfully obtuse. So many of the conflicts were genuinely because she made bad decisions or didn't listen to advice or even just use her brain cells!! The end conflict pissed me off so badly that I genuinely considered DNFing at 91% even though I had enjoyed a majority of the plot up until that point.

I see how some people would really enjoy this book but unfortunately it just wasn't meant for me. Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for an advanced look at this audiobook. All opinions are my own.

All's Fair in Love and Pickleball by Kate Spencer is exactly the book that I thought it would be . . . a cute "enemies to lovers" rom-com with a predictable ending. You've read this book before a hundred times. But if a cozy-style plot is your thing, then All's Fair in Love and Pickleball is your perfect read.

The book centers around Bex (who owns a tennis/pickleball club) and Niko, a tennis pro. Niko is in town to help a family member recover from an accident, but he needs to train for an upcoming tennis tournament. Bex is a pickleball trainer and is trying to keep her struggling club afloat. It's a good thing that Niko can practice at Bex's club. However, if you don't already know, tension between pickleball and tennis can be intense (a tennis player actually told me over the weekend that pickleball isn't a real sport).

While there are absolutely no surprises, this is a cute, light-hearted book with some NSFW scenes. You do not need to know a thing about pickleball to enjoy the story. I actually would haven't preferred more pickleball lingo, but that's just me (and my small pickleball addiction).

I listened to the audiobook and the narrator did a great job of bringing the story to life.

Thank you NetGalley for the audiobook!
I love pickleball so I was excited to read a romcom with that as a main element.
The characters were super cute and had insane chemistry, so I was hooked from the beginning. I loved the narrator, I think she did an amazing job.
There are some heavier topics in the book like grief and finding yourself after tragedy, and the author did a really good job portraying the feelings and emotions as they navigated through it.
Overall it was a cute book and would recommend to anyone who enjoyed rom coms.