Review by Kayleigh


Ali Hazelwood dips her toe into sports romance, but still brings the heat and STEM we know and love.
Favourite Quote:
I should tell him that I’m better, that he can let go of me, but my shoulder is in the throes of a hundred little orgasms. Which must be why I blurted out the question that has been buzzing in my head for days. “If Pen hadn’t … if you guys hadn’t broken up, would you have just gone with vanilla sex for the rest of your life?”
Book Synopsis:
Scarlett Vandermeer is swimming upstream. A Junior at Stanford and a student-athlete who specializes in platform diving, Scarlett prefers to keep her head down, concentrating on getting into med school and on recovering from the injury that almost ended her career. She has no time for relationships—at least, that’s what she tells herself.
Swim captain, world champion, all-around aquatics golden boy, Lukas Blomqvist thrives on discipline. It’s how he wins gold medals and breaks records: complete focus, with every stroke. On the surface, Lukas and Scarlett have nothing in common. Until a well-guarded secret slips out, and everything changes.
So they start an arrangement. And as the pressure leading to the Olympics heats up, so does their relationship. It was supposed to be just a temporary, mutually satisfying fling. But when staying away from Lukas becomes impossible, Scarlett realizes that her heart might be treading into dangerous water…
Review:
My heart did so many happy dances while reading Deep End. Listen, this is classic top-notch Ali Hazelwood. You get sweet, focused and tormented Scarlett and domineering Alpha Lukas. You get an entry into BDSM, and you get to zoom into competitive college sports, with a hero and a heroine who are also whip-smart.
There’s angst, there’s steam, there’s STEM and a lot of hot people doing sexy and explicit things to each other. Deep End is a fabulous ride. Lukas and Scarlett are sharp and fully-fleshed characters with growth and depth during their story. Lukas and Scarlett are still in undergrad, and are a little younger than some of Ali’s past university-set stories. She excellently captures the stress, fatigue and carousel of emotions that your senior years of college and university are like (from what I remember, it’s been a few years for me). And then, throw in a group of D1 swimmers and divers at Stanford University and you have a cesspool of gossip, drama and relationships. I loved every moment of it.
Scarlett is just recovering from an almost career-ending dive a year ago. She’s back with her team at Stanford and finds herself in the middle of the golden girl on her team breaking up with her long-term golden boy, past Olympian boyfriend from the swim team. Why? Because Lukas likes to play in the bedroom, and his girlfriend Penelope is not interested. After discovering that Scarlett also likes it kinkier in the bedroom, Pen drunkenly suggests the two of them should sleep together and get it out of their systems, but she doesn’t want anyone knowing that she and Lukas had broken up to ensure there isn’t even more drama.
You can see where this is going.
In the months after, Lukas and Scarlett start to come together and explore their passions and interests both in bed and in life. They also end up working together on a research project with a cameo from one of my favourite Ali pairings (Adam and Olive), and prep for trying to make it to the Olympics. You know, just an average year in the life of over-achieving college students. Who are both pre-med.
Ali blends sports team dynamics and a really funny group of friends and teammates that Lukas draws Scarlett into. Honestly, watching Lukas and Scarlett figure out their dynamic and watch the people around her embrace her were some of the best parts of the story.
What was one of the absolute best parts though? The intimacy between Scarlett and Lukas. Now, don’t get me wrong, there are also a lot of sexy, sexy, sexy scenes in Deep End, which I thoroughly enjoyed. However, there is such a deep well of intimacy and emotional closeness that develop between Scarlett and Lukas that is undeniably relationship goals. Lukas is such a patient, sensitive and sexy young Stern Brunch Daddy, and I love him so much.
Deep End is, in my opinion, Ali’s best book yet. Get ready to dive in; water you waiting for.
Thank you to Penguin Random House for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.