READING: The Foxhole Court (All for the Game #1) by Nora Sakavic

Publication date: January 15 2013
Published by: Nora Sakavic
Genre: Contemporary, Advertised as YA BUT IT'S NOT!, Adult, Sports, College
Rating:

Neil Josten is the newest addition to the Palmetto State University Exy team. He's short, he's fast, he's got a ton of potential—and he's the runaway son of the murderous crime lord known as The Butcher.

Signing a contract with the PSU Foxes is the last thing a guy like Neil should do. The team is high profile and he doesn't need sports crews broadcasting pictures of his face around the nation. His lies will hold up only so long under this kind of scrutiny and the truth will get him killed.

But Neil's not the only one with secrets on the team. One of Neil's new teammates is a friend from his old life, and Neil can't walk away from him a second time. Neil has survived the last eight years by running. Maybe he's finally found someone and something worth fighting for.

I didn't like this book 😕 I found it weird and off-putting.

Let's go through the GOOD parts first: I found the story interesting enough to offset the bad parts, and what ultimately made me continue reading. I liked Neil's background story in particular, with all his history of abuse and very dark past (I'm a sucker for a tormented soul, what can I do?) I found his difficulty to trust people and his struggle for survival genuine and well presented through his POV. A lot of readers were put off by mafia stuff being thrown in an NA sports book, but it didn't really bother me. I guess when you put it in actual words it does sound ridiculous but trust me, that was the least of this book's problem!

And now the BAD: the characters. All of them! They were impossible to like. Nicky, Andrew, Aaron and Seth in particular. Not that everyone else was great and they stood out, they were all bad. But those four really took the cake.
Where do I begin? The casual jokes about rape? The roofying? The obvious threats to someone's life? The constant mocking and derogatory comments? The homophobic slurs? ... among others. I don't like to use the word "psychotic" because psychosis is actually a serious mental illness. These guys were, simply put, major assholes. Freaking spoiled brats who happen to play a sport, and they think they're all that. Ugh, I hated them so much. I found no redeeming quality in any of them. They were all scum, and I can't think of a reason other readers might like them. It doesn't matter to me if their behaviours are going to be explained away in the next books. I read this one, and in this one, there was no explanation and no excuses. They were just disgusting human beings-end of story. And also, I highly doubt Sakavic would find an explanation that is convincing enough. Neil had an abusive and sad past, he didn't act this way.
The team's Coach was a full-on enabler, giving them drugs and alcohol and talking to them like they were delinquents, which ok, fair enough.

I still don't know what the point of Kevin was. His story and what happened with the Ravens could get someone to read the second book (not me), but he, again, was all fake machismo and toxic masculinity. I thought that had died with Twilight and the whole NA genre, no? I guess I'm too old for this shit, because I seriously can't stand it.

I have no idea why this book is advertised and marketed as an MM romance, because it's not. There is not even a slight hint of romance in this and to be quite frank, I found it refreshing. Imagine if on top of all this verbal and physical abuse, there was a romance out of nowhere? No, thank you.

Braver people than me have read the next two books. I think I might skip them. I have no time in my life for books that bring me down, and this one was a huge bummer for all the wrong reasons.
If the second book is so miraculously amazing as the ratings seem to show, I'll just have to take your word for it. 🤷