Week 6 Review: Deep End

From Goodreads:

A competitive diver and an ace swimmer jump into forbidden waters in this steamy college romance from the New York Times bestselling author of The Love Hypothesis.

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...

My Review:
This was another fantastic read! I love Ali Hazelwood's books, and this latest romance, while being sports focused which isn't really my thing, was pretty great, and of course they are college students in the STEM field, so it wasn't a completely different set up.

One thing about Ali Hazelwood books, is that the guy always falls first. And it's typically pretty obvious from the outside, that this guy who the narrative has built up to be a guy that someone would want to be with, is obsessed with the girl. Which is always a really fun dynamic, so I'm down to read it any time! 

Scarlett is pretty interesting to read about-she's kinda crumbling under the weight of all that she has on her plate, from going to med school, while also dealing with the injury that sidelined her swimming career, and how she hasn't been able to perform that move that injured her since the injury even though it's healed. That this is the first time that she's really hit a roadblock in life, yeah, that was a bundle of anxieties! 

I really enjoyed their dynamic. He's her captain's ex, said captain, who said it'd be a good idea if they got together, since their complementary interests in BDSM. Which is pretty funny, because it actually is an interesting idea, and it turns out that they do fit together really well, it's just complicated by the fact that he is the captain's ex, oh, and they haven't told anyone about the breakup yet. SO that was a lot of fun to read! 

Absolutely loved reading this book and I can't wait to read more by Ali Hazelwood! 

Author: Ali Hazelwood  
Read: February 5th, 2025 
Source: Bought 
Reason Why: Love her writing and it sounded really good, and it's a SAC 2025 Book and a WoW Book! 
Publisher: Berkley 
Published: February 4th 2025

5/5 Hearts

5/5 Books

5/5 Stars