AND THE CROWD WENT WILD

The 11th book in the Chicago Stars series features a second-chance romance between a down-on-her-luck actress and an NFL quarterback.

After suffering through a divorce and a miscarriage, actress Dancy Flynn decides to reclaim her place in the spotlight by appearing at a ritzy Chicago gala. When her ex-husband appears with his newly pregnant fiancée, Dancy panics and creates a drunken, humiliating spectacle of herself. Mortified, she impulsively flees to the Wisconsin home of her high school ex-boyfriend, Clint Garrett, now the quarterback of the Chicago Stars, whose address she finds on her phone right before the battery dies. Clint has avoided the press ever since his girlfriend was found murdered in his home five years earlier, and the last thing he needs is a celebrity trying to hide out on his property. Clint can’t help but pity Dancy’s pathetic state, though, and he agrees to let her stay for a week in the refurbished caboose he keeps on the property. Dancy’s arc consumes most of the novel, with very little time spent developing Clint as a fully rounded character in his own right. A series of unconnected events—Dancy rescues a dog abandoned on the side of the road, saves a woman from an abusive man in the grocery store parking lot, and finally tells Clint the truth about the events that led to their breakup—helps her recognize that she’s stronger than she thinks. Phillips introduces a host of complications into the slow-burn romance between Clint and Dancy; unfortunately, they leave the romance feeling scattered and unfocused rather than interesting and complex. The repeating plot elements and character types from earlier books in the Chicago Stars series make the romance feel a little stale, even warmed-over.

Too much of a hodgepodge to feel interesting or vitally new.