I’m looking for a hot hookup with no strings attached. And I want my older brother’s best friend to step up to the plate…My dating history is lame. My experiences in bed? Even lamer. As the owner of a thriving business, I’m used to calling the shots. But one place I don’t always want to be in charge is in the bedroom.Enter Luke Rodgers. My brother’s best friend. Former major league baseball … Former major league baseball player. A guy who now hangs out on his farm, sweaty and shirtless, as he nurses a shoulder injury.
If the rumors are true, he also likes to work up a sweat behind closed doors. A total MVP in the sack.
Just the take charge guy I’m looking for.
With Luke and I, it’s game on. And it’s all good until Luke decides he wants forever, and he wants it with me.
I’m just not convinced I can trust Luke. Will he keep playing the field and break my heart? Or is he really ready to hang up his cleats for good?
SOUTHERN PLAYER is a full length, STANDALONE romance.
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This is such a great book! So well written. I absolutely love Luke and how he loves Grace. The characters are real and honest and so great! I loved the first story in the series and this one is even better.
Such a great story. Gracie and Luke are adorable together. This is a older brother’s best friend story at the heart.
Gracie has the biggest crush on Luke, her brother’s best friend. After another break up she wants to try a no-strings attached relationship to explore her desires and fantasies. Who better to do that with than with one of the city’s biggest man whores.
Luke is finally ready to settle down and the only person that he has ever thought of in that way was his best friend’s little sister, Gracie.
Will it work out for the two in the long run or are they just too different with different dreams?
This is an easy 5-star review for me… Five shooting stars. Or would it be exploding stars? Orgasmic ones, maybe?
Luke and Gracie’s story is a Southern Belle’s dream, y’all!
Gracie (Gracie Girl, baby girl…) owns Holy Roasters coffee shop and has degrees from college. Smokin’ hot “experienced” Luke is a college dropout and recovering MLB player (in more ways than one). Can they get Eli’s approval for their “plans” for one another?
The incredible writing done by Author Jessica Peterson has once again brought me to the south and embedded me into the story, just like book one in the series, Southern Charmer. The way she added the “inner thoughts” of the characters throughout this book I FREAKING LOVED, LOVED, LOVED! So perfectly included and placed and it just set you right into their minds! I loved the incredible humor, the major heat level, the storyline, the characters…ALL. OF. IT. Oh, and the fantastic lines! I have never marked so many lines in a book before…EVER!
God, I wanna show you how it’s done.
I wanna show you, sweet girl.
And then I’d wreck you. Same as you’re wrecking me right now.
The slang and the drawl and southern accents delivered into this…PERFECTION! I just honestly fell in love with Luke and his…everything…especially his zucchini and eggplants! The chemistry, banter, and already established friendship between Gracie and Luke add so much comfortable humor between them! I laughed SO hard SO many times…and now I have suddenly have a craving for grits! LOL. Plus, the way Jessica has written Olivia’s books (My Deal With The Duke) into this story is fantastic! It is such a great addition and adds to the storyline so smoothly.
Baby Girl, why you gotta make me feel this way when you’re with me?
Feel what way?
Like everything’s gonna be okay.
So many mentionable scenes…the bar, Gracie talking to Eli, Luke talking to Eli, any scene with the mamas, the bucket list, the butt stuff….I could keep going on and on…but instead, y’all should just pick up a copy and read it, but not in church, people, because Luke will have your panties melting!
I always wonder why there are only 5 star ratings on books that deserve more, and this is one of them. OH MY Luke and Gracie just soo much love for this one.
It is a friends to lovers genre and it is done so well. These 2 had known eachother for years because Luke was Gracie’s brother’s best friend. To Luke she was off limits due to it being his Best Friends little sister. Luke was soo swoon worthy and with all the talk of the guys doing their favorite things sans shirts, AWWWWWWW ((fanning self))) Yep could just picture that sooo often it should be considered pervy, Ha Ha!!!
All I can say is this was a very swoon worthy and can be read as a standalone but I do recommend you start with Southern Charmer as it is book 1 in the series. I can’t wait for the next story as I know it is going to be HOT AF!!!
After Southern Charmer’s Eli and Olivia, I couldn’t wait for Luke and Gracie. Ms. Peterson definitely delivered. The side by side story with the Regency Romance book was a fun way to see their story play out. Eli’s charm and Gracie’s cheekiness make for a fun story. Add Charleston, amusing side characters and chemistry, and it’s a great story. Eli’s cameos made the book better – I miss him! If you haven’t read Charmer, start there.
4.5 “Baby Girl” Stars
*sigh* My face hurts from smiling so much. My stomach hurts from laughing too much. My heart is a swoony mess. This book hit all right spots. I’m giddy as heck and can’t stop all these good feelings. I loved, loved, loved this book.
I don’t want to give plot spoilers away, but I will say this story hit me in all the feels. I didn’t know what to expect, but I was pleasantly surprised. I didn’t want to put this book down, actually, I couldn’t put this book down that’s just how immersed in this story I was. So, so good.
If there’s one thing I root for more than anything is when a heroine knows what she wants and isn’t afraid to to go for it, or ask for it. Gracie put her reservations aside and did just that, and the end result was so freaking worth it. I loved her tenacity and spunk and especially her fierceness. I was like “you go girl!” And boy did she go, and she got it.
Luke, Luke, Luke holy goodness I just couldn’t with him. *bites fist* he was everything delicious. I was swept away by this larger than life man. There was so much more to this happy-go-lucky and funny guy. There were layers to him, and when they were peeled back, oh boy it was something else. My gosh, I loved him to pieces.
Luke and Gracie were everything. They had me swooning nonstop. Their chemistry was off the charts. They were so freaking hot, hot, hot together. Scorching, sizzling, oh so tantalizingly good. They weren’t afraid to be who they were with the other. Their trust in one another made their relationship all the more better. Honestly, they were so perfect for each other. Loved them.
Southern Player was sexy and sweet. Filled with characters I adored. And of course I also loved getting bits of Eli and Olivia, I love those two so much. And if it’s not already evident from the first book, reading this book just made me want to visit Charleston, South Carolina that much more. Another ah-maz-ing read by Ms. Peterson. Definitely recommend this series.
Southern Player is a story full of banter, laughs, swoons, and self-discovery. Set in Charleston, SC- one of my favorite towns- Ms. Peterson takes you through as if you were sitting on King Street watching things unfold.
Luke and Gracie have an amazing, and super steamy, story. I really enjoyed watching their relationship grow. It was nice to get a glimpse of our other favorite Charleston Heat characters, but I feel like this can be read as a true standalone.
If you like a good foodie story mixed with a whole lot of hot, this is a story for you.
Southern Player by Jessica Peterson is simply perfection. This is the story of Gracie and Luke.
In book 1 -Southern Charmer- You got a glimpse of Luke and Gracie before they even knew there was a Luke and Gracie. Now in book 2, Southern Player is their story.
Gracie is a sassy, beautiful, independent and successful woman who just wants to meet a man who will be willing to accept and love her flaws and all. Gracie makes an offer to Luke, her older brother Eli’s BFF and OMG, what an offer. Luke is a former MLB player who retired due to an injury and now is building up his farm and working on it. Gracie makes Luke this offer that he won’t refuse . This is a story full of spice, passion, heat, drama,angst, dirty talkin, emotional feels and hot romance. Gracie and Luke’s love story is a journey that will have you glued, needing to find out what happens- will the HEA happen? How will Luke and Gracie’s journey end up?
The emotions in this book are amazing and the characters are outstanding. The plot is phenomenal. I can’t wait for book 3 in this series.
My Rating: 4.7 stars *******
Oh my stars….sweet, swoony, sexy, steamy, Southern….Grace and Luke’s story sizzles!!! Grace gets in her head about being the perfect person in relationships and it almost ruins her for finding the real thing. Luke gets in his head too as he wonders if he’s enough. I love a book that has real life advice and this one has a lot….be true to yourself, find someone who loves the real you, the importance of communication, compromise, it’s ok to ask for what you want, and so much more. This book is a real page turner….be prepared to read it cover to cover because you’re not going to want to put it down.
This is the second book in Jessica Peterson’s Charleston Heat series set in Charleston, South Carolina and is a standalone love story.
Southern Player has it all: romance, laugh out loud humor, memorable side characters and scorching heat! Gracie and Luke burn up the pages. She’s tired of losing herself in relationships, overthinking everything, trying to be who the guy wants her to be and she just wants to let loose and explore. She asks her brother’s best friend for “help” because she trusts him, she’s always been attracted to him and since he’s a known player, she doesn’t have to worry about it getting serious.
Luke shocks her by telling her he’s been crushing on her for years and asks her to consider giving serious a try! This rocks her world in more ways than one as they explore each other, work through her bedroom bucket list, dirty talk and are totally honest with each other about what they feel every step of the way.
Eli and Olivia from Southern Charmer (Charleston Heat Book 1) make appearances here, as both of them attempt to let this unfold without interfering, (yeah, right!). Passages from Olivia’s second published work, My Deal with the Duke, are juxtaposed with real life throughout the story as both Gracie and Luke find so much of themselves (as do the readers) in Olivia’s characters.
There was so much humor in this book from tractor jokes to produce to double-entendres to the internal dialogues in Luke’s and Gracie’s heads. I may never see “watermelon” the same way again! Seriously, laughed out loud every time “the mamas” showed up in the story!
Jessica has done such a great job of developing Luke and Gracie and she touches on feelings and fears we have all experienced. Am I good enough? Am I too much? What if I got it wrong? Can I be myself? Will I ache like this forever?
For all these reasons and a million more, you have GOT to read this book!!! (less)
Total standalone, but I HIGHLY recommend reading book 1, Southern Charmer, first. You’ll get a glimpse of Luke and Gracie before they even know there is a Luke & Gracie 😉
Some stories are so good they are hard to review. EVERYTHING about this one makes me smile. I haven’t been so thoroughly entertained reading a book in a while. I laughed, I cringed, I smiled so big, and yes, I fussed & stomped my foot when Luke has a dumb boy moment.
I have not highlighted SO many great lines in a story ever. Jessica Peterson’s writing is always superb – Southern Player being an excellent example. She writes feelings so well they leap off the page.
“But let me show you how I can do better than the guys who came before me. There ain’t nothin’ lukewarm about the way I feel for you, Grace.”
“I wanna be part of your liberation from bad boyfriends and bad sex.”
“…it’s about me being able to tell my truth. It’s about making myself the star of my own story”
“Aw yeah. I like where this is going”. Luke & his “aw yeah” <3
YUM! As much as I loved Eli (from Southern Charmer, Charleston Heat 1, but don’t worry they are stand alones interconnected series, reading this one first is FINE) I think I love Luke MORE. He’s just soooo dreamy! His dirty talk, YIKES, scorched my Kindle lol. The description though of that mountain of a man, a bear, with the soft melty center, thats my addiction I didn’t even know I had an this author had me mainlining it! I was feeling his whole vibe about not feeling like he fit in Gracie’s ‘world’. The best and most honorable intentions, any brother would have been proud to have his sister dating Luke. I feel like his missteps at the end only strengthened their bond in the long run. Also I loved their banter! It makes the story so much better much like laughter adds so much value to life! Really wonderful well rounded tale and I can’t wait for more from one of my favorite one click authors!
This is second in Peterson’s Charleston Heat series and although it can technically be read as a standalone, there are enough appearances from characters from the first book (i.e. El and Olivia) that it would probably be helpful to have read the first one prior (but certainly not required).
There was some serious steam in this story. The chemistry between Gracie and Luke was obvious when they interacted in Southern Charmer and that certainly carried over here. On top of that, Luke is a total southern gentleman and just absolutely smitten with Gracie which that makes him extra swoon-worthy in my opinion. Gracie was pretty kick-ass and accomplished, but had some self-confidence issues when it came to her relationships with men, thanks to some of her past experiences – something I think a lot of women can relate to.
And I’m just going to say I’m really looking forward to Julia and Greyson’s story – I just love me a good enemies-to-lovers story!!
*Advance copy provided by the author/publisher. All opinions are my own.*