The Prospects by KT Hoffman, 366 pages
In his third year playing for a minor league baseball team, Gene Ionescu is the first openly trans player in professional baseball. He's a well-regarded solid shortstop, so imagine his surprise when his team brings in Luis Estrada, a former teammate and now rival, to take over at short, shifting Gene over to second base. While the two initially can't stand to be around each other, eventually they realize that they're going to have to start communicating and working together if they're ever going to escape errors and finally turn a double play. But as they start working together, Gene and Luis realize that something more than friendship is developing between them.
This combo of enemies-to-lovers and second-chance romance works well between the two main characters, both of whom struggle with their place in baseball — Gene for the understandable challenges that come with being trans, Luis with a double whammy of debilitating anxiety and living as a closeted gay man. I love that they find solace in each other, no matter how awkwardly it plays out in the beginning stages. While the hyper-realistic baseball talk sometimes clashed in my head with the absolute fantasyland of an LGBTQ-friendly MLB, at the end of the day, it's nice to see a trans character thriving and finding love in fiction. Fans of Check, Please! will dig this one.
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