A review by amandareads666
Penalties and Proposals by Anne Kemp

3.0

This is a very short story that feels like a one shot fanfiction. With it being so short that means that everything felt a tad rushed. I don’t know that I agree on the “enemies to lovers” portion as they are only enemies for 35 seconds because they immediately jump into dating. Going in (I may have/probably missed it) I did not realize this was completely closed door romance. I don’t even think there was a single curse word! 

The characters feel very thrown together. Willa falls pretty flat and is kind of boring to the point that I didn’t really care about her a ton. Noah is better worked out and feels more of a whole character. It’s as though they wrote out a whole intricate backstory where he worked through his alcoholism and then were like “oh yeah I need a second character” and just shoved Willa together. 

I will say the bookstore scene was suuuper weird; shameless plug anyone? 

The weird not quite a miscommunication trope towards the end was…. Something else. It made me hate Willa all together. You’ve actually known this man for barely a month and you’re expecting him to just simply not do his job? “When you let go of my hand and walked away to front the media” so he was just supposed to NOT go do pressers post game?? Girl shut up  

Thankfully that didn’t last long and they made up almost immediately and everything was wrapped up nicely in a tight little bow. 

Thanks to NetGalley and Red Bird Publishing for the ARC!