An Ali Review: Lucky by Garrett Leigh

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

Dominic Ramos is a Premiership football player with a secret. There are no trophies for being gay in his game. Locked into his rep as the meanest defender on the pitch, keeping his secret is soul-crushing, but love has no place in his sport, even if his soft heart craves it.

Lucky Coleman is on his knees when he meets a man with more money than sense. It’s a Grindr hook-up for cash, not a love match, but dreaming of his desperate, kind eyes earns a place amongst his numerous bad habits.

Meeting once was risky, twice pushes Dom’s courage to the limit. Losing Lucky seems inevitable, but his tight grip on his image counts for nothing when Lucky starts to fall.

Catching him could cost Dom everything, but if he can set his heart free, getting Lucky long term might be a risk worth taking.

This was a classic Garrett Leigh book.  It was everything I love about her stories.  She’s the queen of taking guys who are at rock bottom in their lives and somehow turning things around for them and giving them a beautiful happily ever after.  This book was no exception.

When we meet these two they are in bad shape.  Dom is a professional football player so he has a good career and money but he is isolated and lonely and drowning in self hate and grief.  He’s in such a bad place he can’t even imagine something better.  Lucky is basically homeless and struggling to eat and find some where safe to sleep.  He’s trying to find a job and he has one friend but he’s turned to Grindr hook-ups for cash when he meets Dom.  And while his issues are different, Lucky also doesn’t have much hope for a better life.

Despite having very serious topics, this wasn’t especially angsty.  There were some ups and some downs but it all felt realistic and necessary. There was an Easter egg from one of this author’s other books and a set up for the next book in this series, both of which I enjoyed.  Overall, I enjoyed this a lot and think it was another really enjoyable story by Leigh.