Right of First Refusal by Dahlia Adler

Title: Right of First Refusal (Radleigh University #2)

Author: Dahlia Adler

Publisher: Self-Published

Release Date: March 15, 2016

Source: Purchased

Buy the Book: Amazon / B&N / Indigo

On the lacrosse field, Cait Johannssen gets what she wants. Off the field is another story. Because what she wants is the school’s hot new basketball student-coach, Lawrence Mason, who also happens to be the guy who broke her heart in sports camp two years earlier. 

But it’s Cait’s new roommate who’s got him.

Cait and Mase agree it’s best to keep their past a secret, but she doesn’t expect him to completely ignore their history…or how much it’ll hurt when he does. So when a friend on the basketball team asks her to pose as his girlfriend for a night, Cait can’t turn down the opportunity for distraction. (Okay, and a little spite.) But what starts as an evening of fun turns into a fake relationship with more lies than the usually drama-free Cait can handle, and it’s only keeping her from the one truth that’s nagged at her for years: Why did Mase cut her out of his life to begin with?

And is it really too late to get him back?

Dahlia Adler’s Last Will and Testament was one of my favourite books of 2014 and today is still one of my all-time favourite books. I have basically been dying for more Radleigh University books since the moment I finished it. So when Right of First Refusal landed on my Kindle, I dropped everything to read it right away. And of course, I loved it.

When it comes to lacrosse, Cait knows exactly who she is and what she wants. And she knows exactly what to do to get it. Her personal life is a whole other story. Especially when she meets her new roommate and discovers that said roommate’s boyfriend is the boy she fell in love with and who broke her heart at sports camp years earlier. And apparently Cait’s not as over it as she thought. Yeah, that’s not awkward at all. What started out as Cait looking for a distraction from all the drama in her life, somehow turns into pretending to be a friend’s girlfriend and navigating a complicated web of lies. But no matter how much she tries to put him out her mind and move on, Cait soon realizes that she’s not over Mase and she’s ready to get him back.

I was so beyond excited when I woke up on Tuesday and Right of First Refusal was on my Kindle. I feel like I have been waiting for this book for forever and I was so freaking excited to finally be able to read it. So of course I jumped in right away. Well, as much as I could considering I was working that day. But any moment I wasn’t working, I was reading Right of First Refusal. And needless to say that I absolutely ADORED this book. I mean, it’s written by one of my go-to authors, it has a strong sports theme, it’s a second chance romance, and there’s awesome female friendship. What is there not to love about all that? For real, though, this story was fantastic for so many reasons and I could go on all day about how much I loved it. The thing Dahlia Adler does best is write all kinds of relationships that feel completely real. And there were so many great ones in this story. There was the friendships between Cait, Lizzie and Frankie that made me wish I could be part of their trio (which I guess would make us a foursome, but I digress). The camaraderie between Cait and all her teammates on the lacrosse team. The complicated dynamics of Cait’s relationship with her father as he’s starting a new part of his life. Cait’s tricky relationship with her new roommate. Even Cait’s relationship with lacrosse, the sport that got her through the toughest parts of her life. All those relationship felt so real and complex, and the way they were all woven together added so much to the story. But the most important of all was the whole “you-were-my-first-love-until-you-broke-my-heart-and-now-you’re-my-new-roommate’s-boyfriend” situation between Cait and Mase. To say it was complicated would be an understatement. But it made for a compelling read, that’s for sure.

Let me just start off by saying (well, repeating, actually) that I want to be best friends with Cait, Lizzie and Frankie. Their friendship and their love for each other completely leaps off the page and makes me want so badly to be a part of it. On the surface, the three of them don’t really look like they have much in common, but that doesn’t really matter to them and that’s what makes their friendship so great. They love each other and are always ready to be there for each other, no questions asked and without judgement. At its core, Right of First Refusal may be a romance, but Dahlia Adler does a fantastic job also making this a story about friendship. Speaking of the romance, it was also pretty freaking great. I’m a sucker for any kind of second chance romance and that’s exactly what I got here. It was interesting seeing Cait work through everything as she was trying to figure out her feelings about Mase while also coming to terms with who she was herself. Her confusion over her feelings felt real and made her story that much more of a compelling read. And I could more than understand why she wanted to be with Mase because she made him sound pretty great. I loved getting to see the different sides of his personality, the way he would go from being hard and closed-off to the way he would be with the kids he coached basketball. It’s really no wonder that Cait fell for him. Twice. I mean, I had totally fallen for him by the time I got to the end of the story. Which speaking of the end of the story, can I just have Frankie and Samara’s story now? Because I really, absolutely cannot wait to read it in Out on Good Behavior.

If you made it through this ramble-y mess, I love you. Almost, but not quite as much I loved Dahlia Adler’s Right of First Refusal. I could keep going on all day about everything I loved about this story. But I won’t. Go read it and find out for yourself just how awesome it is. While you do that, I’ll be right here counting down the days until I can read Out on Good Behavior.