Rumor Has It

Lemmon delivers purely delicious fun in this lighthearted contemporary, the fourth in her True Love series (after Man Candy). After ex-NFL bad boy Barrett Fox loses his sportscasting job for calling a female referee a few unprintable names, he’s desperate to get it back. Catarina Everhart, a relationship columnist for a paper in Barrett’s home town of Columbus, Ohio, is assigned by her unscrupulous editor to pretend to date Barrett, write dishy pieces about him, and rehabilitate his image while getting lots of clicks that lead to lots of ad dollars. Catarina (amusingly a self-proclaimed writer of “fluff”) is incensed by the assignment at first, but she begins to fall for Barrett and the vulnerable side he rarely shows. Barrett is often unpleasant and abrasive in the beginning of the book—puffing on a cigar in a no-smoking restaurant and grabbing a restaurant hostess’s rear end—but Lemmon humanizes him with his shyness around his dyslexia, caring for his wastrel brother and young nephew, and willingness to make genuine apologies. After Catarina’s editor betrays them both, driving a sharp wedge through their relationship, they have to decide whether there’s more to it than a mutual career opportunity. Readers who stick with Barrett will grow to love him by the end of the story, and Catarina is a feisty heroine who isn’t afraid to own up to her feelings. Hot interludes and a Cinderella-worthy ending ensure this story will capture hearts. (May)