A Premier League football star must defend his roster spot—and his heart—when a threateningly talented and handsome midfielder joins his team in this utterly charming debut romance, a profound love letter to the world’s most popular sport. Oliver Harris is football royalty in London. Ordinarily the star of the Camden Roses is calm, cool, and collected, keeping his club relevant with his prowess in the midfield and his mighty left foot. But this season, the threats abound: There’s Camden’s management to contend with—complete with a prickly new Dutch coach, eager for better results—and a midseason injury, which sidelines him when his team needs him most. When a recruit is called up to fill in, Oliver fears he’ll be replaced. If he can mentor this younger talent, then they might just have a chance at winning, together. After a string of lackluster performances in his native Spain, Leonardo Davies-Villanueva is looking for one last shot with the club he always dreamed of, where he once played in the youth academy. Oliver immediately finds confident, eager Leo irritating. He can barely go through the motions, let alone coach him, without outright hostility. When he comes to admire Leo’s skill and warms to his humor and energy, though, he begins to see Leo as a friend—and then, to his mounting horror, as something more. Leo craves Oliver’s attention and partnership; Oliver can’t afford to fall in love with his teammate. He’s always kept a tight lid on his sexuality in a league that’s never had a player come out. As the season heats up, a lot more than football hangs in the balance. Can Oliver—and Leo—win when it counts most? “An exuberant heart-squeeze of a book . . . Two Left Feet is the kind of joyful, hopeful story the romance genre was made for.”—Rachel Lynn Solomon, author of What Happens in Amsterdam “An exuberant heart-squeeze of a book . . . Kallie Emblidge writes with tremendous wit and empathy. Every character feels three-dimensional, the setting wholly immersive—both on and off the field. Two Left Feet is the kind of joyous, hopeful story the romance genre was made for.” —Rachel Lynn Solomon, New York Times bestselling author of What Happens in Amsterdam “A fantastic, sharp, and witty debut . . . Two Left Feet is not one to miss!” —Hannah Bonam-Young, New York Times bestselling author of People Watching Kallie Emblidge works for The Washington Post and is a co-chair of the paper's union. She lives and writes in New York City. Two Left Feet is her first novel, but she's been a football fan forever. Sunday, January 1, 2017: West Bromwich Albion at Camden Matchday 19 Blink and you’d miss it—­a whoosh and then a sickening thunk . And there he is: suddenly and involuntarily sprawled at the base of the freezing stairs, clutching his upper leg, pain radiating down to his toes. Oliver Harris is beginning to suspect that 2017 might not be his year. “Ah, Christ, ” someone, probably Garcia, shouts from behind him. The remainder of the squad follows suit, bellowing and cursing as they converge in a protective ring around Oliver’s prone form. He feels as if he’s looking up at the chief mourners from his own grave. It falls to Anthony Moss, center back and team captain, to make sense of the chaos. It always does. He assumes a crouch beside Oliver, stern in the face. “Easy, lad, sit up now. What did you do?” “Careful, it’s slippery,” Oliver jokes weakly, before he’s hit with another queasy wave of pain. “Oh f***, that hurts.” He scrabbles his way to sitting, but finds it impossible to shift his left leg, his good leg, at all. “We’re getting Sebastian and Willem,” Anthony says. “You stupid bastard.” His tone brooks no argument, even if Oliver were inclined to disagree with the assessment. He nods resignedly, trying to regulate his labored breathing as it puffs into clouds in the cold air. Anthony motions the rest of the men out into the stadium so only the two of them are left in the mouth of the tunnel. The squad can’t wait for a diagnosis; there’s a match to start, though Oliver won’t be playing in it. The massive lights of Regent Road cut through the rain, streaming over the crowd, across the pitch, and down the tunnel to the changing room, a beacon for forty thousand witnesses to Oliver’s private despair. The sheen of the damp grass paired with the guttural roar of the crowd can make a man larger than he really is. Oliver doesn’t believe in magic, yet he can’t deny he’s felt the air in the stadium fill his lungs with something more than oxygen. Now the familiar surge of adrenaline has turned poisonously inward, flooding his veins with anxiety and a stabbing in his hamstring. He lets his head fall back again as the medics swoop in to stretcher him away. Hours later, he’s still horizontal and he’s still not alone, on a cot in Anna’s office at the training grounds, Camden Crossing. It’s only ten minutes in the car, with traffic, between Regent Road and here, but the small c