"When Did You Get Hot" by Sabrina Carpenter
This is the song of the book for me…it’s PERFECT for the best friend's little brother trope! The shock of suddenly seeing someone you've known forever in a completely different light matches Harriet's realization about Gale. The playful disbelief and attraction in this song nails that "wait, hold up, when did this happen?" moment.
"Dimple" by BTS
This flirty, playful track about being completely captivated by someone's charm (especially their dimples and smile) captures the lighthearted yet intense attraction. The teasing energy matches Gale's knowing smirks that threaten to short-circuit Harriet's system, and the song's playful confidence mirrors his, ahem, willing cooperation.
"Bad At Love" by Halsey
This track about self-sabotaging relationships and not trusting your own judgment in love parallels Harriet trying to fight against what The E.M.M.A. (and her heart) are telling her. The tension between wanting control but repeatedly making the "wrong" choices mirrors her sending Gale on dates with other people while denying their obvious chemistry.
"Sparks Fly" by Taylor Swift
The electric chemistry and tension of wanting someone you shouldn't ("Drop everything now, meet me in the pouring rain") mirrors Harriet's struggle with her forbidden attraction. The push and pull of trying to resist but being magnetically drawn in captures their dynamic during those definitely-not-professional training sessions.
"Fallin' All In You" by Shawn Mendes
This song about unexpectedly falling for someone who was always there captures the friends-to-lovers realization perfectly. The lyrics about sunrise and new beginnings parallel how The E.M.M.A.'s calculations reveal what was hiding in plain sight - that they were meant to be together all along.
A Spicy STEM Romance of Sports, Artificial Intelligence, and a Forbidden Best-Friend's-Brother Love Story
Jane Austen meets Ali Hazelwood in this steamy, friends-to-lovers, STEM rom-com! He’s her best friend’s little brother and NHL forward. She’s a computer scientist used to being in control. The E.M.M.A., her elite AI training program, claims optimizing his performance requires one thing: the perfect match. According to its calculations, that’s her… Will Harriet discover that The E.M.M.A. knows best?
Harriet Smythe’s AI was supposed to create sports legends—not encourage her crush on her best friend’s totally off-limits, hot younger brother. But when funding runs dry, she has no choice but to enlist Gale Knight as her test subject. The same Gale she’s been secretly crushing on for years. The player who follows her every instruction with a knowing smirk that threatens to short-circuit her carefully maintained system.
Everything changes when The E.M.M.A. determines that finding Gale’s perfect match is essential to his peak performance. Even worse? According to its data, that match is Harriet.
Determined to keep things professional, Harriet makes it search for new candidates. But as Gale dutifully endures awkward outings with pop stars and athletes, the chemistry between them only intensifies. And his willing cooperation during their sessions definitely isn’t helping her stay focused.
With her deadline approaching and The E.M.M.A. still playing cupid, Harriet must choose: trust in pure logic, or admit that sometimes taking control means letting go.
Maybe The E.M.M.A. knows something they don’t—even if they’re not ready to compute it yet.
Romance Sports | Romance Comedy [ HarperCollins, On Sale: December 2, 2025, Paperback / e-Book, ISBN: 9780063412361 / eISBN: 9780063412378 ]
After studying at the University of Montana-Missoula, Lia Riley scoured the world armed only with a backpack, overconfidence and a terrible sense of direction. When not torturing heroes (because c'mon, who doesn't love a good tortured hero?), Lia herds unruly chickens, camps, beach combs, daydreams about as-of-yet unwritten books, wades through a mile-high TBR pile and schemes yet another trip. She and her family live mostly in Northern California.
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