Last night, I finished reading Keeping Pace by Laurie Morrison. This sports romance novel is about Grace Eller, an overachieving thirteen-year-old girl who is disappointed after she is rejected from a summer creative writing intensive and her GPA is second place to her former friend, Jonah Perkins, for top scholar at their eighth grade graduation. With nothing planned over the summer, she writes a checklist of summer goals and signs up for the half-marathon race that Jonah is running at the end of summer. She also babysits Teddy, the son of her dad's new girlfriend, Brie, and joins a weekly creative writing class at the library. Initially, she wants to beat Jonah at the race more than anything, but when they begin training together, they reconnect and she has to decide if Jonah matters to her more than winning and success.
Reading this book was such an enjoyable experience. I absolutely adored the main characters and the romance was perfect, even if most of the book was about personal growth. I loved that Grace and Jonah went from childhood friends to rivals to friends to maybe something more. It was so sweet, especially as training for the half-marathon brought them closer. I related to both of them because I was an overachiever when I was in middle and high school. I also liked that Grace's best friend was her cousin, Avery, even though they didn't share all the same interests. I was a little nervous that they would grow apart because of Grace's ambition, but at the end of the day, they had each other's back. Another interesting part of the story was Grace's gradual realization that her dad isn't as great as she thought he was. Somehow he managed to both place a lot of pressure on her to achieve academic success and not be present as he could have been as a father...definitely not a great combination. Additionally, I enjoyed how babysitting Teddy taught Grace that it's okay to make mistakes and always looked forward to their scenes. Finally, I would like to mention Grace's older sister, Celia. Although they clashed a little at times, overall she was supportive of Grace and I was happy when she was able to find her own path for success, starting a neighborhood compost project, by the end of the book. With all that said, Keeping Pace is an outstanding choice for anyone who likes stories about friendship, sports, ambition, love, and finding balance.
