Courted

by Celia Cohen

What could be a better assignment for a lesbian cop than handling personal security for the hottest player on the women's tennis circuit? After just 10 minutes on the job, Officer Wendy Lynn Kotter can think of a million things—like walking barefoot on broken glass or chugging a bottle of Tabasco sauce. It seems that off the court, angel of Wimbledon Alie de Ville is spoiled, conceited, rude, and—to make matters worse—a thousand times more attractive and desirable than any of her Sports Illustrated covers can convey.

Tennis isn't the only game Alie excels at. Her winning streak extends to her bedroom—and she's got her sights set on a new trophy. Rich, powerful, and on her home turf, the professional athlete appears to have the advantage. But former softball champ Kotter is no stranger to tough competition. Could the champion have met her match?

Genres: Lesbian, Sports, Romance, LGBT, Fiction, Queer, Contemporary

153 pages, Paperback

First published June 28, 1997

About the author

Celia Cohen is a newspaper writer. She lives in Delaware.

Reviews

[Paula Phillips · Rating 3 out of 5]

As a fan of sports novels and tennis in particular , I downloaded Courted and when I opened it I was definitely in for an eye-opener novel as I wasn't sure to exactly expect . Turns out that Courted features Allie - a champion on the Wimbledon court , who is here for a tennis tournament. She has been given Officer Wendy Kotter as her escort. As the story goes along, we discover that Wendy is a lesbian and later on Allie -our tennis player bats for the same team and so does Wendy's boss - the police Captain. In this book we have a slight story about the tennis player, but in fact the majority of the book was rehashing Wendy's life story about how she became a police officer and her different relationships which funny enough were all with athletes, seems our Officer Kotter has a thing for the sports players. Courted was quite a quick read and read more like a novella , than an actual novel. So if you love Tennis and don't mind reading about a bunch of Lesibians, then Courted by Celia Cohen is the read for you.

[M.B. Austin]

Before passing this book on to a friend, I tried to remember why I had liked it so much. So I read it again -- it's quick and easy. But it's also really well written, with great voice. And that was it -- the almost-noir tone. Courted is young, small town cop Kotter's coming-of-age story. Reviewers who sound annoyed that it didn't conform to romance genre or sports story expectations are right. It's not either. Which didn't bother me at all, b/c just following Kotter's evolution as a baby dyke, with the grace of found family to help her become a happy adult, is enough. This short read (a novella, really) from Kotter's first person POV has a good amount of what a friend calls, 'sexy fun times' and also a minor suspense subplot. Although Kotter is the protagonist, the real hero is her tough-love surrogate mom, an African-American police officer (Randi Wilkes). And the real love story is Kotter's gratitude for all the women who showed her by example how to become someone she was proud of.
Favorite quote: (in response to a despairing Kotter asking, "We're really fucked, aren't we?")
Randi chuckled. "Not fucked, Kotter. Sold down the river on account of money and politics. You get fucked when someone wants to hurt you. You get sold when you don't matter enough to get fucked."
Summary: I found this story completely satisfying. When I closed the book, I wished it was the prequel written to provide some backstory about a couple private eyes (Kotter and Wilkes) in a great neo-noir mystery series. I would gladly ride along with Kotter on a bunch of those.

[SussexCat · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is some slick, smart, sexy fun!

[k reads · Rating 3 out of 5]

what was here, I enjoyed. Liked the characters, felt like I knew who they are, But there is not very much to the story. There isn't much of a story. It's not a mystery. It's not a romance. Its really about whether the MC is gonna get laid by the sexy tennis star. That's pretty much it.
Still, an easy (and not unpleasant) read. Just wish there was more there there.

[Sue Online · Rating 2 out of 5]

I got bored pretty quickly, finding it uninteresting and uninspiring. I am more of a non-fiction gal anyway. The better half of our coupledom, however, liked the book. She thinks. It's been a while since she read it.

[Anna · Rating 2 out of 5]

The tissue-thin plot didn't hang together very well, even though the lead character had some endearing qualities.

[Kim · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not terribly imaginative and the character development was pretty much non-existent.

[Oz. · Rating 2 out of 5]

An easy to read book.

[Debby · Rating 4 out of 5]

enjoyed.

[Kathryn · Rating 1 out of 5]

Very shallow read.

[Siân · Rating 3 out of 5]

A cute, fun read.