Reviewed by Annika
TITLE: Trading Teams 
AUTHOR: Romeo Alexander & John Harris
NARRATOR: Kaeomakana Tiwanak
PUBLISHER: Books Unite People
RELEASE DATE: December 21, 2018
LENGTH: 6 hours, 25 minutes
BLURB:
A Jock Nerd Romance.
Jake thought he had life all figured out. He had the perfect girlfriend, a starting position on the Varsity baseball team, and a raging social life. He was living the dream. That is, until he discovers that he’s in danger of losing his scholarship. The ultimatum? Get a tutor; or get out. Jake has no choice but to buckle down and put his head in his books. No sweat, right? The only problem is that the only person available to tutor him is a quiet nerd who would rather be alone than spend any time with a headstrong jock who isn’t used to applying himself to anything but sports.
For Kyle, college was only a formality. He didn’t need the degree, and he barely attended his classes and still passed with flying colors. Instead of sitting in class, he’d rather be chasing his true passion—designing and programming an original MMORPG game. Kyle doesn’t need a social life, and he definitely doesn’t need a boyfriend, especially because that would require stepping out of the closet, something he has no intention of doing any time soon. The only problem? He’s been assigned to tutor a handsome jock who would much rather be out on the field than stuck in a classroom.
When it comes to having life figured out, Jake and Kyle will have to realize that there’s more to life than good grades and games. Neither one of them is ready for what their newfound camaraderie will mean; but the bases are loaded and it’s time to step up to the plate.
REVIEW:
I was in the mood for something light-hearted and sweet and figured I’d give Trading Teams a try. It was new to me authors and narrator so I went into this book without any preconceived notions of either.
Baseball jock and basically the man on campus; Jake has it all, the perfect girlfriend, a sport he loves and a social life that would make many guys green of envy. Slowly that starts to change – he changes. His low grades puts him in danger of losing his scholarship and spot on the team, his perfect girlfriend dumps him and suddenly he’s more interested in studying with his geeky tutor than going out partying with his friends.
Kyle is not really into the whole college scene. It’s more of a stepping stone to where he’s going, so he doesn’t care much one way or another. That being said, the boy is a genius and excels at everything the does, so classes are child’s play to him. So when Jake asks him to tutor him he’s not easily persuaded. In the end he’s unable to resist…
I liked the story for what it was. It wasn’t a masterpiece or very deep. It didn’t evoke many feelings in me, but was all in all a cutesy story of coming of age, self-discovery and coming out. Sure it was a bit too picture perfect at times for my tastes. Then again, it didn’t require thinking on the listener’s part, it was effortless that way. So if you go into this book without looking for a masterpiece, anything deep and don’t mind all the perfection going around, you will be totally fine. Otherwise, you might want to look elsewhere for your next read.
Kaeomakana Tiwanak is a new to me narrator, and a quick search turns up only a handful of narrations in total to his name. Sadly this shows clearly in this book. I kind of got the feeling that either he’s bitten of a bit more than he can chew, or more likely he hasn’t quite found his feet yet in the narration field. Bear with me and let me explain. I think the one thing he had going for him with this book is that his voice sounds young and that really fits with the characters as it’s a college romance and they are still wet behind the ears. That part really works, but then it kind of goes downhill…
You probably know me by now. You know that I love when narrators use different voices for different characters and add feelings into the words. And well, Tiwanak tried that. Don’t get me wrong, he had many different and very distinct voices for all of Jakes friends, but sadly he’s not able to maintain them and in the end they are all a bit jumbled together, accents and voices mix in a way they shouldn’t so there is no way to keep track. Not even the voices of the main characters are consistent during the book. But I can live with that. What I had a really difficult time with was the voices for Jake’s friends. Remember when you were little and playing pretend, you created these strange voices that you thought represented the character you were playing – rarely being true. The overacting you did. Those voices made me think of that – and not in a good way. They didn’t sound credible and really took away from the story.
All of this might give you the impression that it was a bad narration all over, but that was not the case. When it was just Jake and Kyle I loved the story and was invested. Those parts were great – and was the main part of the book, but it was just when Tiwanak got creative that it didn’t quite work for me. I do believe with more practice, more narrated books Tiwanak will find his feet and become a much better narrator, so while I’m not going to pick up any more of his narrations right now, I won’t discount me doing it in the future when he’s got more experience under his belt.
RATING: 
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