**You can see this full review and more at Book Briefs: http://bookbriefs.net**Pretty Smart Girls: Lace Up is a standalone (at least at this time) new adult contemporary romance from Entangled Embrace's romance imprint. This is another one of Entangled's imprints that I all seem to have great luck with. And Pretty Smart Girls is a fun, flirty and well rounded romance story about a girls team from Michigan State and a guys team from University of Michigan competing against each other in an entrepreneurial competition. I really liked the competition setting and I liked the school rivalry theme woven throughout the book. I could easily picture this as a Florida State v. University of Florida thing and put myself right in that rivalry mindset. I also loved the title for this book, these ladies are pretty, yes, but first and foremost they are smart. And the play on the pretty smart and pretty, smart girls is explained throughout the book.

This was my first opportunity to enjoy a book by Shae Ross, and I have to say I can't wait to read more by her. The book was under 300 pages but it was a complete story, with well developed, fleshed out characters. I had only two very minor issues with the book, but they weren't things that detracted from the story, and the ending kind of resolved one of the tiny issues anyway. First, this seemed like a very high stake, very public competition with a New York powerhouse company. Why were there only 2 teams competing, and why were both of the teams from Michigan? Especially since it wasn't a Michigan based company. I was kind of hoping there would be more teams involved, and that these two were the front runners or something. And second, it seemed a little convenient that the three guys and the three girls each paired up so easily. But like I said, it didn't detract from the flow of the story and in the end it kind of resolved itself because different relationships and friendships developed between the 6 of them.

Now that my very minor issues are out of the way, I can talk about how much I loved Pretty Smart Girls. This was a book that I wanted to ignore my job, my boyfriend and even food for. It was one of those book where I picked it up and started reading thinking I had been reading for only 15 minutes or so and I look up and 2 hours have passed. it sucked me in, and I kind of had a perma-smile on my face throughout most of the story. I loved the back and forth between Rose (Ryan) and Jett. And I just really enjoyed the whole story. I don't know if there is going to be a follow up or not, but I do know that Shae Ross is an author I want to see more from. This is a book I would recommend to everyone and anyone who likes contemporary romance books. It is wonderful.This review was originally posted on Book Briefs