The characters are both likable and believable. The setting moves cross country from Victoria, BC, to Baton Rouge and Charleston, giving a clear sense of each locale.

There’s an interesting subplot involving Rayne’s parents, Luke and Emily. They’ve lived apart for 23 years, but are still very much in love. Rayne both worships and despises his father.

The author provides lots of tension and edge-of-your-seat action. The final resolution is a true nailbiter. This was an extremely enjoyable story and I recommend it highly.
-rated 5 Hearts by The Romance Studio

Ms Cross writes well, with smoothness and polish and her ability to create sub plots means that she makes a [stalker] theme refreshing. Go for it- this is a super read.
-Between the Lines WRDF Review

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I rode the roller coaster ride of Rayne and Christa and have never enjoyed being on the edge of my seat like this before. The author illustrates not only the scenery perfectly but also the personalities of the characters. The emotions that Christa kept trapped inside and the way she was forced to confront and deal with them were heart-wrenching. You cry for her, and you cheer her on at every little baby step that brings her back to some sense of normalcy when it comes to romantic relationships. Christa’s stalker adds a whole other dimension to the plot and leads the reader on a suspense-filled path that makes you constantly wonder what is just around the corner. I was so impressed by the depth of the story and how each different layer was carefully pulled together in the end. Truly one of the most remarkable stories I have read. Kudos to Ms. Cross for a story well-told.
- Simply Romance Reviews

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OUT OF HER LEAGUE is a tantalizing story that has well-developed characters plus lots of mystery, suspense of the ever-present stalker, and the suspense of how Christa and Rayne can find common ground in order for them to share the phenomenal love each feels for the other.

Ms. Cross’ description of settings brings the locations to life and reveals even more about the characters. Her smooth, easy flowing writing is a joy to read, AND the love scenes are truly love scenes not just sex – ah!
- rated 4.5 books from Long and Short Reviews

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The common advice to beginner authors is to “write what you know.”

When you’re a former White Rock Renegades pitcher who’s competed in many national championships and the Canada Cup – and even made the Canada Games team in 1993 – it makes sense to give your first novel a softball background.

Kaylea Cross has also included distinctive White Rock and South Surrey atmosphere and locations – including Softball City – in Out Of Her League, a romantic suspense novel published by Wild Rose Press.

But the Richmond-born Cross’ debut novel is about a lot more than providing cozy local references. Clearly written with an eye on the commercial potential of today’s more explicit romance fiction, Out Of Her League is a bona-fide page-turner, peppered with profanity and violence, and with a slow, but steady, progression to several steamy sex scenes.

It’s also her springboard to a series (she’s already completed another title and is in the process of revising a third).

They’re all action and suspense tales set around the globe, although involving an interrelated set of people.

Even Out Of Her League ventures south of the border for episodes on the Oregon coast and in Charleston, South Carolina, establishing characters who will show up later in Cross’ continuing saga.

The first novel’s main protagonist, Christa Bailey, is a White Rock softball catcher and a prospect for the Canadian Olympic team.

She’s a tough athlete, a warm friend and an attractive, independent woman who runs her own landscaping business. But she also has a guarded, vulnerable side, thanks to an ex who seriously damaged her self-esteem.

When Christa attracts the attention of a creepy ‘fan’ who begins stalking her, it provides an unexpected opportunity for her to become close to Rayne Hutchinson, the rippling-muscled, Carolina-raised ERT cop she’s had a secret crush on for years.

It isn’t long before romance blooms – but also not long before the stalker scenario escalates into a harrowing, and deadly serious, situation.

Cross’ prose is spare, fast paced and evocative, with enough narrative hooks and violent jolts to snare even those who profess to deride this kind of fiction.

This doesn’t describe Cross. The author, affable, perky and naturally inquisitive in person, admits she’s a fan of the genre – or genres, to be precise. The New York State-based Wild Rose has 12 different imprints to reflect a whole range of romance categories from ‘historical’ and ‘erotic’ to suspense.

“Romantic suspense is one of the biggest categories for romance novels right now,” she said.

“They’re exciting and edgy and they mix equal amounts of both so you have a good suspense story and a good romance at the same time. If you open up a newspaper or watch the news, it can be depressing at the best of times. A lot of people read fiction for an escape.”

Cross always thought her way into print would be through historical romance. She’s had a long-time obsession with the American Civil War, which has led her to drag others around battlefield sites and driven her to collect authentic weapons of the period. It was even the costume theme of her wedding, in 2000.

She still has half of a sprawling Civil War epic she penned at the age of 16 tucked away somewhere – and she wouldn’t mind revising it if the market for historical romances ever gets out of its current fascination for the Regency period.

Cross played softball from the time she was eight, and was a member of the Peninsula’s very first Renegades team, playing with the organization for 13 years until 1999.

She credits softball with developing her intense focus and discipline and helping her face up to adversity and disappointments (she says of her character Christa “She’s got my determination; I was a pitcher who always wanted to be a catcher”).

But writing was always as important to Cross as playing ball.

“I’ve always wanted to write,” she said.

“I got a typewriter for my sixth birthday, sat down and pecked out my first little story.”

She also credits her teachers, Alice Sears and Wagner Strauss, at the one-room Elgin School on Crescent Road, with encouraging her earliest writing efforts.

“They got my imagination going at an early age,” she said.

The first draft of Out Of Her League was written more than four years ago, when she was pregnant with her eldest son, and edited when she was on bed rest due to complications while pregnant with her second boy.

“A professional editor went through it, and it was a good job I was on bed rest, because I would probably have had a hemhorrage when it came back covered in red ink.”

Although she had to lose close to a third of the novel’s length and rewrite much of what remained, she found it a valuable process.

“I learned a lot about writing,” she said. “I didn’t know there were so many things to think about voices and tenses and descriptive tags.”

A draft of Out Of Her League made it to the semi-finals of Amazon’s Breakthrough Novel competition, out of 5,000 manuscripts submitted.

“That’s what made me think I could really get it published,” she said, adding that she learned about The Wild Rose Press through a publication of the Romance Writers of America.

“They’ve set out to be a kinder, gentler publisher. Even when they reject a manuscript they give you feedback and ask you to resubmit.”

She sent a couple of chapters and a synopsis to Wild Rose and was stunned when they responded within 10 days with a request for the full manuscript. When Wild Rose offered to publish the book, Cross sought advice from another mentor, established local author Wayne Ralph.

“He told me ‘This business is tough and if somebody’s offering to publish your book, go for it’.”

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