PHOENIX — Pickleball has taken the world by storm. Whether you're a pickler yourself or know someone who loves to dink and volley all day long, chances are, the tennis adjacent sport is on your radar.

And for author Ilana Long, it's not just on her radar: it's the subject of her rom-com novel, .

Long wrote her debut romance, , in 2024, and in her second book, readers may recognize some beloved characters from and get to meet a few new faces only mentioned in the previous book.

Lulu Gardner is a single parent in her thirties, faced with a crisis: a viral mistake that puts her stable teaching career in jeopardy, and now, she's wondering if teaching is really it for her at all. In an attempt to destress, she joins her godparents on an all-expenses-paid destination pickleball vacation. But

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