Cover of Deep End, featuring two white hands, one with tattos and one with blue nails, in front of a swimming pool.

About the Book

Title: Deep End
Published: 2025
Swoonworthy Scale: 8

Sub-Genres:
BDSM (Dom/Sub Kink), Sports Romance, College Romance, He Fell First

 

What’s Your Type?
Love From the Start But She Doesn’t Realize, Light Love Triangle, Overcoming Trauma, The Hazelwood Special (i.e., a giant man with giant hands and a giant …)

Content Warning: Deep End explores elements of BDSM, particularly the Dominant/Submissive kink. Everything is very consensual, but it might be triggering for folks who had non-consensual experiences. There are also examples/discussions of parental emotional abuse, healing (both mental and physical) from injury, and death of a loved one.

Welcome back to our Grown-Up Guide to Romance, and Happy Valentine’s Day! As Stephanie said in last week’s post, it’s so important to celebrate love—in all its forms—both this month and every month. And today, we’re peeking into a trope that’s often hidden or talked about in hushed tones.

The initialism BDSM (bondage and discipline, dominance and submission, sadism and masochism) covers a wide variety of sexual interests, but the most important part of any BDSM relationship is communication and consent. Ali Hazelwood’s latest book doesn’t go deep into BDSM, but it does makes it clear that no one is engaging in any dubcon (dubious consent), which is, in my opinion, absolutely necessary when delving into this trope.

Deep End by Ali Hazelwood

Fancy Dress to Fabio: Study of Hands

I am not an artist, but I’ve heard from many artist friends and acquaintances that hands are the hardest bit of anatomy to draw, so I have to applaud Lilithsaur (the cover illustrator) for their skills. This cover is a nice departure from Hazelwood’s previous books, most of which have illustrated versions of the main characters canoodling around STEM details. It’s also just a little bit sexy, which makes it enticing.

The Leading Woman:

Scarlett “Vandy” Vandermeer has been diving at an elite level for much of her life. An injury set her back during her freshman year at Stanford, but she’s back for her junior year and ready to prove herself. She’s completely healed, physically, but she’s got a mental block that keeps her from performing the dive she was doing when her injury occurred. She’s also struggling with school, something that has never happened to her before.

The Leading Man:

Lukas Blomqvist is a swimming golden boy who’s been winning medals—including at the Olympics—since he was young. A senior at Stanford, and one of the captains of the swim team, he’s a stunning example of Swedish genetics and a very hard nut to crack.

Meet Cute: 

Vandy and Luk have been swimming (heh) in the same circles for years, but have never really had the opportunity to get to know each other. Until Luk’s soon-to-be-ex-girlfriend and Vandy’s diving team captain drunkenly suggests that the two of them start a sexual relationship because they’re both into “the same stuff.” The same stuff being BDSM kinks.

At first, the two balk at the idea, but when Luk emails Vandy with a proposition, she begins to think about how a purely sexual relationship might be what she needs to take her mind off of, well, everything.

Risque Rating: 8

Deep End is Hazelwood’s “spiciest book yet,” and yet … I didn’t find it to be overwhelmingly sexual? Sure, there were scenes of graphic sex—and kinky sex of the dominant/submissive variety at that—but the book really only scratched the surface of BDSM. There were hints that Luk and Vandy would be into experiencing even more kinky things, but either those were left off page or they didn’t get into the dirtier things until after the end of the book. 

Ms. Perky’s Prize for Purplest Prose

If you’ve read one Hazelwood book, this book won’t be much of a departure. Her penchant for matching small women with huge men continues, as does her inclusion of STEM interests. (Vandy and Luk are both premed students and work on a project under a certain Stanford professor who’ll be familiar to anyone who’s read Hazelwood’s first book, The Love Hypothesis.) If you’re a fan, you’ll like this book. If you’re coming into Hazelwood’s books for the first time, you’ll probably also enjoy it. (There’s a reason her books are so popular!)

Was it Good For You? 

Overall, I knew what I was getting into when I dove into this book. Even though I was a bit nervous, reading the blurbs that this was her sexiest book yet and dealt with kinks. (I am still bobbing around in the shallow end when it comes to romance novels.) I was actually a little surprised at how much I like the book as a whole, given that when I read the last Hazelwood book, I felt pretty Hazelwood-ed out by the end. (There’s only so many small woman meets giant man and eventually get together after a bunch of misunderstandings and they also are scientists stories one can read.) The characters in Deep End were well-rounded, nuanced individuals for whom I was rooting from the very start. 

One complete nitpick I have is the use of “TiVo” in place of video or recording. It sounds really silly, but it was mentioned at least five times throughout the book and threw me out out of my reading groove every single time. Do people actually use phrases like ““Send me your TiVos if you need pointers.” Is this a swimming/diving term that I’m just not familiar with? (The only TiVo I’m familiar with is the early DVR.) 

FTC Full Disclosure: I bought a copy of this book with my own money and got neither a private dance party with Tom Hiddleston nor money in exchange for this review. Deep End is available now.

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Mandy (she/her) is a manager at a tech company who lives in Austin, TX, with her husband, son, and dogs. She loves superheroes and pretty much any show or movie with “Star” in the name.