A Legend in the Baking is the second book in Jamie Wesley’s cupcake bakery themed series, Sugar Blitz. The bakery is run rather unconventionally by three football player teammates who also have a passion for baking. But each player/baker has his own personal challenges when it comes to relationships, showing that just because you’re famous (and can make awesome baked goods) doesn’t mean love comes easily.

Sloane Dell is looking for a promotion to social media manager at the company she works for. But when she’s passed over for another co-worker, she knows it’s time to move on. As part of her job application to a new company, she needs to take a current company and up their social marketing game. While she’s always been reluctant to get involved with her brother Donovan’s bakery, Sugar Blitz Cupcakes, she knows their social media could use some improvement. Helping out his business and helping herself seems like a win-win, even if it means she’ll have to work alongside Donovan’s best friend (and her teenaged self’s crush) August Hodges.

August relishes his role as a silent partner in the bakery business, preferring to be busy in the kitchen baking than up front socializing. But when an impassioned defense of women’s roles in the kitchen turns viral and he becomes a sought after bachelor, he reluctantly turns to Sloane to help curate their social media to turn his new found fame into dollars for the bakery. He and Sloane have a history from his years-long friendship with Donovan, who is only a few years older than her. They’d often spoken on the phone while he was in college and she was in high school, not romantic but friendly. When she’d suddenly planted a kiss on him on one private occasion, he had recoiled, their ages a big factor, not to mention his having a girlfriend at the time. That snuffed out her crush pretty quickly, but it also brought a distance to their relationship that has never really gone away.

Stuck together to make things work, both for the bakery’s proposed second location and for Sloane’s job prospects, Sloane and August find themselves rediscovering their long ago friendship. And this time, age is no barrier to something more if they are willing to take the chance. But with August’s shy personality clashing with Sloane’s ideas to promote the bakery, is there room for a happy ending for all?

I enjoyed this sweet and sexy romance. It’s family driven, with attention given to both August’s discordant relationship with his father and Sloane’s relationship with her protective older brother and her divorced parents. And naturally, there are scenes featuring the three men who run the bakery that show their deep friendship. There are some flashback scenes to twelve years earlier showing August and Sloane’s friendship developing, as well as how her crush on him played out. Despite the fact that the three men are active football players, I wouldn’t classify this as sports romance as it seems to be more of a secondary plotline and doesn’t get the same focus the bakery business does.

The author also delves into the real life problem of gentrification and the realistic concerns of the neighborhood where the men plan to open their second bakery, especially when it’s discovered that they’ve bought up more real estate than they need. The challenges Sloane has in her career, especially as a black woman, are highlighted, as she has to work that much harder to achieve her goals. I didn’t always agree with her social media strategy and approach for the bakery, as it sometimes puts August in a difficult spot. But to her credit, she figures out a way to balance both of their professional needs. I’m also not sure how realistic it is to have active football players open a bakery, in terms of how they would keep the business going during the football season, so you have to suspend your belief a little to make that work. Sloane and August definitely have chemistry together (it’s a slow burn romance) and the long term relationship they seek benefits from recognizing their differences and compromising. All the loose ends get tied up nicely with a happy ending for the gents, their bakery, the neighborhood and the couple. I recommend this to readers looking for romances with emotional depth and strong female characters.