Baylin Crow writes contemporary gay romance featuring college athletes, football teammates, neighbors, longtime friends, rivals, and men questioning what they thought they knew about themselves.
Her bibliography is relatively compact, but several books are easy to misplace. Rookie Mistake belongs inside the Sugar Land Saints sequence, Flunking with a Ghost is part of a multi-author paranormal series, and Crushing on the Quarterback is a separate sports-romance short story rather than another numbered Sugar Land Saints novel.
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Most of Baylin Crow’s books follow different couples and can be understood independently. The safest approach is still to complete each named series in order, especially Sugar Land Saints and Guys Next Door, where teammates, friends, and previous couples continue to appear.
The Essential Reading Rules
Only a few rules are needed to navigate Baylin Crow’s catalog correctly.
- Read Sugar Land Saints from Quarterback Sneak through Delayed Game, placing Rookie Mistake after Recovered Fumble.
- Read Guys Next Door from Stripped Love through Clueless Romeo. The men live within the same Atlanta social circle, so later books assume familiarity with earlier relationships.
- Read The Faker Rulebook before The Hater Playbook. They feature different couples, but the college setting and connected character group develop in sequence.
- Treat Flunking with a Ghost as a separate paranormal contribution. Readers do not need Baylin Crow’s contemporary books first, and they do not need to complete every Haunted Love title to understand its central romance.
The remaining standalones and short stories can be selected by premise.
Sugar Land Saints Books in Order
Sugar Land Saints is Baylin Crow’s best-known series. It follows members of a Texas college football team as friendships, hookups, rivalries, and hidden feelings become committed relationships.
The central couple changes in each book. Publication order is recommended because teammates recur and later stories reveal which earlier couples stayed together.
1. Quarterback Sneak
Quarterback Sneak (2019): A college quarterback becomes involved in a romance that complicates his place on the team, opening the Sugar Land Saints world through sports pressure, attraction, and questions about identity.
This is the correct first book even when later editions or collections display the titles in a different visual arrangement.
It introduces the team and the social group that continues throughout the series.
2. Broken Play
Broken Play (2019): A new Sugar Land Saints couple faces a relationship disrupted by emotional defenses and choices that do not unfold according to either man’s original plan.
The football setting remains central, while characters introduced in Quarterback Sneak continue around the new romance.
Read it second to preserve team introductions and the outcome of the opening relationship.
3. Recovered Fumble
Recovered Fumble (2019): Rendon meets Nash, a confident campus playboy from a football family, and an attempted hookup develops into a more complicated relationship after their first encounter ends badly.
Nash’s status within the team and his reputation on campus give the romance consequences beyond the two central characters.
This is the third main novel and should be read before Rookie Mistake.
3.5. Rookie Mistake
Rookie Mistake (2021): This shorter Sugar Land Saints story begins where Recovered Fumble ends, adding another romance and showing the team immediately after the third novel’s events.
The novella is sometimes placed before Recovered Fumble in automated catalogs because both appeared in revised or later editions. Its story position is after book three.
Status: Included novella.
4. Delayed Game
Delayed Game (2021): The final main Sugar Land Saints romance brings another player’s private life into conflict with football expectations, while the established couples and friendships return around him.
The book closes the numbered series and benefits from the full team history established in the earlier novels.
Starting here would reveal several previous relationship outcomes.
Correct Sugar Land Saints Reading Order
- Quarterback Sneak (2019): Introduces the Texas college football team and its first central romance.
- Broken Play (2019): Expands the Saints through another player and relationship.
- Recovered Fumble (2019): Follows Rendon and campus football star Nash after a failed first encounter.
- Rookie Mistake (2021): Continues the team directly after Recovered Fumble in novella form.
- Delayed Game (2021): Completes the main series with the final numbered Saints romance.
This order should be used even when a retailer numbers Rookie Mistake inconsistently.
Is Crushing on the Quarterback a Sugar Land Saints Book?
No official numbering places it inside the Sugar Land Saints series.
Crushing on the Quarterback (2022): After hooking up with teammate Cannon Diaz at their high-school graduation party, the narrator is left without a goodbye, only to encounter the now-famous quarterback again three years later.
The story uses football and teammates, which makes it resemble Sugar Land Saints. It follows a separate couple and is listed independently rather than as book five or a numbered prequel.
Continuity status: Separate sports-romance short story.
Readers may enjoy it after Sugar Land Saints, but no earlier series knowledge is required.
Guys Next Door Books in Order
Guys Next Door follows men connected through their Atlanta neighborhood, work, friendships, and family relationships.
These are interconnected standalones rather than one couple’s continuing trilogy. The order still matters because supporting characters become later protagonists and previous couples remain part of the group.
1. Stripped Love
Stripped Love (2020): Phoenix gives up his attempt to build a songwriting career in Nashville and returns to Atlanta, where financial pressure leads him to work as a stripper and places him in the path of an unexpected romance.
The story establishes the neighborhood, its friendships, and several men who become important later.
Phoenix’s family responsibilities give the romance a more serious foundation than his new occupation initially suggests.
2. Sweetest Hate
Sweetest Hate (2021): Kellan immediately clashes with his best friend’s new stepbrother, Arsen, creating a relationship driven by equal amounts of hostility, attraction, and forced proximity.
Neither man can avoid the other because their family and friendship connections keep placing them together.
Read Stripped Love first for the surrounding group and the established relationships that appear in the background.
3. Clueless Romeo
Clueless Romeo (2022): Tattooed professional matchmaker Roman accepts an unusual request involving former college athlete CJ, only for his confidence in arranging other people’s relationships to become less useful in his own.
The book closes the trilogy by moving another familiar man from supporting character to romantic lead.
Earlier Guys Next Door couples return as part of the shared social circle.
Guys Next Door Reading Rule
Read:
- Stripped Love
- Sweetest Hate
- Clueless Romeo
Each romance has its own ending, but the sequence preserves introductions and prevents established couples from appearing before readers know their stories.
Boyfriend Rules Books in Order
Boyfriend Rules is a two-book college-romance series. Each installment follows a different couple using a questionable set of romantic rules, lessons, or plans.
The books are light on long-running plot, but publication order provides the intended introduction to the connected college environment.
1. The Faker Rulebook
The Faker Rulebook (2021): Noah agrees to fake-date his supposedly straight childhood best friend, Rook, during his brother’s wedding, despite having loved him since a kiss they shared years earlier.
The arrangement is meant to help Noah face his cheating ex, but shared rooms and staged affection make their rules increasingly difficult to maintain.
This is the stronger series starting point and establishes the playful rule-based format.
2. The Hater Playbook
The Hater Playbook (2022): Owen asks Knight Jackson, his brother’s popular basketball-player best friend and longtime crush, to teach him how to attract another man.
Knight has always treated Owen as his best friend’s younger brother, but the lessons force him to reconsider both Owen and his own assumptions.
Read The Faker Rulebook first for publication order, although the second couple’s romance can be understood independently.
Boyfriend Rules Continuity
The Boyfriend Rules books are connected standalones rather than a continuous story about Noah and Rook.
Readers primarily interested in brother’s-best-friend romance may begin with The Hater Playbook. Readers completing the series should start with The Faker Rulebook.
Nothing Serious Books in Order
Nothing Serious currently contains one confirmed novel.
1. Fling
Fling (2018): Hayden has loved Dean, his best friend’s older brother, for years, but Dean has continued to see him as the younger boy who lived next door until a limited summer together changes their relationship.
Both men know their time has an expiration date, giving the romance a choice between a temporary arrangement and the feelings Hayden has never been able to dismiss.
The book can be read independently.
Series status: One confirmed published installment.
The Nothing Serious label should not be used to absorb Baylin Crow’s other standalones simply because they contain casual arrangements or short-term relationships.
Haunted Love Contribution
Haunted Love is a multi-author paranormal romance project. Each installment is written by a different author and centers on a separate supernatural couple.
Baylin Crow contributed one book.
Flunking with a Ghost
Flunking with a Ghost (2022): A college-centered romance develops around a ghost whose missing memories and unfinished history complicate the bond forming with the living man able to encounter him.
The book combines romantic comedy, paranormal mystery, and the question of whether a relationship can survive the truth about the ghost’s death.
It is listed within the wider Haunted Love sequence, but it has its own principal couple and can be read alone.
Status: Separate multi-author continuity.
Do You Need to Read the Other Haunted Love Books?
No.
The Haunted Love titles share a ghost-romance concept rather than one uninterrupted cast. Flunking with a Ghost provides the immediate information needed for its supernatural premise.
Readers completing the multi-author project may place it according to that project’s release order. Readers following Baylin Crow only can treat it as an independent paranormal novel.
Baylin Crow Standalone Books
Baylin Crow’s independent books cover bartender romance, mixed martial arts, former best friends, holiday hookups, neighbors, and viral fake dating.
They do not form one verified continuity and can be read in any order.
Scar
Scar (2016): A closed-off bartender with a painful past becomes involved with an outgoing college athlete, forcing him to decide whether emotional safety is worth more than the relationship he wants.
The romance is built around opposing personalities and a hero determined not to let anyone get close enough to hurt him again.
This is Baylin Crow’s earliest confirmed published book.
Continuity status: Standalone.
Risk
Risk (2018): Drew takes a job at his uncle’s mixed martial arts training center and becomes roommates with light-heavyweight champion Asher Ramsey, whose presence makes Drew question his assumptions about himself.
The close living arrangement turns professional admiration and physical awareness into a relationship neither man intended.
Continuity status: Standalone MMA romance.
The Holiday Hookup
The Holiday Hookup (2021): Two men with contrasting personalities begin a festive hookup that develops across the holiday period, testing whether a supposedly temporary connection can continue after Christmas.
The short story uses workplace tension, opposites-attract chemistry, and a low-angst seasonal setup.
Continuity status: Standalone holiday story.
Dear Creed
Dear Creed (2023): Former best friends are reunited after years of hurt, forcing one man to confront the love he once hid and the reasons Creed Masters became someone he believed he had to hate.
The story combines friends-to-enemies tension, unresolved longing, and a relationship rooted in their shared childhood.
No prior Baylin Crow novel is required.
Continuity status: Standalone.
Kissing the Grump
Kissing the Grump (2024): A coffee-shop worker repeatedly clashes with the difficult customer he privately calls Forrest Grump, then discovers that the same infuriating man is also his new neighbor.
The short romantic comedy pairs an inexperienced hero with a man whose apparent dislike may be concealing a different kind of interest.
Continuity status: Standalone short story.
Happy Palentine’s Day
Happy Palentine’s Day (2025): A joking beach proposal between best friends is filmed and goes viral, leading them to accept payment for pretending to be a couple before Valentine’s Day.
One friend identifies as gay and the other believes he is straight, making their public performance increasingly difficult to separate from their private bond.
This is Baylin Crow’s latest confirmed publication as of August 4, 2026.
Continuity status: Standalone short story.
Short Stories and Novellas by Placement
Baylin Crow’s shorter works do not all serve the same purpose. Some belong inside series, while others are completely separate.
Included Within a Series
- Rookie Mistake (2021): Read after Recovered Fumble and before Delayed Game in Sugar Land Saints.
Separate Contemporary Shorts
- The Holiday Hookup (2021): A Christmas hookup develops beyond its temporary plan.
- Crushing on the Quarterback (2022): Former high-school teammates reconnect three years after a graduation-night encounter.
- Kissing the Grump (2024): A coffee-shop worker discovers that his difficult customer is also his neighbor.
- Happy Palentine’s Day (2025): Best friends fake a relationship after their accidental beach proposal goes viral.
Earlier Shorter Standalone
- Scar (2016): A guarded bartender and an outgoing athlete test whether attraction can overcome a past built around self-protection.
Catalogs differ in whether Scar, Risk, and Dear Creed are labeled novels, novellas, or shorter fiction. Their exact length category does not affect reading order because all three stand alone.
Anti-Valentine Anthology
Anti-Valentine (2023): This multi-author collection gathers queer romance stories built around characters resisting, avoiding, or unexpectedly reconsidering Valentine’s Day and conventional romance.
Baylin Crow is one of several contributing authors.
The collection is optional and is not part of Boyfriend Rules, Guys Next Door, or Sugar Land Saints.
Status: Separate multi-author anthology.
Anthology publication should not cause the same story to be counted twice when it later appears independently.
Sugar Land Saints Complete Collection
Sugar Land Saints: The Complete Collection: This omnibus packages the college-football romances and associated novella into one edition.
It does not introduce another Saints couple.
Readers using the collection should follow the internal order:
- Quarterback Sneak
- Broken Play
- Recovered Fumble
- Rookie Mistake
- Delayed Game
Status: Alternate format, not a sixth original story.
Complete Baylin Crow Publication Order
A publication-order reading shows how Baylin Crow moved from early standalones into football, neighborhood, college, paranormal, and shorter romantic comedies.
- Scar (2016): A guarded bartender resists an outgoing college athlete because intimacy threatens the life he rebuilt after a damaging past.
- Fling (2018): Hayden finally has a chance with Dean, his best friend’s older brother, but their limited time together makes the relationship appear temporary.
- Risk (2018): Drew becomes roommates with MMA champion Asher and begins questioning the limits he previously placed on his identity.
- Quarterback Sneak (2019): The Sugar Land Saints series opens with its first college-football romance.
- Broken Play (2019): A second Saints couple faces a relationship that does not follow the plan either man expected.
- Recovered Fumble (2019): Rendon and confident football star Nash revisit a connection that ended before it properly began.
- Stripped Love (2020): Phoenix returns to Atlanta and becomes a stripper after financial responsibility replaces his songwriting plans.
- The Faker Rulebook (2021): Noah fake-dates his childhood best friend Rook during a wedding while hiding years of genuine love.
- Rookie Mistake (2021): A shorter Saints romance follows the events of Recovered Fumble.
- Sweetest Hate (2021): Kellan and Arsen turn immediate hostility and unwanted attraction into a volatile stepbrother-adjacent romance.
- Delayed Game (2021): The final main Sugar Land Saints couple closes the team sequence.
- The Holiday Hookup (2021): A seasonal arrangement between opposites develops beyond its Christmas limits.
- Crushing on the Quarterback (2022): Former teammates reunite three years after a graduation-night hookup and abrupt separation.
- Clueless Romeo (2022): Professional matchmaker Roman accepts an unusual request involving former athlete CJ.
- Flunking with a Ghost (2022): A college romance develops around a ghost with missing memories and unfinished history.
- The Hater Playbook (2022): Owen asks his brother’s basketball-star best friend to teach him how to attract another man.
- Dear Creed (2023): Former childhood friends confront love, betrayal, and the history that turned affection into resentment.
- Kissing the Grump (2024): A difficult coffee-shop customer becomes the inexperienced hero’s unavoidable new neighbor.
- Happy Palentine’s Day (2025): Best friends monetize a viral joke proposal by pretending to be a couple before Valentine’s Day.
This list is useful for completionists, but it moves repeatedly between unrelated continuities. Completing one series at a time gives a smoother reading experience.
A More Efficient Baylin Crow Reading Plan
Readers do not need to follow the full publication list. The following route keeps related characters together and minimizes unnecessary switching.
Begin With Sugar Land Saints
- Quarterback Sneak
- Broken Play
- Recovered Fumble
- Rookie Mistake
- Delayed Game
This is Baylin Crow’s longest completed series and the clearest introduction to her college sports romances.
Continue With Boyfriend Rules
- The Faker Rulebook
- The Hater Playbook
These books retain the college-athlete focus while moving away from one football team.
Move to Guys Next Door
- Stripped Love
- Sweetest Hate
- Clueless Romeo
This trilogy shifts into an Atlanta neighborhood and work-based social group.
Choose the Standalones by Premise
Read Risk for MMA romance, Dear Creed for former best friends, Kissing the Grump for neighbor comedy, or Happy Palentine’s Day for viral fake dating.
Save the Paranormal Detour for Any Time
Flunking with a Ghost belongs to a separate shared project and can be read whenever a supernatural romance fits the reader’s mood.
Chronological Order
No meaningful universal chronological order exists across Baylin Crow’s books.
Sugar Land Saints, Guys Next Door, Boyfriend Rules, and the standalones use different groups and settings. Similar college ages or sports themes do not prove that the stories share one timeline.
Within the named series, publication order already provides the most stable chronology.
The only special placement is Rookie Mistake. It begins where Recovered Fumble ends and should remain between that book and Delayed Game.
Flunking with a Ghost should not be inserted into the contemporary timeline because it belongs to a separate paranormal project.
Which Books Can Be Safely Skipped?
Readers following only full-length series novels may skip several optional works.
Rookie Mistake: Shorter, but recommended because it directly follows Recovered Fumble.
Crushing on the Quarterback: Optional standalone short with no required Saints continuity.
The Holiday Hookup: Optional seasonal romance.
Kissing the Grump: Optional standalone romantic comedy.
Happy Palentine’s Day: Optional standalone fake-dating short story.
Anti-Valentine: Optional multi-author anthology.
Flunking with a Ghost: Separate continuity, optional for readers interested only in contemporary romance.
Skipping these books will not interrupt Guys Next Door or Boyfriend Rules.
Latest Baylin Crow Book
As of August 4, 2026, Baylin Crow’s latest confirmed publication is Happy Palentine’s Day.
Happy Palentine’s Day (2025): A viral video turns a joking proposal between best friends into a paid fake relationship, forcing them to reconsider what their closeness means when strangers begin treating it as romance.
No forthcoming Baylin Crow book had a stable official title and publication date at the time of this update.
Unconfirmed placeholders should not be added to the bibliography until the author announces a final title, series placement, and release schedule.
Frequently Asked Questions
What was Baylin Crow’s first book?
Scar (2016): A bartender who has rebuilt his life after a destructive past becomes attracted to a confident college athlete but fears the risk of allowing anyone close.
It is the earliest consistently listed Baylin Crow publication.
What is the best Baylin Crow book to start with?
Quarterback Sneak is the strongest entry for readers who want her best-known college football series.
The Faker Rulebook is a good alternative for fake dating and childhood friends. Risk works for readers who prefer an independent MMA romance.
Do the Sugar Land Saints books need to be read in order?
Yes, publication order is recommended.
The couples change, but teammates return and later books reveal earlier romantic outcomes. Rookie Mistake also continues directly from the end of Recovered Fumble.
Where does Rookie Mistake belong?
Read it after Recovered Fumble and before Delayed Game.
It functions as Sugar Land Saints book 3.5, regardless of catalog records that place it elsewhere.
Is Crushing on the Quarterback part of Sugar Land Saints?
It is a football romance, but it is not officially numbered as part of Sugar Land Saints.
Treat it as a separate short story about former teammates reconnecting after a high-school graduation hookup.
Do the Guys Next Door books stand alone?
Each book follows a different couple and provides its own romantic ending.
The characters share a social circle, so reading Stripped Love, Sweetest Hate, and Clueless Romeo in order gives the clearest introductions.
Are The Faker Rulebook and The Hater Playbook connected?
They form the Boyfriend Rules series and share a college-romance framework.
They feature different couples. Read The Faker Rulebook first for the intended series progression.
Is Flunking with a Ghost part of a Baylin Crow series?
It is Baylin Crow’s contribution to Haunted Love, a multi-author paranormal series.
It is not connected to Sugar Land Saints, Guys Next Door, or Boyfriend Rules.
Must the Haunted Love books be read in order?
No. The books are written by different authors and focus on separate ghost romances.
Flunking with a Ghost can be read without the preceding Haunted Love titles.
Is Fling the beginning of a longer series?
Fling is labeled as Nothing Serious book one, but no second published installment is currently confirmed.
It works as a complete romance and does not end by requiring another book.
Is Scar connected to Risk?
No confirmed series links the two.
Both are early Baylin Crow romances, but Scar follows a bartender and college athlete, while Risk centers on a man working at an MMA gym and his champion roommate.
What is Dear Creed about?
Dear Creed (2023): Two former childhood best friends reunite after love, silence, and unresolved hurt transformed their closeness into resentment.
It is a standalone and can be read without preparation.
Is Kissing the Grump a full series novel?
It is a short standalone romantic comedy.
The story follows a coffee-shop worker and the grumpy customer who unexpectedly becomes his neighbor.
What is Happy Palentine’s Day about?
Happy Palentine’s Day (2025): Two best friends agree to perform a romantic relationship online after their joke beach proposal goes viral and a content creator offers them money.
It is a standalone rather than a new Boyfriend Rules book.
Are Baylin Crow’s collections new stories?
Collections and omnibus editions generally package stories already available elsewhere.
The Sugar Land Saints complete collection should not be counted as another numbered team romance, while Anti-Valentine is a multi-author anthology containing multiple contributions.
What is Baylin Crow’s latest book?
The latest confirmed release is Happy Palentine’s Day, published in 2025.
No later book had a reliably confirmed release date as of August 4, 2026.
Conclusion
Baylin Crow’s catalog is best read in small, self-contained groups.
Begin with Quarterback Sneak for Sugar Land Saints, keeping Rookie Mistake between Recovered Fumble and Delayed Game. Begin with Stripped Love for Guys Next Door, or The Faker Rulebook for the two-book Boyfriend Rules series.
The standalones can be chosen by premise, and Flunking with a Ghost remains a separate paranormal detour. For most readers, series order matters more than one combined publication timeline.
Frank is the editor of BookSeries.blog, focusing on publication order, chronological timelines, and spoiler-free reading guides for book series and fictional universes.