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Verdict: A warm, pun-heavy butch/butch small-town romance with rare representation, a scene-stealing cat and a community readers want to move to, held back by a romance that starts at full speed and a heroine whose anxiety loop wears some readers down.
Best for: Readers who want two butch women desiring each other on the page, Jewish leads, disability and social-anxiety rep, and a low-angst, lighthearted read, and who can forgive a fast start and sex scenes that are frank but brief.
Heat level: ★★★☆☆ (3/5 — open door; romance.io has no steam band, so this is derived from the series’ own heat guide and reader reports)
Rating: ★★★★☆ (3.6/5 — a 3.98 Goodreads average across 61 ratings, with the low scores all pointing at pace and the same repeated worry)
Tropes: Butch/butch, small town, forced proximity, introvert/extrovert, online friends to lovers, will-she-stay, queer found family, pet-assisted romance, single POV, happy ending.
Rooting for You by Roz Alexander is the third book in the multi-author Clover Hill Romance series, a self-published 2022 contemporary lesbian romance set in an artsy, queer-friendly small town — and its collision is Sara Fisch, an anxious botanist who has built herself a very small life, opening her door to Jaeeun Kupperman, a travelling photojournalist who makes friends with everyone and has never stayed anywhere long.
It holds a 3.98 average across 61 Goodreads ratings, 3.91 across 21 StoryGraph reviews and 4.5 across 39 Amazon ratings, and The Lesbian Review covered it with a verdict that listed no cons at all. Only 7% of Goodreads ratings sit at one or two stars, but the readers who bounced off it agree on why, and at least one four-star reader flags it too. That overlap is the thing worth understanding before you start.
What Is Rooting for You About?
Rooting for You is a short romance — 151 pages in the Kindle edition — in a shared-world series of novellas by different queer authors, all set in the same town. That structure explains a lot: the café, the bakery staff and the neighbours are built to recur across books, and the town itself is supposed to feel like somewhere you would move. It is also low-angst by design. The Lesbian Review files it under low angst, and the central obstacle is logistics and nerve rather than villainy.
Fisch is the only point of view. She is in her mid-thirties, a soft butch with social anxiety and early-onset arthritis, who moved to Clover Hill to get away from a mother who disapproves of her and then barely left the house. Jaeeun is the more butch of the two, Korean-American and Ashkenazi Jewish, an extrovert who arrives with a camera, a cat named Dan and no plan to stay. One early reviewer notes that the single POV is a deliberate choice explained in the author’s introduction, and it means Jaeeun is seen through Fisch’s nervous, smitten eyes.
What Makes This Butch/Butch Small-Town Romance Work
- Butch-for-butch desire: The most praised element. Reader after reader calls a butch/butch romance rare, and one butch reader writes that it was wonderful to see butch women written as desirable.
- Representation stacked, not listed: Two Jewish leads from different backgrounds, social anxiety, arthritis, and a cast that includes a French-Taiwanese baker. Even the two-star reviews credit the representation.
- Dan the cat: The Lesbian Review says she steals every scene she is in, and at least four Goodreads reviewers single her out.
- Clover Hill itself: The café, the bakery and the town are consistently described as affirming, and one reviewer says she ended the book attached to the neighbours as much as the couple.
- Puns and plant talk: Jaeeun’s terrible jokes and Fisch’s native-plant enthusiasm are the book’s comic engine, and readers who liked it name both.
Book Synopsis
Fisch chose Clover Hill for its biodiversity, not its people. A year into living there, she works alone on other people’s textbooks and projects, knows almost nobody beyond the bakery staff, and treats a grocery run as an ordeal. Distance from her mother was meant to be freedom. Instead, she has quietly built a smaller room to hide in, and she is starting to admit to herself that she is lonely.
Then the photojournalist she has been talking to online arrives in person. Jaeeun is in town to photograph and write about Fisch for a series on queer scientists, and Fisch, against every instinct she has, has offered her a place to stay. Jaeeun turns out to be even more striking face to face, relentlessly friendly, fond of truly awful puns, and travelling with a cat who decides on sight that Fisch is hers. The attraction is mutual and immediate, and it does not stay polite for long.
The problem is the calendar. Jaeeun’s work has always kept her moving, and her next assignment is already on the horizon. Fisch has roots here, however shallow, and a head that turns every quiet moment into a list of reasons this cannot last. Neither has said out loud what they are to each other. With the town slowly pulling Fisch out of her shell and Jaeeun beginning to wonder what staying somewhere would feel like, the question is whether either of them is brave enough to ask for more than a visit.
My Review
The best thing here is who it is about. A romance where two butch women want each other, where neither has to soften into the femme role for the story to work, and where both are Jewish in different ways, is still rare enough that readers keep saying so in almost identical words. It is not a gimmick. Fisch and Jaeeun bond over plants, science and a shared, lapsed Jewish upbringing, and The Lesbian Review notes the pair gradually reclaiming ritual together.
The second strength is warmth. Clover Hill accepts Fisch’s anxiety without trying to fix it, which The Lesbian Review’s reviewer found true to experience, and the supporting cast — the baker, her friendly cashier, Dan the cat — is vivid enough that one two-star reader says they were the most interesting people in the book. StoryGraph’s crowd agrees on the mood: 88% call it lighthearted and 77% hopeful.
Where it struggles is pace and repetition. The most repeated criticism is that the romance starts at full speed: Jaeeun moves in during the first chapter, the two are sleeping together by the second, and readers say they wanted more build-up — one four-star reader struggled at first for exactly that reason, and one reader stopped early because the opening felt rushed. The second theme is Fisch’s inner loop. Two lower-rated reviewers found her constant anxiety exhausting, and one points out that after months of sharing a bed she still has not asked whether they are dating. Add a writing style that did not click for a third reader, and at least one reader objecting to Jaeeun being called “the butch” instead of her name — the same complaint a reader raised about the author’s Matzo Match.
One expectation to reset: this is not a slow burn, whatever you may have seen it listed as. The attraction is instant and physical from the start, and the tension is about staying, not about getting together. If you want a slow build, calibrate; if you want a gentle, cosy romance with real desire in it, it delivers.
My honest note: A four-star idea with three-and-a-half-star execution, carried by representation, community and a very good cat. If an anxious narrator circling the same worry grates on you, this will grate. If you have been waiting for two butches in love in a town that roots for them, it is exactly that.
| Element | In Rooting for You |
|---|---|
| Central relationship | Sara Fisch & Jaeeun Kupperman — anxious soft-butch botanist and extrovert butch photojournalist, online friends to lovers |
| Core tropes | Butch/butch, small town, forced proximity, introvert/extrovert, will-she-stay, queer found family |
| Setting | Clover Hill, an artsy, queer-friendly small town shared across a multi-author series |
| Heat level | 3/5 — open door, brief explicit scenes |
| Series | Clover Hill Romance book 3 — standalone couple, happy ending with an epilogue |
| Content notes | Explicit sex, brief homophobia from a parent, strained parent relationships, internalised butchphobia, negative self-talk, social anxiety, chronic pain, discussion of climate change |
How Spicy Is Rooting for You?
A 3/5. romance.io lists the book but has no steam rating for it, so this comes from two places. The Clover Hill series runs its own three-step heat guide, and this book sits at its top level, which means on-page sex. The Lesbian Review tags it average spice, medium heat. Readers fill in the detail: one reviewer’s content notes include explicit sex with penetration, another counts three scenes in the first 80%, each about a page long, and a third describes Jaeeun as a confident top.
The thing worth knowing in advance is the gap between promise and delivery. The author’s introduction, as readers describe it, promises hot, explicit queer Jewish sex, and two lower-rated readers found the scenes brief and “so-so”; both also flagged one piece of anatomical vocabulary they disliked. No reviewer I found flags anything darker than the homophobic mother. For butch-centred romance in the same heat band, Wherever Is Your Heart and Butch Girls Can Fix Anything sit at the same level.
Who Should Read This Book?
You’ll likely love it if: you have been looking for a butch/butch romance, you like cosy small towns with a big supporting cast, you enjoy disability and anxiety rep written with care, and you want low angst with real desire on the page.
You may want to skip it if: you need a slow build before the leads get together, an anxious narrator repeating the same doubts frustrates you, you want long, detailed sex scenes, or puns make you wince.
In short: the representation, the town and the cat are the reasons to go; the fast start and Fisch’s worry loop are the price.
What Readers Are Actually Saying (September 2026)
There is no viral moment behind Rooting for You and no sign of one now. It is a quiet 2022 indie release with a small, steady readership: 61 Goodreads ratings, 21 StoryGraph reviews, 39 Amazon ratings, and a Kindle Store rank around 932,000 when I checked, which means very few people are finding it by browsing. The routes in are visible in the reviews. Several of the early reviewers received advance copies from the author or through BookSirens, a few say they came because they already follow the Clover Hill series, and one DNF reader says she kept seeing it recommended as a rare butch-for-butch romance — sometimes, she suspected, by people who had not read it. There is no audiobook that I could find.
Why readers love it (according to the discourse): Representation, first and by a distance. “Rare” is the recurring word for a butch/butch pairing, and the Jewish leads, social anxiety and arthritis come up again and again as things readers rarely see. Second, the community: every character except Fisch’s mother is described as affirming, and readers name the baker, the cashier and the cat as highlights. Third, the tone. Readers call it sweet, wholesome and hopeful, with “delightful” recurring, and StoryGraph’s crowd rates it fast-paced (62%) and character-driven (75%). Notably, one reader with social anxiety of her own said Fisch’s urge to isolate resonated — the same trait other readers found tiring. And the epilogue gets unusual attention: one reader says it made her tear up, another calls it surprisingly different from the romance norm but a perfect fit.
What readers argue about and complain about: Pace, above everything. Readers say the romance is too quick to start, and one reader who stopped at 80% sums up her problem with it — moved in by chapter one, in bed by chapter two, and still dithering months later. The second theme is Fisch’s anxiety on the page: two lower-rated reviewers describe her timidity as never-ending or wearing, and one felt the obstacles were illusory. Third: the prose. One reader found the style simply not for her, another called the whole thing bland, and one criticises the habit of calling Jaeeun “the butch.” Then the genuine split: the sex scenes, which some readers call hot and others call brief and underwhelming.
The standalone question worth asking first: Rooting for You stands alone. Fisch and Jaeeun’s story resolves, and each Clover Hill book follows a different couple by a different author, so you can start here. The series averages cluster around four stars, with Winning Move (book 1, Skye Kilaen) at 4.19 and A Milky Way Home (book 6, Hsinju Chen) at 4.32 among the most-read. Within Alexander’s own catalogue, the Hot for the Holidays books sit a notch higher: Higher, a butch/butch Rosh Hashanah romance, averages 4.16, and her butch-for-butch short Bring Me Home averages 4.30. If this one leaves you wanting more heat from the same author, Matzo Match is noticeably spicier.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is Rooting for You a butch/butch romance?
Yes. The official description calls it a butch-for-butch love story, and readers consistently describe the pairing that way: Fisch is a soft butch and Jaeeun the more masculine of the two.
How spicy is Rooting for You?
A 3/5. romance.io has no steam rating for it, but the series’ own heat guide places it at on-page sex, and readers describe a few explicit scenes that are short rather than lingering.
Does Rooting for You have a happy ending?
Yes. Readers report no cliffhanger and no sad turn, and two reviewers single out the epilogue as a perfect ending for the couple. The main conflict — whether Jaeeun will keep travelling — is resolved.
Do I need to read the Clover Hill Romance books in order?
No. Each book is a standalone romance about a different couple, written by a different author and set in the same town. One early reviewer notes it reads fine as a stand-alone.
Is Rooting for You a slow burn?
No. The attraction is immediate, the two share a house from the first chapter and they sleep together early. The tension is about whether they will stay together, not about getting together.
Is there a Rooting for You audiobook?
Not that I could find. Amazon lists only Kindle and paperback editions, and Libro.fm does not stock it.
If You Loved Rooting for You, Read These Next
For another rare butch/butch romance in a small town with a supporting cast readers love, Touch the Sky is the closest match, donkey instead of cat. If you want two butches in a less welcoming town and more heat, Desperate Times is the frank, funnier cousin. And for a tender butch/butch novella at the same heat level, Wherever Is Your Heart trades Clover Hill’s youthful nerves for two women around fifty finally acting on years of pining.
For more in this register, browse our butch/butch lesbian romance guide or the full Book Reviews collection.
The Bottom Line
Rooting for You sets out to give butch readers something the genre rarely offers: two butch women, both Jewish, both wanted, in a town that is on their side. The representation is layered, the community is warm and Dan the cat is worth the price alone. It is also a romance that starts too fast to build tension, a narrator whose anxiety repeats more than it develops, and sex scenes shorter than the introduction promises. Whether that trade works depends on what you came for — but if you want a sweet, low-angst butch/butch romance with a happy ending, it is well worth an afternoon. Check Rooting for You on Amazon →
The Eikna Overall Ranking
On the Eikna scale, Rooting for You ranks as a warm, low-angst indie butch/butch small-town novella — rare in its representation and generous with community, held back by a rushed start and a repetitive inner voice, and best approached for the couple’s world rather than for slow-burn tension.
The Evidence Scorecard
Overall ★★★★☆ 3.6/5
- ✓ 3.98 average across 61 Goodreads ratings
- ✓ 3.91 across 21 StoryGraph reviews
- ✓ Only 7% of ratings at one or two stars
- ✓ Pace complaints recur across the low ratings
Romance ★★★★☆ 3.6/5
- ✓ Mutual attraction from the first meeting
- ✓ Bonding over plants, science and Judaism
- ✓ Honest communication praised by early readers
- ✓ Too fast to start for several readers
Characters ★★★★☆ 3.8/5
- ✓ Dan the cat steals every scene
- ✓ Supporting cast named as a highlight
- ✓ 100% of StoryGraph voters call them loveable
- ✓ Fisch’s anxiety loop wears some readers down
Writing ★★★☆☆ 3.3/5
- ✓ Puns and humour widely enjoyed
- ✓ 62% of StoryGraph readers call it fast
- ✓ Native-plant detail feels lived-in
- ✓ Style, word choice and “the butch” flagged
Emotional Impact ★★★★☆ 3.6/5
- ✓ Anxiety rep resonates with anxious readers
- ✓ Epilogue moved at least one reader to tears
- ✓ 77% of StoryGraph readers call it hopeful
- ✓ Obstacles felt illusory to some readers
Heat Level ★★★☆☆ 3/5
- ✓ Top level of the series’ own heat guide
- ✓ The Lesbian Review tags it medium heat
- ✓ Explicit scenes confirmed in reader content notes
- ✓ Scenes short, and no romance.io steam rating
Ending ★★★★☆ 4/5
- ✓ Standalone couple, no cliffhanger
- ✓ Epilogue singled out by two reviewers
- ✓ Will-she-stay conflict resolved
- ✓ Low stakes make the outcome predictable
Re-read Value ★★★★☆ 3.6/5
- ✓ Cosy, one-sitting length at 151 pages
- ✓ Clover Hill offers twelve more books
- ✓ In Kindle Unlimited for an easy return
- ✓ No audiobook for a second pass
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