I rarely read sports romance. I enjoy sports, go to baseball and hockey games a few times a year, this last year I even followed the Tour de France…and still I mostly avoid sport romances. This is why when Cat Sebastian was singing the praises of this series several years back , I was happy to ignore the rec and keep on reading my RS and PNR books.

However after stumbling on to dozens of positive and more importantly several considered critical mentions of the series on Bluesky in the wake of the release of the first season of Heated Rivalry I decided to finally give them a try. I skipped Game Changer initially, starting with Heated Rivalry since I was eager to watch the show.

I don’t regret that decision, especially since the audio narrator in the early books makes many questionable voice and accent choices and I might have bounced off the series if I hadn’t been invested already. I am glad that I went back to read book 1 before reading the rest of the series in publication order despite the hilarious New Yawker bro voice given to Kip.

I think the critiques of Reid’s virtual erasure of Shane’s Japanese-Canadian heritage and generally underwriting him in the series are completely valid.

Despite having living engaged parents, his ethnicity and heritage rarely mentioned, most often by other people. Ilya’s character is way more flashy in story and narratively makes a lot of the big moves in the book (and through out the series). Huge kudos to Hudson Williams and Jacob TIerney for doing as much as they do in the series with his hyper reserved and controlled persona.

One real highlight for me in both the books and the show is the love Ilya and Shane receive from Rose and Svetlana. Those are great pivotal relationships and I enjoyed those characters greatly. I would love stories for them!

I loved Tough guy and I particularly loved Ryan Price as a character. So much to chew through, his tough guy persona, who is really frustrated by the way he is used to the league and also feels like he shouldn’t walk away from what so many others would love to have. Loved that with the introduction of Barrett and Kent, we really started to get to see Reid be willing to engage with the darker elements of Hockey.

Fabian’s familial trauma and his struggle to accept Ryan as a hockey player was deeply tough conflict to overcome. He is right that Hockey is not good for Ryan, but his own pain makes it difficult to support Ryan.

Also I am huge fan of books that are willing to tackle sexual incompatibilities and struggles with reaching orgasm. Too often it is cured by love. And for Ryan and Fabian it isn’t that simple.

I really want to see both these characters in the 2nd season and I am deeply curious what parts of their relationship will make it on screen. How comfortable will people be with a MC that doesn’t feel sexy, or worthy of sexual attention?

Of the sequel books this feels like the book most likely to make it to the screen in season 2. I loved the Ottawa team and I particularly loved the return of Wyatt whose geeky and steadfast goodness and awesomeness is first introduced in Tough Guy. I loved another perspective to the same time period we end up seeing in The Long Game.

I loved Harris in this book, and while I had at points a hard time accepting Troy’s ignorance of Kent’s depravity and his earnest allyship as redemption move, and newfound convictions, I did love how incredibly awkward and lost he is trying to figure out how to treat people with care and respect, rather than being a huge asshole as self-defense.