There are SO MANY hockey romances around, you guys!! I read a random sampling of them over the course of the year. Please, allow my sacrifice to guide you, as you choose more wisely than I did.
Slap Shot was a fun if forgettable romance. First in the series, but the subsequent novels were, according to my notes, “too expensive to be worth it.” My thumbnails are occasionally rude like that.
Juliet heads to a hockey match, and gets hit in the head by a slap shot from Vaughn. She awakens with AMNESIA. I did not make this up. Amnesia. Vaughn has recently moved to Lauderdale for a fresh start, and so he’s a little worried about the repercussions of almost killing a hometown princess from a big Italian family.
Juliet feels way more comfortable with Vaughn than she does with said big, Italian family, and the clean slate gives her a chance to re-evaluate her choices. Inevitably, they fall in love, and live HEA.
Not so inevitably, there’s some weird stuff in there about Vaughn’s dad being from an MC that had absolutely zero payoff. Earlier This Year Me had no idea what was going on, there.
Ice Breaker is book one in the Maple Hills series. I read book three on a plane (it was the only book on special enough in the airport shop), and decided to come back for the rest of the series. A pretty classic enemies-to-lovers romance, it involves Anastasia, a figure skater, and Nate, captain of the hockey team. When one of the two (2!) rinks on campus gets damaged, their respective teams are forced to share.
When Anastasia’s skating partner is hurt in a fall, she is forced to train with Nate in order to stay on track for an upcoming comp. Inevitably, they fall in love.
These are actually pretty good instances of the hockey romance genre, as far as it goes. HG includes neurodivergent characters in the series with a deft hand, everyone’s in college so they’re making choices with actual stakes, and they’re not so contrivance driven that you can’t see the page for rolling your eyes (see also: AMNESIA!). Nobody was more surprised than I was when I read all three.
The Boyfriend Goal, another series starter, and to be quite honest, I didn’t mind it. Josie is a librarian who has just moved to San Francisco. Until her temporary rental is ready, she’s staying with a friend. Unfortunately, she manages to lock herself out of said friend’s apartment in her PJs, and the code to the door is on her phone… on the kitchen counter.
With no option other than to search out her roommate at work, Josie takes off in her slippers an art gallery event. She’s stopped at the door by the artist (because: standards), and rescued by Wes. One thing leads to another, and they head home together.
Turns out, Wes is a hockey player, and on the team her brother captains. It ALSO turns out that her rental falls through, and her brother organises her a spare room to stay in… at Wes’ house. Contrivance, ho!
For all that, I actually really loved the library Josie was working in. She was a contract hire, brought in to help digitise old books and videos for library guests, and to run some social media initiatives. That library sounded amazing, and I wanted to work there. Oh, and they lived happily ever after, of course.
In contrast, Thoroughly Pucked, ALSO by Lauren Blakely, was bit of a WTF of a novel. From my notes, because I was apparently aghast:
So, I thought this was part of a series I was already reading, because of the cartoon image on the cover. But it turns out I am reading two (2!) other hockey-based threesome series? How is that a thing? Nice one, Self.
Protag is getting ready for her wedding and having second thoughts. Groom bursts in and tells her, “Actually, there’s a whole world out there for banging, and maybe let’s not get married? Wedding night is still a go, though, yeah?” This is almost a direct quote.
Protag’s brother’s besties bust her out of the wedding and then take her on her NotHoneymoon to cheer her up.
The rest is banging history, and I already forgot all their names.
Going to go ahead and NOT recommend that one.