Books: Romance and/or hockey recommendations

[escritoireazul]

I'm in need of recommendations for contemporary romance stories, hockey romance stories, and hockey stories in general and would love any and all suggestions, fic or books or movies/tv shows, whatever.

Comments

[tielan]

At some point in the past, I got hooked into Catherine Gayle's Portland Storm hockey romance series. It's a series surrounding the players of a Portland hockey team, and how the various players find love.

It's a pretty long-running series - about 18 stories at this stage, most of them novel-length, a few novellas. Sometimes there are callbacks, and the series progresses through the various years. In book-time, there's at least five years between the first book and the ones currently being published.

The books are pretty good. There's something in the writing that feels a touch awkward and I've never managed to quite process what. It might be the first-person POV (for both male and female protags) that puts me off, I can't decscribe it. But I liked the characters better than the first hockey romance series I tried reading, which was Dierdre Martin's NY Blades series. The characters in that one annoyed me, and I think I stopped reading after book 3.

There's at least one m/m romance in the Portland Storm series, but that's about book 15 or 16. She also has a spin-off series that's a lot darker-and-edgier: the heroes or heroines have been through a much rougher time, including abusive parents, exes, and a background in the porn industry.

I don't know how you feel about Hockey AUs for fandom, but philyra has written an entire MCU AU where the Marvel characters (mostly from the movies) are part of a hockey team owned by Pepper Potts. Get Ready For It is a fun, enjoyable happy-place read (particularly the first one in the series).

Contemporary romances: someone above has mentioned Courtney Milan, and although they didn't talk about the series name, it's called "Year Of The Crocodile" and is a couple of novels, assorted short stories, and I think that there's an m/m romance coming out about the father(s) of the male protag from the first book. Also, Tina Chen's mother is GOLD.

Finally, I briefly landed in hockey RPF when someone recced me Neon Tulips by ladyalysv which is Sidney Crosby/Amanda Kessel. It's delightful and entertaining and deservedly popular.