Pucking Around: Our First (and Last?) Hockey Romance | Book Chat - Shelf Addiction Podcast

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:02):
Hey, booklovers, Welcome back to shelf Addiction, the podcast where
we dive deep into the pages of thriller and fantasy reads.
I'm your host, Tamara, and today we are breaking from
our usual genre with a palate cleanser, a hockey Why
choose romance? But first a quick heads up. If you
crave the full visual experience and want to ditch the ads,
head on over to our Patreon. You'll unlock ad free

(00:24):
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(00:47):
book Club's app, and don't forget to subscribe and leave
us a review wherever you are listening. And speaking of community,
I'm thrilled to welcome back my fantasy and romance writer
die co host Casey from Heart full of Ink, Welcome
back here.

Speaker 2 (00:58):
Hello, Hello, I'm so excited to be here today.

Speaker 1 (01:02):
I'm excited to talk about this book.

Speaker 2 (01:05):
Are you.

Speaker 1 (01:08):
So? Are you though? Okay? Well, okay, I'll get into
that in our high level, but for now, yes, I
am okay. Y'all can find both of us online and
all of the usual spots. The links for everything are
in the show notes, so click around do all the things.
We appreciate you for doing it. Before we begin, I
want to remind you that we talk full spoilers here

(01:30):
with book chats, so spoiler alert you've been warned. Today
we are discussing pucking Around. Written by Emily Wrath. The
audiobook is narrated by Amy Hall, Alex Kidd, and Ash Beverly.
Published on March twentieth, twenty twenty three by Emily Rath
Books and Tandor Audio. The e book is a whopping
five hundred and ninety four pages, and the unabridged audio

(01:53):
is never ending at twenty four hours and forty one minutes. Casey,
would you kindly share the synopsis?

Speaker 2 (01:59):
My name is Ray Price, and two months ago I
walked away from the perfect man, sweet and funny and
so hot it should be illegal. We shared one magical night,
no names, no strings. I never thought i'd see him again.
I was wrong. It turns out mister Perfect is the
ployeeboy grinder for the Jacksonville Rays, the NHL's hottest new

(02:20):
hockey team, and I'm his new physical therapist. Oh and
the jerk doesn't even recognize me. This fellowship is going
to be the longest ten months of my life. Mister
Perfect Mistake will do anything to get back on my
good side. Meanwhile, his best friend is the surly new
equipment manager, always riting my case. Worst of all, I've

(02:41):
got an uncooperative goalie who thinks I can't tell he's
hiding an injury. This is my chance to prove myself,
and I'm not risking it for anything. But with one
unexpected night, one secret revealed, these men are ready to
test all my limits. I can't fall for a player,
let alone three If love is a game these guys

(03:01):
are playing to win. Contains mature content.

Speaker 1 (03:07):
Definitely, It definitely does. It definitely does, And with that
being said, you guys, we are gonna try our best
to keep it PG. Thirteen for you. We're definitely saving
the juicier stuff for the after show. So if you're
curious about what we think of some of those scenes, specifically,
you'll need to tune into the after show. You know,

(03:28):
we don't want any strikes on our accounts over here,
so we try to clean ourselves up. Okay, as best
we can with this kind of content, that's for sure.
All right, high level, what do you think?

Speaker 2 (03:42):
I enjoyed it. It was cute, it was sexy. I
like that the sex scenes were actually showing character growth.
I mean that's the rule of romance, is that they
should show character growth, but usually they just get so
boring and repetitive and gratuity. But this time, like each
scene was actually gross and different. So I when I

(04:08):
enjoyed it.

Speaker 1 (04:09):
But okay, so I with you.

Speaker 2 (04:12):
Never read a hockey book before. Yeah, you never watched
a hockey game before. I have no idea what they're
doing on the ice, Like, none of that matters to me.
I'm just talking about like the vibes of the book.

Speaker 1 (04:24):
Yeah, I still think you're being generous. But okay, yes, okay,
so high level, I too also enjoyed it. In the moment,
I had a good time with it. I was kind
of like, OMG, and this can't be real, Like this
is the most I heard. But you know, it was
a good ride and it kind of made for fast

(04:45):
reading because it was definitely entertaining. And I did listen
to an audio book, so of course that was your
phone's only. Oh yeah, because you did not cooth. No,
you don't want anyone to hear what they are saying
because it's like pornography. Let's let's keep it real. But

(05:06):
you know, I too, also, I've well, I've been to
one hockey game and it was on a date and
I barely remember because I was so cold. I was
freezing my ass off. I don't I barely well. I
remember one other thing, okay, there were no other black
people in sight. I remember that, okay, but it was cold,

(05:27):
and I never saw another hockey game again, I have seen.

Speaker 2 (05:31):
Zero, so you've seen exactly one more than me.

Speaker 1 (05:34):
Yeah, and I don't remember it very well. So that's
I don't know. So when she was talking about hockey,
I feel like the author did a decent job explaining
the things. So I wasn't confused by any of the
hockey things that were happening, but I didn't really care
about it. So overall, good experience. But yeah, I'm going
to nitpick the hell out of this book.

Speaker 2 (05:57):
Go for it.

Speaker 1 (05:58):
So but you know, you get the two things can
be true. You can have a good time and still
not be the best thing you ever read. So it
was honestly when this book was picked, I just felt
kind of tired of all the like I've been reading
a lot of the same stuff. Yes, and so this

(06:22):
was definitely out of the box first time for both
of us with hockey romance. Yes, And we picked this
author because she like has some thing going on on
the internet, right, She kind of has like a rep
on the internet.

Speaker 2 (06:37):
She's telling all Trump supporter maga people to f write
off her books are not a safe space for them
because they keep voting to take away gay rights, and
she's like, you hate my characters, so don't read my books.
And then the Republican MAGA people who keep voting for
Trump to take away gay marriage or saying no, you

(06:59):
were a total bit for telling us that we can't
read your books, and it went on for a while.

Speaker 1 (07:06):
Well, I appreciate her for doing that, Like I'm glad
she stood up like fuck you guys, excuse my friend. Yeah,
but you know, I like when authors take a stand
on things, and I thought that was pretty cool when
I heard her doing that. So I'm like, well, why
not try her? Like, that's not really our jam, but
we can try it.

Speaker 2 (07:26):
Why not exactly? So question to jump in, did you
read the prequel that one night? Did you think of that?

Speaker 1 (07:38):
So? Okay, Honestly, I really really liked the prequel. I
think without the prequel I wouldn't have been as invested
in the characters because I kept wanting to them to
like come across each other sooner. I'm like, oh my god,
it's gonna happen. How long do you have to wait
before they have an interaction or whatever? But I thought

(08:01):
was really cute. It was kind of like a one
night stand kind of thing, and of course it was sexy.
I liked it. I thought it was a good leading Yes.

Speaker 2 (08:11):
Same and now I'm gonna be mean and say I
feel like that was the only time Jake really shined
in their relationship, Like I during that novella when it
was just the two of them and she's like, I
love you, You're perfect, You're my angel, You're my everything. I

(08:31):
believed it then and then every other time throughout the
rest of the book. He always felt like second fiddle
to everybody.

Speaker 1 (08:39):
Else he is. Unfortunately Jake is I would call him,
and I don't have a lot of contemporary romances to
stack this against, you know, I don't need a ton
of it, but I would put him in that, you know,
golden retriever status, Like he's a coldly retriever kind of
guy who knows how to kick it up for her

(09:01):
because he knows she likes it, so he can be
a little bit more dominant when it's called for. But
his nature is to just you know, love me, be
with me, go around. Yeah. Yeah, it's very interesting and
very different from the others, and that does kind of
I think put him in last place, which is sad

(09:23):
because he's the one that craves first place most. He
like wants to marry her, he wants all the things. Yeah,
you know, I guess he gets what he gets, but
he has to share, so I don't know, I.

Speaker 2 (09:36):
Don't know, like it just I believed her love of
him in the novella, and I believed that there were
soulmates there. And then as soon as like his best
friend starts coming in, Caleb and she's just like, oh
my god, Caleb, I love you so much. And then
she turns and she's like, yes, Angel, I love you too.

Speaker 1 (09:56):
And I was like, Okay, honestly, this just honestly made
me not like Rachel because I don't think she actually
loves these two dudes, because okay, three dudes. Because let
me just say, I did not read the synopsis when
I started. I knew it was why I choose, but
I didn't know it was going to be three men,

(10:17):
so I knew it was going to be at least two.
And then as I'm reading, I'm like, bitch, do not
go for the goalie? Are we doing this again? Like
you want them to take a third? So it's like,
I don't believe she really loves any of them. She's
like one of these love is love, y'all, and everybody is,
you know. So I can't take her seriously at all.

(10:38):
I can't take her seriously. So poor Jake, poor Caleb,
and actually poor you know Omri as well, because she
don't love none of them. She loves the sex with
all of them, and she loves being wanted by all
of them, but I don't think she actually loves them.
And that's just my two cents.

Speaker 2 (10:57):
I agree. I feel well, okay, I know, and this
is my personal bias, but I know a lot of
girls with that septum piercing the lotus tattoo who are
obsessed with astrology and going, oh my god, he's such
an aries. He's doing this because he's an aries, And

(11:19):
I have my gold nose piercing, and I just I know,
I just know he's doing this because.

Speaker 1 (11:27):
Of a mood rising sars.

Speaker 2 (11:29):
Yes, and they are the most annoying women I've ever
met in my entire life. Yeah, and anytime Rachel would
bring up astrology or signs or anything like that, I
just rolled my eyes right out of my head.

Speaker 1 (11:43):
Yeah, I get it. I mean, honestly, Rachel is such
a what is the word I want to use for her?
She is such a scattered character. She's all over the place.
This woman is twenty six years old. She's a pH
d stew in sports psychology, so she's very smart, but

(12:06):
she's also very traumatized, traumatized, and she's all woo woo
in a lot of ways. And she doesn't she just
does not. She's so wishy washy to me. I have
a hard time getting a good grasp of Rachel, which
made me not really care about her feelings at all. Yes,

(12:30):
it was like.

Speaker 2 (12:32):
They were so and everybody has this. Everybody has all
of these layers. That's not like we all do. But
with her character, You're right, there were so many.

Speaker 1 (12:45):
I don't know.

Speaker 2 (12:45):
But even then, it wasn't like, oh, she acts this
day with this guy, or she does this with this guy.
It was just like she's all of these random things
all at once, and she's making dumb decisions all the time.
And I'm talking about taking a place a secretly to
a different state to get X rays without telling her

(13:05):
boss or clearing it with anybody, which is why she
should have gotten fired.

Speaker 1 (13:10):
I actually wanted her to get fired me too. I
thought that would be good for the character law.

Speaker 2 (13:16):
You're not necessarily the law, but like the law of hockey,
the law of the breaking.

Speaker 1 (13:23):
Yeah, like you're supposed to be a doctor, you're breaking
like the do no harm. By doing that, you're like
not being fair to your boss's, the team or anything.
And I wanted her fired. I wanted her to, like,
I don't know, work for another team or do something.
But how they saved her at the end, I was
like such an over it. At that point, I'm like,
this is such a cop out. I cannot do this.

(13:44):
When it was done, so Rachel didn't really grow to me.

Speaker 2 (13:49):
Why the hell was the other doctor such an asshole? Like,
was he just an asshole for the sake of being
an asshole? And of course everybody hates him, so it's
okay that he gets fired.

Speaker 1 (14:00):
Yeah, he's just a nice person. And he didn't really
they well the author wrote it, so he didn't really
listen to the players.

Speaker 2 (14:08):
Yeah, but like, what was his motivation for ignoring the players?
What was his motivation for being an asshole to the players.
I understood if he was just a misogynist towards the
young twenty something doctor he doesn't give a shit about, like, yeah,
that's a normal thing, but the fact that he even
hated the players and the players hated.

Speaker 1 (14:27):
Him, it's just like he wasn't good at his job.
But yeah, why Yeah, yeah, he's just a villain to
be a villain, to throw a villain.

Speaker 2 (14:35):
Which is annoying. I hate I hate villains who are
just evil for the sake of evil.

Speaker 1 (14:40):
Mm hmm.

Speaker 2 (14:41):
I want them to have some good reason for being evil,
or having backstory or whatever.

Speaker 1 (14:48):
M h Yeah. I agree. That would have been nice
to know why he was like that, but I don't.
In the scheme of things. It really didn't matter. It
was just the catalyst for you know, Mars to go
off and do whatever with Rachel.

Speaker 2 (15:02):
And of course, of course, but it was just one
of those things where I'm like, I wish there was
more here. I know, we have a giant, never ending book,
but like, this thread needs more weight to it.

Speaker 1 (15:16):
Mm hmm. I agree, El Maury is finish. And I
listened to the audio book and can I just say,
every time Elmary or Rachel spoke in finish, I cringed,
fucking cringed. It was so bad. I'm like, oh my god,

(15:37):
what is this? What are they saying? And you know,
Rachel was trying to learn finish, so it was even
more cringe because she really couldn't speak finish and she
was trying to say things to him. I was so
put out by all the finished stuff in there, and
I get why it was there, but on the audio book,
it just did not do what I think the author

(15:59):
wanted it's do. It didn't translate well to me.

Speaker 2 (16:02):
It didn't sound sexy.

Speaker 1 (16:03):
It did not sound sexy. It sounded like what okay next?
Oh no, I did not like, I did not care
for that, but I know that's a part of you know,
his character, but it is what it is. I don't know.
I just had to complain about that because it was
pretty bad. I mean, complain away, I don't actually Okay,

(16:28):
So now High Insight, you know, I've been separated from
this book for a week now, a little over a week,
so I've had a lot of time to kind of
think on it and process a little bit. Because you know,
we come together for these podcasts. I do kind of
like want to have an idea of what I want
to say. So I have thought about the book here
and there over the last week, and every time I
think about the book, I get slightly more annoyed by it,

(16:52):
which is opposite of how I felt when I finished
the book. So when I finished the book, I was like,
oh that was cute. Yeah, And you remember I text you,
I'm like, oh, I really like it.

Speaker 2 (17:00):
You talk to me, You're like, I just started and
I'm enjoying it, and I was like.

Speaker 1 (17:04):
Yay, we have happened. That was the prequel. I was
really excited by the prequel, and it's just the longer
it went on. So I guess ultimately I do have
issues with some of the characters. As we'll get into
more of that, but like at the highest level, the
book was too damn long, and it just dragged and
dragged and dragged, and I think the more it went on,

(17:28):
the harder it was for me to even suspend disbelief
for the stuff that was happening and thinking about it after.
That's why I was rolling my eyes and kind of
was like, you know, here and there, So that's my
my issue. It was almost too much of a thing.

(17:48):
You know how you have like too much of a
quote unquote good thing. I almost think that was like
the offense here. It was just too much, too much
of everything. It was gluttonous. And at one point I
called Rachel gluttonis I said, bitch, you just graty.

Speaker 2 (18:02):
Oh she's so greedy.

Speaker 1 (18:04):
I don't even I don't believe her. Like I mentioned earlier,
I don't believe she's in love with these two dudes.
She's just gratty and that's not sexy to me.

Speaker 2 (18:15):
Yeah, ran over.

Speaker 1 (18:17):
I don't even know how I got on that topic,
but that's how it went.

Speaker 2 (18:21):
I mean, we're just talking about the book. We're just
you know, oh, this book.

Speaker 1 (18:29):
Okay, So what did you think about the goal of
the goalie. So he had.

Speaker 2 (18:38):
I don't want to say the most depth, because Caleb
had some depth too. But Caleb was like, we got
a lot of his trauma at the very beginning, and
then he just kind of tapered off and then he
was just like the grumpy cat that she kept comparing
him to. He's just like, he's just my grumpy cat.
He's just my grumpy cat. And I was like, he
has trauma, he has story. What about his alcoholism? What

(19:02):
about all of these other things he wants?

Speaker 1 (19:04):
Alcoholism? Oh yeah, I guess he was kind of an alcoholic.

Speaker 2 (19:08):
Yeah, no, like after and he was depressed, and he
was an alcoholic for years, and like he went through
all of this, Like there was so much of that
in the beginning, and I was like, oh, I'm really
intrigued by him. I want to learn more. And then
it just disappeared to me.

Speaker 1 (19:26):
He was just like, what is the word? Is this
escape me me? Right now? He is just a dominant person.
Well yeah, no, it was a dominant and that was say,
that's all I could think about him, And I couldn't
even like his trauma. I don't know how that reflected

(19:46):
in that other arena, Like I couldn't see the correlation
between the two or no, like a periods. So like,
if he's supposed to be obviously at the end there
was that hiccup because they had the game and you know,
Jake took that guy. It was a whole thing.

Speaker 2 (20:02):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (20:02):
So outside of that, though, if he's supposed to be
doing all this growing and he had all this trauma
about that, I didn't feel that throughout the book.

Speaker 2 (20:12):
And that's what I'm saying is like there was so
much at the beginning and then it just kind of disappeared,
and then his story just became about getting Jake to
admit that he loves him and going gay or by
or whatever. Like it was just this weird you're for
him and now we're just focusing on the gay side
of things, which is fantastic. I love bisexual men, like

(20:35):
love them so much, but it just is not It
wasn't a compearing, it wasn't consistent. There was so much
more that could have been done with his character. And
sorry I got sidetracked with him when you asked about
the other guy in Mars, whereas he you know, had
all of his trauma with his dad, abandoning him, his
mother dying, he doesn't feel like he's part of the team,

(20:58):
even though he's the Kohli and everybody's like you are
the team, and like there was so much more to
him than and that that got dealt with, right, Like
he he kept dealing with that throughout the story. His
his arc didn't change.

Speaker 1 (21:16):
Right because I think he just I think the found
family trope really applied to him more than the rest
of them because he really didn't have that and he
was missing that, yes, Peace, And so I think you're right.
His story arc, you know, his plot device was him
having a problem with his past and you know, his

(21:39):
family and all that shit, And yeah, I got it
throughout the entire book. I feel like it was consistent
in that and even where he grows a little bit
at the end and his dad is invited to the game,
you know, so it's kind of like we see some
character grow there. But with khalib I, he's very one
note to me, unfortunately, and he was trying so hard

(22:03):
to get Jake to like admit that he loved him,
like you said, but I stand by Jake is not gay.
He's gay for Khalib and that kind of came up
in the book because he's like, dude's gross. But Khaleib Caleb, Okay,

(22:23):
maybe it's gay.

Speaker 2 (22:29):
I'm gay for you.

Speaker 1 (22:31):
Yeah. So it's like, I'm not attracted to you visually,
but I'm attracted to you emotionally. It's kind of hard
to explain what was going on between Jake and Caleb.
I keep trying to say his name wrong, but I don't.
I don't know. I think that's the only way the
author could make it. Okay, so it was m f

(22:54):
m M. That's the only way she can make it
that way is if two of the guys will have
inner action with each other, And that's how she did it,
just because they're best friends forever. But I don't think
it's it's weird. It's weird to me. It didn't feel
like natural. Is that the word I'm looking for. I

(23:15):
don't know.

Speaker 2 (23:16):
Was it forced to me?

Speaker 1 (23:18):
Yeah? I think it was a little bit, because we'll
talk about the scene where Jake decides to try some
things and I'm like, oh god, okay, oh yeah, not
bad for him a little bit. I'm like, oh, I
felt a little embarrassed for him a little bit. But
I don't know if that was the I'm sure that

(23:38):
wasn't the goal the author was going for, but that
was the reaction I had. I'm like, oh shit, but yeah,
it felt forced to me. I didn't believe that Jake
and Caleb loved each other.

Speaker 2 (23:49):
I believe that they did. It just felt convenient, especially
when they all get married and she's like, I'm gonna
marry Mars and you get to marry your best friend.
How I was like, oh, it's a nice little pretty bow,
even though Jake has been asking you since day one

(24:12):
to marry him, and now you're just like, I'm gonna
pawn you off onto your best friend.

Speaker 1 (24:18):
Again, get what he wants. Jake never gets what he wants.
He's stuck with Caleb because obviously Mars is like hands off, dudes.
He's like no, so he's not for that part of it.
But yeah, so you're right, he got ponned off on
Caleb so they would have this perfect square, you know.

Speaker 2 (24:43):
Which. Again I was like, that doesn't seem fair to anybody,
especially not Jake, especially not Caleb. But like, none of that,
like you said earlier, does she even love them or
does she want to control them? And say, Okay, this
is how what's happening? You're doing this, I'm doing this.
This is the way it plays out. Yes, you're my

(25:05):
special mystery man, my soulmate of forever. It always but
just like, marry your best friend and keep fucking me
like girl.

Speaker 1 (25:16):
So do you think, okay, let's talk about that specifically.
Do you think that Rachel is really the captain of
this team? And I'm saying that in air quotes because
they keep calling each other a team, but she's the
one bossing everybody around and telling people what the rules are.
Do you think she's like for they're just going along

(25:36):
or do you think that you know, they're kind of
letting her think that she's.

Speaker 2 (25:40):
I think they're going along with what she says because
they're getting what they want, which is her kitty cat.

Speaker 1 (25:54):
I can say something about that after show.

Speaker 2 (25:56):
Oh yeah, yeah, there's so many words and names you
talk about black. They wanted that and they were getting that,
and they were definitely letting her take the lead a lot.
I did, like when Caleb gave her the SmackDown and

(26:17):
I was like, you either leave or you stay, it's
your choice, and then walked away from her, and then
she had to you know cry again, which, by the way,
just overall, this is something I hate with the very
core of my being. When like the first or second chapter,
the heroine says, I hate crying. I never cry. I

(26:41):
never want to break down in tears in front of everybody.
But then literally every other chapter she's crying over something
or another like a petulant child, Like a petulant child,
and I'm just like, Okay, either get rid of that
line of I don't cry, or get rid of all
the tears.

Speaker 1 (27:00):
I only I hate crying unless it's I needed to
get my way.

Speaker 2 (27:05):
Which she did every single time. And some of the
times were understandable, like when she was really stressed out
after staying up for thirty six hours and moving her
life across the country, Like, yes, tears, they're understandable. I
would be crying too, like that was. But every other
chapter she's blinking back tears, crying over this or that,

(27:28):
and I was just like, God, damn it. Yes, women
are emotional, but do does she have to cry every
two seconds?

Speaker 1 (27:36):
Again? I think that what the author was going for
with that she missed because instead of feeling ah, dang,
you know, poor Rachel, I feel like girl, get the
hell out of here exactly. Like in chapter one, say I'm.

Speaker 2 (27:54):
A crier, like I get stressed and I cry.

Speaker 1 (27:57):
I'm emotional about everything. Me too, into real.

Speaker 2 (28:01):
Life, me too, I get that, But don't be this
girl who's like, oh well, I never cry. I don't cry.
I'm so emotionless. And then every other chapter you crying
over something of like, oh my god, he's meeting his
father again and I'm crying. You yelled at me, so

(28:22):
now I have to cry? Like there was just so
much crying after she made it so clear that she
would never ever ever cry.

Speaker 1 (28:33):
Yeah, there was a lot of crying, so much crying.
Oh okay, Actually, I think this is a great time
to take a break. You guys, check out these commercials.
By doing that, you are supporting the podcast. Don't forget
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(28:53):
the Shelf Addiction design on it that would support us,
and we'll be right back. Okay, welcome back everyone. What's next?
What else? What else we got?

Speaker 2 (29:07):
Oh? Okay, so do you want to hear my plot
hole of a sort? Yes, that you actually had to
help me figure out before we started recording.

Speaker 3 (29:18):
Okay, obviously everybody, this is a giant book, right, and
there's so many details just falling in love with three
different men and has so many emotional conversations with them.

Speaker 1 (29:30):
And I was like, I.

Speaker 2 (29:33):
Was like, I remember, at some point I thought she
said her parents got divorced. But then at the end
of the book, she flies out to La where her
parents are happily still married, living in the same house.
Everything's hunky dory, and I was like, what, wait a second,

(29:56):
what didn't she say bad shit happened with her? So
dem literally downloaded it on d unlimited and we searched
for the word divorced and popped up what like four times.

Speaker 1 (30:09):
Yeah, and so yes.

Speaker 2 (30:11):
During one of her conversations, she talked about how her
dad shaded on her mom and there was picture evidence
and they split. The word used was split, right, But
I guess they got back together because divorce was still taboo.

Speaker 1 (30:28):
Yeah, I guess that's stupid, But.

Speaker 2 (30:31):
It's stupid, sure, sure, but you know she has to
have the happy ending where her mother is there supporting her,
and her dad's there singing, because of course he has
to sing for her and her twin brothers there crying
happy tears for her. Oh so happy, happy, happy, and

(30:53):
I was just like, a damn it, this is annoying.

Speaker 1 (30:56):
Think about it. It was one of those flashforward happy
ending scenes that you get in movies, because you know,
Jake's twin was there, Kleib's dad was there. You know, like, hey, everybody,
we're one big, happy family and we're all married to
each other. And I'm pregnant.

Speaker 2 (31:14):
But she wasn't actually pregnant yet. They're just trying to
get there.

Speaker 1 (31:19):
But I know that's still but I cannot you know
how much I hate the pregnant me too? Why me too? Why?

Speaker 2 (31:26):
I was like, this is slightly marginally better because she's
not pregnant yet.

Speaker 1 (31:32):
Yeah, but she had to announce.

Speaker 2 (31:33):
It fucking ever after novella that's basically them happy and pregnant.

Speaker 1 (31:38):
And making babies.

Speaker 2 (31:39):
I was like, nope, nope, nope.

Speaker 1 (31:41):
No, Yeah, she had an announcement for them that we
can start trying for a baby. I guess that was her,
which is essentially the same thing, and I will not
be reading that next thing. I don't care about that.

Speaker 2 (31:52):
No.

Speaker 1 (31:52):
I am kind of curious about how they're going to
see who the dad's gonna be first, or they're just
gonna take a chance and I'll take turns and see
and do a tap. I don't know how they're gonna
find out.

Speaker 2 (32:02):
Probably because I was gonna say, like, at least for
medical reasons, and she's a doctor, so she knows this.
They need to know who the actual DNA father is,
so then you'll be like, oh, yes, heart disease runs
in your family. Instead of that, you know, very fictional.
We're not gonna know who your father is because we

(32:23):
all are your father's and we all love you. And
I was like, oh my god, at least like get
the DNA so you know, if you have any genetic
issues in your feet, that's gonna.

Speaker 1 (32:35):
Be very interesting. I don't know. I don't think I
want to touch that subject, but yeah, I yeah, I
just did not care for that little ending almost so
of course, between her not getting fired, which was a
cop out, yes, and then that whole happily ever after
bus at the end, and I guess that's traditional to

(32:58):
a romance, you have to have a happily ever act after, yes,
but I just thought it was so blase. I'm like, oh,
I roll left and left and right all over the place.
I kind of was just like, nah.

Speaker 2 (33:11):
What like the facts that the three guys are switching
their last like doing name changes to take on her
last name. That was different but also really annoying.

Speaker 1 (33:22):
It was not cute. I'm like you, Okay, So first off,
everybody keep your own damn last name, right, you're adults,
keep your own last name. Your professionals. The only person
who probably could do it without any big problem would
be Caleb. But you two are professional hockey players. You

(33:43):
walking around with a jersey with Rachel's last name on it.
What kind of dumb shit is this? This is some
dumb shit exactly. No, No, I'm sorry. I did not
like that. It just got too ridiculous at the end there.
It was just really really stupid. And the longer I've

(34:04):
been away from it, the more stupid I think it is.
Like I said, at the end, I kind of said, oh,
that was cute. But it didn't take but twenty four
hours before I was thinking about, Wow, why m.

Speaker 2 (34:19):
Can I ask what speed did you read the audiobook at?

Speaker 1 (34:24):
I think it was that I played around between one
point five and one point eight. Oh wow. Okay, yeah,
so just depends on what narrator was talking and if
I wasn't feeling the scene that I was listening to
or not, fifth thought it was a lot of whatever.
I just kind of ticked it up a notch. Yeah, okay,

(34:44):
So you know, we have read polyamory books before we
read one or two. Do you think that Emily Rath
managed the emotional complexity? I guess, I'll say of this
type of relationship. Even though we talked about how she failed,
she had some missus hits, I guess with individuals. How

(35:06):
do you think she played, you know, did with them
as a unit. So we read, Oh, her name was
Lily Gold.

Speaker 2 (35:19):
It was like the neighbors next door or something. There
was three guys living next door. So kind of similar
setup with the four people because the heroine she was
running her own store, lingerie, online shop something, and then
the three guys were fake dating her.

Speaker 1 (35:43):
Right.

Speaker 2 (35:45):
I feel like Lily Gold skipped a lot of the
steps because the three guys had dated a woman before,
like the three of them had already gone through polyamory.
They knew what they were doing, right, Whereas here with

(36:06):
Emily Rath, nobody knew what they were doing. It was
all just kind of feeling around in the dark, so
to speak. And so for that I kind of appreciate
Emily a little bit more because it does take time
to set it up, It does take time to kind
of deal with it and say, you know, do you

(36:30):
want to try this? How does this work? What are
we doing?

Speaker 1 (36:35):
Oh?

Speaker 2 (36:35):
You're with them. I can't be with you. Oh but
I want to be with you anyway. So let's try
and make it work with them. Let's have these little
fights that aren't really fights and get resolved really fast,
and everybody's just happy, which is not very realistic. Everything
was so happy because it's fiction. I think if this
was more realistic, the book would have been twice as

(36:57):
long and they're doing a lot more fights, and people
would have left and then maybe come back and YadA, YadA,
YadA YadA.

Speaker 1 (37:05):
Okay.

Speaker 2 (37:06):
All of that to say is I kind of appreciate
what Emily did more because she took the time to
really dive into the Okay, what is Poullyamory, what are
we doing? Whereas Emily or Lily the last book was
just like, Yep, we've done this, we like this, We're
all gonna date together and it's fine.

Speaker 1 (37:26):
Yeah, So that book was Faking with benefits, Faking with Me.
That's the title, and if you're curious, we did do
it on the podcast. It's available. If you're curious what
we thought of that, Watchoo's book.

Speaker 2 (37:39):
We did that like two or three years ago, right.

Speaker 1 (37:41):
That was actually twenty two, twenty two.

Speaker 2 (37:43):
Okay, I'm surprised I remember that much.

Speaker 1 (37:46):
Yeah, you remember it a lot. I think, I guess. Ultimately,
I think she did a good job with Pollyamory as
like a topic, you know what I mean. There was
the comparison thing going on, There was jealousy going on.
They had to deal with boundaries. Yes, they had to
make sure that freakin' Mars would share. Remember, they're like,

(38:09):
we got to make sure he's on board to actually
share because he doesn't want to deal with us kind
of thing. I think she did a good job with
it as well as, you know, as a topic in itself,
more than the other book. But again, the dynamic is
a little different here because it seems like Rachel's the

(38:30):
one in the driver's seat, but the guys kind of
were similar, and that you know, you got one who's
like the power person, like who's running the show, but
not what do they call it topping from the bottom
or something. He's doing that like the whole time. Caleb
is kind of that, Oh yeah, but that's very weird.

(38:55):
And then we have someone who's kind of reluctant, and
then of course the puppy dog. So it was kind
of like similar in that way.

Speaker 2 (39:02):
I feel like those are the main archetypes that authors
go for, just to make it easy to be like, Yes,
here's our tall, dark fay prince with his black hair
and his scruffy beard. And then here's our Thor look
alike who's tall and blonde and broad shouldered and has

(39:22):
a giant ding dong. And then here's our happy golden
retreats who just loves everybody and wants to be friends
with everybody.

Speaker 1 (39:32):
Okay, remind me to come back to that topic of
the huge you know, after show, let's go. Yeah, remind me.
Remind me later because I have comments.

Speaker 2 (39:41):
So I have a question about the tentacle, which is
gonna come out in the after show. Yeah, because I
have seen some tentacles in real life. They are fucking scary.
They are scary.

Speaker 1 (40:00):
I believe you, they are scary.

Speaker 2 (40:05):
And the way she was just so easily I like
number three.

Speaker 1 (40:09):
Okay, no, no, she knew exactly what she liked to Well,
I'm gonna say.

Speaker 2 (40:16):
Sorry, that's not PG thirteen at all.

Speaker 1 (40:22):
No, it's fine. We're back on the We're back on
the PG thirteen week. We're pulling it back in. Okay,
let's see what else. Okay. So, I guess teamwork was
a big thing in this book, because you know, we
got the hockey themes and now, of course the boys
had to pull that team spirit into their relationship, so

(40:46):
they're like team Rachel. Yay. Yeah, I think that was cheesy.

Speaker 2 (40:55):
It was so cheesy. I was wondering if I was, like,
if I like hockey more, would I like the team stuff?
Or is it just cheesy? No matter what, I need
somebody who likes hockey to tell me what they thought
about it.

Speaker 1 (41:07):
Yeah, if you love hockey and you read this book,
what tell us was it? Did you? How'd you feel
about it? Was it cheesy just because it's cheesy or
was it on par with the theme. I don't know.
I guess I couldnot with the team, like, can I
quit the team? I'll be trying to quit the team. No,

(41:29):
I don't want to be in this team. Okay, what
else I'm trying to think, Do I have anything else
I want to talk about?

Speaker 2 (41:40):
I'm sure the secondary characters, sure, like who there's her
twin who we saw for half a second even though
they're twins and they do everything together, and I was
just like, I feel like he should have played a
bigger role in the story. But all so, I don't know,

(42:03):
I don't know. It was just it felt so focused
on Rachel. I don't know what I'm saying.

Speaker 1 (42:13):
So both of both of them had twins, Rachel and
Jake said Jake had twins, and both of their twins
kind of got a back seat, even though they were
brought up quite frequently, especially in the beginning, like oh,
you're a twin, I'm a twin. You know, it would

(42:33):
have been cool to see them more on the page
instead of kind of just at the end there. But
I don't know, they weren't really the focus of the story.
So I guess it's fine, but I would have liked
some more interaction between the twins. I mean, especially Rachel.
You know, you're doing all this stuff. You're not telling

(42:53):
your brother anything, you wouldn't ghost, You're not send it.
I mean, throw some text messages on the screen or something,
you know, on the page. There's some exchanges between you
two that might have been fun, but I don't know.
I feel it was just.

Speaker 2 (43:11):
They felt flat. A lot of the secondary characters felt flat.
Like we talked about the other doctor earlier. He was
just evil and dickish for the sake of being a dick.
The other team players kind of seemed nice, but they
were all interchangeable, and I don't know who is who.

Speaker 1 (43:28):
Somebody's name j Lo the only guy and I don't
remember his name, but the only guy that stood out
was the guy who was trying to talk to her friend.

Speaker 2 (43:35):
On the Little Puppy Dog Boy.

Speaker 1 (43:38):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (43:38):
He was like twenty.

Speaker 1 (43:40):
Yeah, he's younger, but he felt like a version of Jake,
Like yeah, I mean even her friend, you know, she
had some FaceTime on the page and she was okay.
I don't know. I guess she'll show up again later
in the other book probably, but I don't care about that. Yeah.

(44:02):
All of the secondary characters were kind of oh, they're fine. Yeah,
Like the marketing lady. She hung out with a little
bit a marketing person from the team. She's like, oh
my gosh, are you guys together. You know, she's going
She's like, are you cheating at him? Or are you
cheating on him? And she's like, oh, you know, she
tried to figure it out. Oh my gosh.

Speaker 3 (44:26):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (44:26):
The secondary characters were just there for I guess, because
you can't be in a complete vacuum with these characters. Yeah,
but they don't really mean much in the scheme of things.

Speaker 2 (44:38):
Well, they mean more for the rest of the series,
but I don't know. It was cute. I have nothing else.

Speaker 1 (44:46):
I would like to know. If you could see into
the future without reading the other book, what would you
see for these four characters? What do you hope for them?
If you could just make a guess what their future
would look like?

Speaker 2 (45:01):
Do you want to know what I want their future
to look like? What I think their future.

Speaker 1 (45:04):
Is gonna look Let's do both, Let's do both.

Speaker 2 (45:07):
Oh, well, clearly she's gonna have twins because she's prone
to twins, and so's Jake. So she's gonna start popping
out babies, which no babies for me. So I don't
want any of that. But I just see, like I
don't know, she'll probably keep being a doctor, keep freaking out,

(45:28):
keep popping out babies.

Speaker 1 (45:31):
Oh god, she can't have a football team yeah, or
hockey team I guess, yeah, hockey team moves babies. Okay,
So what do you want to happen to them?

Speaker 2 (45:43):
I mean, personally, I would say, no, babies, keep having
hot sex. Maybe bring in some more people just to
spice it up.

Speaker 1 (45:53):
I don't know, I okay, So for me, I agree
with what will happen. I think that's pretty abc. The
author's following the formula. But what I like to happen. Honestly,
since this is their first trip down the poly trail,
you know, the holy trail, I think they will break up.
They should break up. I think they could probably go

(46:14):
for a couple of years before, you know, they probably
should have never got married. I think they should have
just rode this for a while, you know, because I
think ultimately it's not going to last. Mars is going
to get sick of having to have Jake and Caleb
in the room all the time, and he's honestly, he
deserves someone who just wants him, because that's the kind
of relationship he wants. He caved to her because he

(46:36):
really liked her. I don't know why he fell in
love with her so hard.

Speaker 2 (46:39):
But because she was protecting him and she was like,
I care about you, and he was like, you're the
first person to say that since my mother died when
I was a teenager. So he has mommy issues.

Speaker 1 (46:49):
He does, but go to therapy, Mars, go to therapy
and then break up with them because you don't want that.
I'm sorry he doesn't. And there's no amount of excuses
or you know, reasoning anyone can tell me to make
me think he's going to stick in that foursome. He's
not going to. He's not gonna stay if she pops
out his baby. Yeah, yeah, but in reality, I think

(47:13):
he should bounce. Yes. And I think Jake and Caleb
are going to go back to being friends and maybe
not messing around with each other so much because Jake
isn't gay. I'm sorry, he's not. He's not. He's messing
around because they think it's fun, and Rachel likes it. Yeah,

(47:34):
and Rachel because she loves every freaking body and she's
so oh love is love. She'll go find some replacements.
She'll trade him out soon as its Mars leaves. She'll
find someone else to plug the hole. And Jake and
Caleb will be cool with it, because that's what Rachel wants.
That's what I think would happen if I were just guessing,
because based on what I know about these characters that

(47:55):
I read. Yes, that's a reality check for you guys.
It's a real world making apparent here. Yes, anyway, sometimes
I like to make up my own ending to things
because minds is better.

Speaker 2 (48:14):
Yours is just realistic. Let them have their happily ever after,
because that's the romance fantasy.

Speaker 1 (48:24):
Again. That's probably why I don't read a whole lot
of contemporary romance. I like my romance with way you know,
face and winged men and you know where things are
you know, destined to be because of you know, I
feel like if I can make an excuse for why
the things are happening because it's fantastical, I can get

(48:47):
more on board with that than this bull it is not.
That's why if I don't want to read about real life, Okay,
don't tell me it is how real life shit works out,
because it doesn't. I want to be Lulu in fantasy world,
not in the real world.

Speaker 2 (49:03):
I mean, this is so Delulu like this, Yeah, this
has left reality in the dust. Yeah, Like yes, polyamory exists,
but no, you're not going to fall in love with
three men and have all three of them agree to
this situationship within just a couple months and everybody's happy.

(49:28):
And then they literally changed their names even though they're
professional hockey players already selling like their numbers and their
names and all of that. Like, no, no, sorry, Rachel
talked all three of these dudes into the situation.

Speaker 1 (49:45):
None of them really wanted it, none of them. They
all just got on board with what she wanted.

Speaker 2 (49:51):
No, I realistically, if she never hooked up with the Goldie, yeah,
one two best friends, one's gay for the other, the
other is gay for him, like it. Yes, that can
be realistic, ish more realistic than four of them together

(50:17):
in the Better One.

Speaker 1 (50:18):
As Mars came on the scene, I was like, this
is incorrect. Yeah, stop right now, stop right now.

Speaker 2 (50:27):
But again, like I said this at the beginning, the
novella was so that was the only time I really
believed that she genuinely loved Jake.

Speaker 1 (50:39):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (50:39):
The rest of the time, she just kept referencing, remember
that night, Remember that night. I loved you that night,
so I love you now. And I was like, that
doesn't make sense. No, that doesn't track you left him
that night.

Speaker 1 (50:53):
She sure did, and she was not excited to see him.

Speaker 2 (50:57):
Well she was, but then she was, and.

Speaker 1 (51:01):
I think she was surprised to see him. Yeah, but
she doesn't like, Oh, let me urn up and jump
on Jake. She was like, oh shit, like you know,
it's it's here.

Speaker 2 (51:11):
And he doesn't recognize me because I look different. We're
in a different state. I'm wearing glasses. I don't have
my piercing or recognize me immediately. And then he did,
so he looked at her face. He was like, oh
my god.

Speaker 1 (51:28):
Yeah, because he's so in his head about his Seattle girl,
he's not really looking at women like that, so he
didn't even get a good look at you. What is
your problem? See? But it's still fun. It's still fun.
It was fun. I think I'm done. I'm done anything else.
I gotta say. We need to say an after show.

(51:51):
Let's rate it. How did you rate pucking Around?

Speaker 2 (51:55):
Okay? So when I finished it, I was going to
give it forced because I enjoyed it for what it was.
It was cute. But now that we've ripped it apart,
I don't feel like I can give it anything higher
than a three star.

Speaker 1 (52:09):
Did oh so, and I didn't have to wait for
this conversation. When I finished the book, I was like, oh,
that's cute.

Speaker 2 (52:14):
Okay.

Speaker 1 (52:14):
If I had finished it a week ago.

Speaker 2 (52:16):
I finished it yesterday, so I'm okay.

Speaker 1 (52:17):
So you haven't had the space.

Speaker 2 (52:19):
About twenty four hours. Yeah, I'm at like thirteen hours
or whatever time.

Speaker 1 (52:24):
So when I when I did the good Reads, I
almost rated it then and I said, no, I'm not
gonna and I didn't rate it. I let it sit there.
And I knew before I got on this episode with
you it was going to be a three. But originally
I was going to put a four. My instinct right
after I finished it to put a four, and I
was like no, no, no, no, no, no, because I
know how I am. Yes, just like a marinate and

(52:47):
see what happens.

Speaker 2 (52:50):
No, it was cute, but let's let's move on.

Speaker 1 (52:54):
Let'syeah, be realistic and to be quite frank, I don't
know if I'll ever read another hockey romance again. I
don't think so.

Speaker 2 (53:04):
I probably not. I don't care about hockey. This did
not make me care about hockey. No, I will say so.
Emily Rath has I think only one book is out,
but it's going to be a duology of a fantasy series.
But its ratings are microscopic compared to everything else she writes, like,

(53:30):
I think it only has or less than like three
thousand ratings. Or is this one has like one hundred
thousand ratings?

Speaker 1 (53:36):
This two hundred thousand ratings? Yeah?

Speaker 2 (53:38):
No, So like everybody knows her for her hockey stuff.
I think she wrote well enough that I'd be really
interested to read her fantasy book at some point.

Speaker 1 (53:50):
Oh is it the what is it?

Speaker 2 (53:51):
Is it the night? Something? It has a blue cover
with something.

Speaker 1 (53:56):
Oh, North in the Night. Yeah, wait, North is the Night? There?
It is North the Night? Like this another.

Speaker 2 (54:03):
I think she writes well enough that I would be interested.
I don't think it's a wide choose. I don't think
it's super spicy, it says.

Speaker 1 (54:10):
Some of the genre tags on good Reads are fantasy, romance, mythology,
romantic fiction, LGBT, oh God, Oh God in the Finished
Wilderness more than Wolve's Rome in the Dark Forest. No.
I cannot. If I'm gonna have to listen to people

(54:32):
speaking and Finnish, I can't. I don't know you. I
think I want to check it out. Oh, well, you
let me know. Real fantasy is not in the real world.
Finland is a real place.

Speaker 2 (54:49):
But it's mythology, so there's gonna be like were wolves
and stuff popping up.

Speaker 1 (54:53):
I think you let me know. I'm not I'm not
messing with you. You you let me know. You're right.
There's only like five thousand ratings on.

Speaker 2 (55:01):
This, Okay, yeah, no, it's microscopic compared to her other stuff.

Speaker 1 (55:06):
Yeah. People, well, you know, once the audience gets a
whiff of one thing and it goes viral on book talk,
then that's what everyone's gonna read. They're not gonna bother
with anything else because, again not being no shade to
book talk, but a lot of people who get their
direction from book talk aren't real not real readers, but

(55:27):
aren't long time faithful readers. They read what's hot, yes,
and what you know influencers tell them to read, so
they're not going to delve into other things unfortunately, unfortunately.
But yeah, yeah, okay, I think we're done.

Speaker 2 (55:44):
I think we're done for now. The after show is
going to be where we let it all out.

Speaker 1 (55:51):
So do you think we hit our goal of remaining
pg thirteen for the most part. I think we did
for the most part. Yeah, Yeah, we're good, I mean
really good. I'm very proud of us for like not
letting out words that should not be let out. But
if you're curious about what those words are and what
we're going to say about them, you should follow us

(56:11):
and subscribe on Patreon or speaker or on Spotify soon
and listen to this after show because I'm sure we're
going to have some inappropriate things to say.

Speaker 2 (56:20):
Yes, we'll have some fun, fun things to say about Yes.

Speaker 1 (56:25):
So we're gonna end things there, and we are going
to return to our fantasy roots next time. Yes, back
into the safe space and we'll catch you in the
next one. Take care of yourselves.

Speaker 2 (56:35):
Bye, everybody.

Speaker 1 (56:43):
Did you enjoy today's episode? If so, please head over
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(57:04):
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(57:25):
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the same name on the book club's website and app,
where we discuss all things bookish and more in a
safe space. The shelf Addiction podcast is a part of
the Nerdy Maven Network. Thanks for tuning in.

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Pucking Around: Our First (and Last?) Hockey Romance | Book Chat

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Pucking Around: Our First (and Last?) Hockey Romance | Book Chat