witchbuns

Rachel Reid, 2021. Five Stars.

This is a book about believing sexual assault victims and unpacking identity. This is a book where a professional hockey star on the first page is traded to Ottawa, one of the worst teams in the league, because he was caught on tape calling his friend a rapist at practice. The friend is Dallas Kent, known in the Game Changers series for being toxic hockey traditional trash, and Troy Barrett, the friend and main character of Role Model, believes the victims and starts to speak up.

This is a book where Troy realizes and tries to adjust his communication and relationship skills because he understands that remaining closeted in hockey has resulted in him choosing to be traditional trash, rejecting intimacy and vulnerability. This is a book where Troy meets Harris in the first chapter, an out and proud Social Media manager for Ottawa, who wears pride pins, supports his family’s apple orchard, and loves dogs and Christmas. This is a story where Troy is drawn to Harris and asks himself how he can believe he is worthy of being not only Harris’ friend, but also someone that is worth Harris’ trust, his body, his emotions and his heart. 

This is a five star read for me because it’s also about queer joy, as Troy listens to himself and learns to look outside and watch the Christmas lights. There is a lot of Ilya in this book as the captain of Ottawa, and he’s a pure gem of humour and leadership, and quite heavily influential for Troy to find his coming out tale. It all builds quickly, the pace is steady and forward-moving, and there is a very happily ever now, without an epilogue. I love that Rachel Reid knew where to end the story and we don’t have an epilogue with traditional fourth act gestures, because we’re left with two characters being honest and truthful to one another, in the space of their families. This is salted almond dark chocolate, this is a comfy down blanket, and this is a beautiful edition in the Game Changing series, a world where players can come out, but they have to take pretty steep steps in the hockey culture to find the exits and windows at their own time. 

I got into hockey first, then hockey romance, lead by Rachel Reid’s novels. I think of them as counter-programming that help me to imagine a world where there is non-conformity and playfulness and trust. I will read everything she writes, and I’m so excited to see how this storyline blends into the Heated Rivalry series. It is a radical book, honestly, given the culture. It is a story about speaking up and speaking to one another.