Offside by Juliana Stone

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The final book I picked up for my Hockey Champions Readathon was Offside by Juliana Stone. This is the first book in her Barker Triplets series and features a woman who plays hockey! I applied this to the prompt for the Stanley Cup (book with an HEA). I was also able to use this for the prompt tear-jerker romance on the cover for the 2nd board of Summer of Swoon.

Billie-Jo is coming home after a stint playing professional hockey in Sweden. After getting another concussion, she is too much of a risk to keep on the ice. When she arrives home, Billie is struggling with a big part of her life missing. When she sees a beer league has started in town, she signs up. It's not listed as "men's only," but she's the first woman to want to join. There is a lot of backlash from the players and the community, including her own sister. Logan, one of the captains, offers for her to join his team and quietly supports her. Billie struggles being around him so much since she was in love with him when they were younger. He never realized though, and even tried to get with one of her twin sisters. The tension rises between them over and over, but when secrets come out they were both keeping, it's hard for them to move past the truth.

Oh my gosh, another 2nd chance romance. At least this is a version of the trope that is a little more easier for me to get into. First off, I absolutely adored Billie. I loved that she was a complete bad-ass when it came to hockey and you could just feel the joy and peace in her soul when she was on the ice. A small part of me wished this would've happened when she was still playing professionally, but I still loved it. Even though it's beer league, there was so much hockey throughout the story and it really gave good insight to what Billie was really grieving after her injuries. I also loved the connection between Billie and Logan. Even though they both had their reasons to stay away from each other, they just couldn't.

Now, there are some things that did drag this down a little bit. The biggest is I felt there was a little too much angst thrown in. We have Billie dealing with the career and life goal for herself, issues with her twin sister, the angst between her and Logan and her father is going through early dementia. This is all on top of the hate Billie is receiving from the players and the community. That's what really got me the most, her sister following in line and saying hurtful things about her wanting to play hockey. It just broke my heart all the hurt she was going through. I do want to mention, in case it's triggering for you, the hate that she gets from the community and players is pretty extreme. Outside of just being ostracized and different men "flexing" on her, there's also a point where her car is keyed with slurs and all her tires are slashed. With how bad it got, I do wish that we saw more of the community turn around and saw more people going out of their way to apologize or make it up to Billie.

Overall though I couldn't put Offside down and can't wait to read more from Juliana Stone. I don't think the rest of the books in the series will have much hockey since her twins aren't hockey players as well, but I'm certainly intrigued to see Bobbi-Jo get her HEA. Another new author to add to my list! If you are looking for a female hockey player, certainly give it a try. Just be warned it gets a little rough and ended up being a tear-jerker for me (but I cry super easy).

Have you read Offside?

Bookishly Yours,

Stasi🍎

STATISTICS: Offside, Juliana Stone, 4.5 stars, 0 days, eBook, 222 pages, published in 2012, indie published