The finely drawn characters capture readers’ attention in this debut.Īutumn and Phineas, nicknamed Finny, were born a week apart their mothers are still best friends. Despite well-worn tropes that move both boys from a tumultuous meet-cute toward as realistic a future as possible for two NHL players in love, Mickey’s progress with his mental health avoids predictability.Įqual measures unabashed romance and sports story a thoughtfully rewarding read for those who need one most. Mickey’s queerness and budding relationship with Jaysen highlight first-time author Graziadei’s ability to balance teen melodrama and well-paced eroticism with a thoughtful, contemporary consideration of queer representation in sports and media. Mickey’s five older sisters and their respective successes also shed sobering light on gender inequity in sports while raising the stakes for Mickey in a family full of winners. Explicit conversations about mental health make for a refreshing take on the typical athlete’s journey. Luckily, they come to be overwhelmingly supportive-even Jaysen Caulfield, the other top NHL prospect and Mickey’s biggest rival, who is a Black player in a mostly White sport. The all-but-guaranteed trajectory of his seemingly charmed life makes him deeply uneasy but also sows some initial resentment in his teammates, as Mickey’s mental health issues and years of sports-only development have left him a bit awkward.
Being a hockey phenom doesn’t magically cure overwhelming depression and anxiety, but falling for a teammate definitely complicates things.Īt Hartland University in upstate New York, White freshman Mickey James III has the weight of his family’s hockey legacy on his shoulders: His father and grandfather are both alumni and former NHL legends.
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