Rating: 3.5 (rounded to 4 for GR) : Thank you to the Author for the ARC.

Plot: 3/5
Spice: 3/5 (Numerous open door scenes)
Characters: 4/5

Overall reco: It was like most MM hockey reads. Enjoyable, and mostly digestible. There were some sticking points along the way that disrupted the book. This didn't feel like an independent series from the other series that author has out, it feels like a continuation of that series. There are references to events of those books and while the author seems to give run downs in the middle of the book of parts of those stories, it tended to feel like I was again jumping into the middle of a series where I should have read all the prior books. I did end up finding myself skimming or reading an not absorbing the book and having to reread a lot. In the end, it was enjoyable. I've ready worse. I would recommend going and reading all the other books this author has out before starting this series though...

(rants)
Jamal King? Right.

What the fuck was this character. He keeps getting called out by the author and noticed by the characters but then we get no fucking closure around him or really anything more than he's a weird fucking dude(author seemed hell bend on making his behavior standoffish/weird)? Like.. what the fuck? Also, what the fuck happened to Richardson? He was out with a calf injury and then we never hear from him again? Did I skip past him being traded? They get really into the misconduct shit in the contracts towards the end but we don't hear them thinking about that with Richardson?

My biggest standing out/complaint about the book is the amount of backstory we got on other characters. After a pervious ARC where I jumped into the 4th book in a series, I've been careful to check. This was listed as the first in a series and while the author had other works I didn't think it would be a problem. Right well, it felt like one. There was a lot of "this is X who is the lover of Y and they had all this drama last year with Z event" And it'll be paragraphs about that event or who they are and not always relevant. I expected it in the beginning of the book, prior to the 20% but it was happening all the way up to the 60% line. There is a prequel novel for their other series and those 2 are featured heavily and references are often made to other events that either get glossed over (when it feels like we should get more) or given too much (when I don't give a fuck). 

and I think I also kept confusing Von and Boe? or maybe I wasn't? We head a lot about Von in this book from Lars and I was like.. right.. who? fuck

 
Finally, one that bugged me and actually kept fucking up my reading was maybe not the authors fault? The first few words of every chapter are capitalized, unfortunately this author likes to start chapters with people talking. So, it often comes across as a person shouting half a sentence. For example: "DUDE, STOP WORRYING ABOUT me." sounds a lot different in my head than "Dude, stop worrying about me." It took a while into the book before I noticed it and going back it clouded my impression of the scenes. It might have been my kindle font choice but I'm looking at it now in another app and its the same.. it's a dumb thing to hang my had on but fuck it