Game Changer

Game Changer is a 2018 sports romance by Rachel Reid, published as a 400-page paperback by Carina Press and recorded as the first book in the Game-Changers series.

Scott Hunter is a professional hockey player whose form returns after a smoothie he buys from Kip Grady, and the coincidence gives him an excuse to keep returning to the juice bar. Kip does not mistake the visits for an interest in fruit, but he never expects to be invited back to Scott's penthouse or to find himself in a relationship that is passionate, constant and completely hidden. The arrangement suits Scott's career and costs Kip more than he has said. The relationship runs on Scott's terms from the beginning and stays behind his apartment doors, and Kip's willingness to accept that arrangement is the thing the novel sets against the approaching playoffs.

The complication is timing: the playoffs bring a level of public attention that makes any disclosure dangerous to Scott's position in the sport, and the book sets his career against the possibility of being honest about his life. It is written for readers of the contemporary hockey romance, a form that grew through independent and digital-first publishing, and Carina Press is one of the digital-first imprints that carried it. Kip is ready to commit fully while Scott is not, and the asymmetry between them carries more of the book than the hockey does.