Avon Gale and Piper Vaughn team up together again to bring us the third book in their Hat Trick series, Trade Deadline. Daniel Bellamy gets his happily ever after in this sweet and steamy romance, and you can definitely read any of the books in this series as stand-alones.

I always enjoyed the scenes with Daniel in the earlier novels, his relationship with his wife intrigued me and I love that he was into rescue dogs. He seemed like such an easy going, likable guy I’m glad we got his story.

Always out as a bisexual man, Daniel’s relationship with his childhood bestie Micah isn’t a huge shock to the other characters in the book. I appreciate how casually everyone takes it and “coming out” is not the focus of the novel. It’s all about how these two men come together as adults and renew their friendship. We get both of their stories, and watch them fall in love. It really is very sweet and filled with the steamy hot romantic scenes we fans of Avon Gale and Piper Vaughn hope to get in every book they write.

Trade Deadline is a little short on the hockey scenes, which is a shame because I think Avon Gale writes some great ones, but I was so caught up in the romance I didn’t even notice the lack of actual sports scenes till the very end. It’s just a wonderful, feel good story.

I have liked this hockey series and hope there will be more spin-offs. This one did not feature as much actual hockey as previous entries, perhaps because one of the main characters is a marine biologist, although I found that interesting, too. After winning the Stanley Cup with his long-time Atlanta team, Daniel (Bellzie) accepts a trade to his hometown Miami NHL team, where he reconnects with Micah, his childhood best friend. One thing leads to another as their friendship slowly turns to love, despite Daniel's uncertain hockey future. This is an enjoyable and rather sweet slow-burn M/M romance.

Ganz unterhaltsam, mehr aber leider nicht

Das Buch ist nicht die erste m/m sports romance des Autorenduos, das ich gelesen habe. Die anderen Bücher waren stets unterhaltsam, aber auch leicht zu vergessen und sicherlich nicht so gut wie die Liebesromane von Amy Aislin und Rachel Reid aus der gleichen Sparte.

Vom vorliegenden Buch habe ich eine kurzweilige Unterhaltung erwartet und diese habe ich auch bekommen. Die Liebesgeschichte war ganz nett, wenn auch nicht komplett überzeugend. Gleiches gilt für die Charaktere, die mir leider nie wie richtige Personen vorkamen. Dazu kam, dass nicht alle beschriebenen Emotionen bei mir etwas ausgelöst haben. Im Vergleich mit den anderen Büchern der Autorinnen, war "Trade Deadline" für mich etwas schwächer als die anderen.

Denke ich an dieses Buch, so kam mir alles ganz nett und ok vor, aber leider nicht wirklich packend und emotional mitreißend. Mehr als 2,5 Sterne (auf drei aufgerundet) sind daher nicht möglich.

Trade Deadline was an okay book. I have not read the other books in this series, so this may be part of why I am not super convinced by the story or its characters.

Daniel is a professional hockey player, and Micah is a researcher at an aquarium. Both have exciting jobs, but this isn't the only similarity between the two. Daniel and Micah used to be best friends growing up and had their first kiss with each other. Years later they are able to meet again and continue their love story.

Daniel and Micah are a good couple and I see that they're supposed to be together, but I was just looking for more. More of everything. More depth to all the characters. I like the diversity and think the whole hockey background is great, but I just didn't fall in love or even in like with this book.

I received a free advanced copy from the author/ publisher through NetGalley in return for an honest review.

I think we should all just agree right now that M/M hockey romance stories are the best. There is just something about the combination that <i>works</i>. Daniel is a superstar hockey player towards the end of his career. His longtime team has just won the stanley cup and Daniel is offered a trade to his hometown team to finish out his career. He is recently divorced, on extremely good terms and is trying to figure out where to go next. The trade to Miami makes sense - even if the team is lousy.

Micah was Daniel's best friend growing up - and they were each other's first kiss. Micah is gay and hasn't been treated well by his parents - but has found a place in his community and as a researcher at the Biscayne Bay Aquarium. Both he and Daniel are living their childhood dreams.

When they reconnect there never seems to be a question of whether they were meant to be. Its clear - they are. But uncertainty in Daniel's career leaves them edgy and a little unsure.

Overall -their romance is beautiful. They communicate with each other really well - and their blended families of hockey players and friends is great. Overall - I loved it!

I received an ARC of this book from NetGalley, but these opinions are all my own.

The Hat Trick series is honestly so delightful. This book especially just was so pure and heartwarming. The Friends-to-Lovers trope in this book was done very differently than I have read before. Two childhood best friends reconnecting after 20 years. Daniel and Micah were such wholesome main characters and their chemistry just makes you smile.

If you looking for a low drama, high fluff romance, this books is for you!

I was so looking forward to Bellzie getting his own story, but this fell a little flat for me. Lots of telling not showing the MCs’ connection building, early and often declarations of love, little in the plot department. The steam was quite nice though. Love a bit of dirty talk 😂

A big deal was made of Daniel joining this new team as a leader and that really went nowhere. I was hoping to see him help turn the team around. Also, it seemed like Micah was intentionally missing the very obvious solution to their problem the entire time and I just had to roll my eyes a bit.

If you’ve enjoyed the others in this series, as I have, then you’ll probably still like this one. If you haven’t and you’re looking for a bit of second chance, friends to lovers fluff this could also work.

Now, saying all that: the story they are setting up for Morley sounds exciting, and I’m so here for it if they really bring the anger and heat to an enemies-to-lovers storyline. Those are a personal fave so I’ll be impatiently waiting lol.

Sweet LGBTQ romance with a sports background. A nice easy read, with limited question about whether there will be a happily ever after.

This was quite different from the previous works in this series, but it was sweet. Unfortunately, that's not quite what I'm looking for in my romances personally, but I'm sure others will enjoy this. And I look forward to the next work. Really hoping it's Morley.

I received a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Frankly, this book was disappointing. I have loved previous books by these authors. I love many hockey m/m romances.

Shortly after I started this book, I forgot I was reading it and wondered off into YouTube. Things did not improve much.

For a romance to work for me (or most other fiction) I have to feel like I know and like the characters, and accompany them on the journey in the story. Even though the story was told from one or more points of view (I cannot Even remember, and I finished it yesterday), I never got a sense of them as people. One, Bellesy (?) is nice. The other fellow, has red hair ... and is also nice.

Also, everyone in the story was just too perfect. No one had any flaws except the paper cut-out captain of the hockey team.

A major plot was around what was happening with the hockey team. Yet we never got a sense of what was going on. There were only occasional references to the coaches.

All in all, this was a remarkably beige book.

I received this ARC from the publisher and Netgalley in exchange for my honest review. Thank you for my copy. That being said I thought this book was just okay. It was a cute story of two children best friends who reunite twenty years later. Danny was a hockey player trying to decide his future and Micah has a great job as a marine biologist. I think since this was my first book I read in the series I missed out on what happened earlier to the characters. I loved Danny and Micah together. And I loved Danny’s ex wife and children. My problem was that the story was a bit dull for me. The story had a cute epilogue.

First of all, I love this series. Gale and Vaughn's hockey world and its characters are so vivid and depicted with such heart. I never even would have been interested in hockey (or in Gale's solo hockey romance series, which I love) if not for my first encounter with Hat Trick. I'm not a sports person in general, so I didn't know what I was missing!

That being said, Trade Deadline, while a very sweet story with likeable characters, is the weakest of the three books so far. The relationship between Daniel "Bellzie" Bellamy -- introduced in the previous books -- and Micah Kelly, marine biologist and Daniel's long-lost childhood friend suffers from a dearth of narrative tension. You always know this story will have a happy ending, but there have to be a few bumps along the way, and here the only bump is a kind of synthetic insecurity on Micah's part, when he otherwise does not seem insecure about anything. Part of the problem, perhaps, is that this book has a lot less hockey and hockey drama than the preceding installments. Micah is a brand new, non-hockey POV character with his own life. Daniel -- previously one of the most appealing side characters -- has moved to another team and things don't go smoothly there. It should be a huge deal for Daniel, and we're told it is, but what we're shown makes it come off as almost incidental. This book centralizes slightly older characters, as Daniel is starting to age out of playing in the NHL and already has a family from his previous marriage to an amicable ex (she probably appears more in this book than does actual hockey!), but the way that Daniel's trajectory is presented, the stakes are just not high enough.

In any case, I continue to love this series, and look forward to more hockey romance from this writing duo!

Daniel Bellamy just won the Stanley Cup with the NHL team where he's spent his entire 14-year career in Atlanta. In spite of winning his sport's top prize, Daniel feels restless. He's recently divorced and looking for something to shake him out of his doldrums. It comes when his hometown team offers him the chance to play, the Miami Thunder. Running into his first kiss from the past not long after he moves makes Daniel wonder if it's meant to be, Marine biologist, Micah Kelly, never thought he’d see his childhood crush again, since Danny moved onto a career in the NHL when they were teenagers. Sparks definitely fly when they meet up again.

There is some witty banter in this book, but parts of it felt flat to me. Maybe it's because I hadn't read the previous ones in the series.; however, I liked to see how Micah's life fit into the story, as sport romances are often heavily reliant on the hockey player's career for any dialogue.

Received a free ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.

So, this was the conclusion of this series and sadly it fell a little flat for me. I loved the IDEA of the book- happily married man becomes divorced, has an awesome relationship with ex wife, falls in love with a man. I also love the M/m hockey aspect, but somewhere something was missing here. Thank you to netgalley for the ARC.

This was a super sweet romance between two childhood friends who reunite later in life after losing touch. I really liked that one of them worked at rehabilitation zoo as a marine biologist, and while it was still very hockey-centric, they had a life outside of hockey. It was great to see a professional hockey player, someone with a job that can sometimes overshadow all else, support his partner and his career and make time for his family too. My only hangup was with some of the dialogue, which sometimes felt a little stilted and took me out of it a bit. (And I’m not just talking about working on dirty talk.) But I also got flutters from the cuteness a few times, and even though Bellamy leaves the Venom, we met up with the old gang so it didn’t feel they were too far away.

3* The end of the series, but unfortunately not the most believable of tales.

Book 3 in this series could be read as a standalone, as other than cameo appearances from the previous leads and guys from the Venom, there's not really much of a connection to the previous books. I mean, we do get to see the previous leads eating (a lot!) in cameos, but it doesn't look like there's been a lot of changes in their lives - which made the ending of this book seem rather rushed and premature, unfortunately. It is the tale that I'd been waiting for of the entire series, and in retrospect, book 1 is the best.

Don't get me wrong, this is a decent enough tale but it lacks oomph and tbh, so does Daniel, who I'd been intrigued about in the first two tales, given that he seemed happily married with kids and therefore for him to become a lead of a future book, there either had to be a tragedy - or not. The 'or not' aspect of the tale kind of got laboured on a little too much and I wondered why Daniel ended up not married in this book. I mean, I liked his relationship with his ex and how they were great friends, but at the same time, they were so good together that not to be together kind of seemed a bit inorganic.

The romance in this didn't have passion and Daniel's firsts with a guy, though he identified as bi, seemed a little... too matter of fact to be believable. It was more best friends reconnecting, and I couldn't see the romantic side of them. Which made the ending feel less than believable. I mean, it ended in the start of that HEA of HEAs but it didn't feel organic. If I'm entirely honest, the star of this tale was Silver.

There will be a spin-off tale, or so the stuff at the end mentions, and I wonder if we've already seen the leads of that book here. I think so, because a character got bigged up quite a lot and then faded away, and another faded away seemingly without reason, so I wonder...

ARC courtesy of Carina Press and Netgalley, for my reading pleasure.

Don't get me wrong, this wasn't a bad book, but it was definitely the least enjoyable of the series so far. I'll always have a soft sport for hockey/sports romances, particularly m/m, but this one just didn't have any real tension or intensity going for it. Which isn't to say it's a requirement for me but when nothing else is really egging me on to read, either..?

Huge gold star, though, should be awarded for having a non-evil ex element at play, particularly in the form of an ex-spouse, even more importantly because kids were at play here, too. Everyone was lovely, kind, understanding.. it was all so amicable. Which might be a great paralell to the story itself. It was all just.. fine. So courteous. So considerate.

"I know I have a loud voice."
"You definitely do. I could always hear you yelling at my games."
"That's because there were only ever eight people watching. And six of them were cheering for whoever the other team was."
"Too soon, man."

Not helping matters was the fact that I wasn't really into the love interest, so, I had one foot out the door kind of early on.

"Bellzie's got a new boo?"
"Do not say 'boo'. You're not a ghost. Or a thirteen year old girl."

I love me an ensemble cast, all the group scenes featuring previous couples and a character who is sure to get his own feature moment in book four, were a good time. But overall this was just okay. I will continue to read on in hopes book four rekindles the spark of my enjoyment and also because this genre is my weakness. I have no control.