Title: Crashing the Net
Author: Samantha Wayland
Genre: Contemporary with a Dom/Sub innuendo
Length: Novella (128 pages)
Publisher: Loch Awe Press (July 22nd 2014)
Heat Level: Moderate to Explicit
Heart Rating: ♥♥♥♥♥ 5 Hearts
Reviewer: Tams
Blurb: Mike comes to Moncton wanting nothing more than to play for the Ice Cats and finally live on his own terms. He’s broke, bruised, and covered from head to toe in cheap lube, but he isn’t going to let that stop him. All he needs is a place to live and some time to figure out how to reconcile who he really is with who everyone wants him to be.
Dumping three gallons of lube on the new kid is just another day at the office for Alexei. He knows exactly who he is: a goalie on the ice, a prankster in the locker room, and a man who knows better than to share his private life with anyone. He’s let people in before and it’s taught him that if he can’t have what he really wants, it’s better to be alone.
Despite their apparent differences, an unlikely friendship grows. Neither of them could ever have guessed how much they really have in common.
Purchase Link: http://www.amazon.com/Crashing-Net-Samantha-Wayland-ebook/dp/B00M197TCA
Review: Mike is the newest recruit for the Ice Cats hockey team. With this position comes the usual hazing upon his arrival from his new team mates, but it’s one team-mate in particular the gets Mike’s blood boiling. When he’s invited to join the guys for beers, he declines, instead heading for a nice hot shower. That’s where the one that makes his heart race finds him. Naked and bruised with tear-stained cheeks.
Alexei is the goalie for the Ice Cats, and the man behind the prank that sent Mike to the showers. He makes a u-turn when headed to the bar and decides to go back and check on his new teammate. Alexei has questions for Mike. Where did those bruises come from? Why was he crying? But the older more experienced man and hockey player decides to instead become the one thing Mike needs now more than anything, his friend.
Over the next few months, Mike makes his mark on the team and he and Alexei grow closer. Neither one has confessed their feelings for the other, but they have settled into a comfortable duality. Over a break they build an apartment for Mike in the warehouse Alexei owns and lives in, and it’s that first night in his new apartment, wall shared with Alexei, that Mike finally opens up to his best friend and roommate about his scars.
This book had my three favorite things in it. Sweaty naked men, Hockey and Romance! Win, Win, BONUS!! Seriously, though, this is the first of Wayland’s books I’ve read but I’m a fan. She managed to find the right balance between passion, love, angst and turmoil to create a hard-hitting story with a slight innuendo to dominance and submission. The details in the descriptives were toe curling, hot, and sensual. This is not only a must read, it’s a keep queued on your device to visit whenever you want!