I need season two nowwww do i cave and buy the books? Ive been told they're meh compared to the show - are the essential reading?
As someone who liked (most) of the books, I do recommend reading Heated Rivalry, Role Model, and The Long Game, in that order. Those are my favorites. Are they different from the show? Yes. But I don’t think they’re worse. Heated Rivalry, esp, is a lot more true to the bitter enemies to lovers trope, rather than them falling in love p much right away.
Role Model and The Long Game esp include a cast of extremely endearing background characters that I’m sure will appear in season 2, but probably won’t get nearly as much screen-time as I want for them. Honestly I recommend reading these two books just for them. I genuinely adore the Ottawa Centaurs (and their mascot, and their social media manager) with all my heart.
Tough Guy is also pretty decently written, but it won’t be all that relevant to the show. (It stars Ryan Price, who gets mentioned briefly in episode 4, but other than a cameo or two from Ilya, it is completely divorced from hollanov’s story.)
As for Game Changer and Common Goal… I honestly found both of them kind of boring. Esp Game Changer.
Game Changer is Scott and Kip’s story, and honestly, it is sooooo different from the tv show, in all the worst ways. Jacob Tierney really worked a miracle transforming Scott and Kip’s bland nothing romance into something amazing.
Meanwhile, Common Goal is about Kyle (yes, the Kyle from the bar) and while I enjoy his character, and even the retired goalie love interest wasn’t a complete bore like book Scott and Kip were, but their romance just didn’t do it for me personally. But then again, I’m not too much into age gap relationships.
So to sum up…
Hard YES to Role Model and The Long Game.
Soft YES to Heated Rivalry and Tough Guy.
Soft NO to Common Goal.
And hard NO to Game Changer.
But everyone’s different. The only way to find out if you’ll like the books is if you read them yourself.
