Oh Rachel Reid…you know just how to suck me into a book and make me never want to put it down. The Shots You Take was no different - the characters, the story, the setting, all of it kept me turning the pages for more. 

Riley Tuck and Adam Sheppard were roommates and teammates when they first started out in the NHL together in Toronto. They’re best friends and more than that, but things never quite go how they’d like and things change with their relationship. We see moments of their early days together via flashback and it’s heartbreaking to know what happened but also to see it happening in detail as well. 

The majority of the book takes place in the present day, starting with the funeral of Riley’s father and Adam’s reappearance in his life after more than a decade apart. Their second chance is colored by grief, emotions and hurt in the beginning and, at points, it’s a little difficult to read in both the present day and the flashbacks. Riley’s pain over what happened between him and Adam is palpable and the events that happened afterwards completely changed his life, taking him out of the professional hockey world and forcing him to face his demons while building the quiet, small town life he loves so much. Adam comes into town during some of Riley’s toughest days, looking to right his many wrongs with Riley and make up for treating him so poorly when they were younger. 

I loved that both of these MCs were in their 40s and acted like it. They had real conversations about tough things, confronted the hurt that kept them apart, addressed all of the things they’ve learned about themselves while they weren’t part of each other’s lives and generally acted like adults. It was real and refreshing and felt right for this second chance romance. The things that Adam did to Riley in the past were horrible, but his dedication to making things right between them and all of the things he did to make that happen made me finally believe that he was there for the right reasons. 

This book handles some heavy topics - toxicity in professional hockey, grief, mental health, addiction - in a way that seamlessly wove them into the story and made it feel real, like Riley and Adam were real people I could meet tomorrow. Their story wasn’t typical and it wasn’t all happiness, but it was real and that made their HEA even more rewarding to read because they worked for it and grew as individuals to get there together.