The Fake Out by Stephanie Archer
Genre: Romance
Blurb (on back of book): The best way to get back at my horrible ex? Fake date Rory Miller--my ex's rival, the top scorer in pro hockey, and the arrogant, flirtatious hockey player I tutored in high school.
Faking it is fun and addictive, though, and beneath the bad boy swagger, Rory’s sweet, funny, and protective.
He teaches me to skate and spends way too much money on me.
He sleeps in my bed and convinces me to break my just-one-time hookup rule.
He kisses me like it’s real.
And now I wonder if Rory was ever faking it to begin with.
The Fake Out is a pro hockey fake dating romance. It is the second book in the Vancouver Storm series but can be read as a standalone.
MY OPINION: ****
This is arguably one of the better hockey romances I've read in my entire repertoire of hockey romances. While I enjoyed the first one, I thoroughly loved this book and ate it up.
This book follows Rory and Hazel, with use of the fake dating trope and forced proximity trope. It was so fun to read and I loved both Rory and Hazel so much.
Hazel is Pippa's sister from the first book and works as the hockey team's physiologist (or something like that) but wants to open up her own body-positive exercise and training gym. TBH, I don't know what exactly she envisioned but it was like yoga x pilates x dance x physical therapy for any and all people. Her mother deals with a lot of self-image issues, especially since she failed to meet her dreams of becoming a star ballerina, so Hazel has grown up with this toxic environment her entire life. She wants to change and help her mother and people like her mother see the beauty in themselves. This was a nice message but overall, not that relevant to the story?? Like, obviously I loved what she was doing but it always felt like a side storyline instead of the main plot device for Hazel's character.
Anyways, Hazel's toxic, manipulative, cheating hockey ex is traded onto the team that she works for and is assigned to Hazel for his physio. She basically calls upon Rory, the arrogant hockey player who she tutored in high school, to start a fake relationship with her to make her ex jealous and help him to see that she has moved on. The ex, whose name I cannot remember for the life of me, was so annoying and a piece of shit, who constantly belittled Hazel and acted like she was just an object for him to take back from Rory.
It's clear from the start that Rory is obsessed with Hazel, which I love. I love when the man is down bad for the girl and is willing to do anything and everything for them, even if it is getting into a FAKE relationship to tick off the girl's ex. I loved Rory so much. He genuinely cared about Hazel and did little things for her to let her know how he felt, and I loved seeing that all unfold. He was so sweet and loving towards her and instantly apologetic and communicative whenever he messed up.
These two had amazing communication skills that couples in other books and couples in real life really need to take into account. There was no traumatic third act breakup because of some stupid miscommunication which was so refreshing and I loved seeing them get through everything without being stupid or gaslighting the other one.
The ONLY thing I thought was stupid about this book was the pet name "fire-breather" (like seriously), the tattoo (read and find out), and the **SPOILER** ENTIRE SCENE WHERE SHE SUPPOSEDLY FALLS WHILE ICE SKATING. Like, PLEASE be so for real. She doesn't know how to skate so Rory teaches her but she falls and like kind of twists her ankle or something but this man and everyone else treats her like she is paralyzed, like she died or something. Like actually genuinely be so for real. It's sweet I guess but I was laughing the entire time. He acted like she was genuinely dead and was like SO overprotective to the point where I would have broken up with him just for being so overportective and smothering. Like dear God, she didn't lose a leg. **END SPOILER**
I'm so excited for the third book, which is following some of the side characters we saw in this book. I'm not sure how I feel about the tropes because of what we know so far but I'm confident I'll still eat the book up.
The banter and chemistry was so cute and I loved seeing the relationship between Rory and Hazel grow. I loved this book a lot and would highly recommend it to everyone looking for a fun, cute, refreshingly healthy hockey romance.
Main Character: Hazel, Rory
Sidekick(s): Friends, family, etc
Villain(s): the ex, etc
Romance Elements: This book was centered around a romance plot.
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