Heated Rivalry (2025) (season 1)

19 Jan
Poster for the Crave "Heated Rivalry" show; it shows the two main characters, Shane Hollander (Hudson Williams) and Ilya Rosanov (Connor Storrie), dressed in the fictional Montreal and Boston hockey teams' jerseys, facing off at center ice; the background is a blownout/faded hokey ring with the stands crowded with fans. The title is in cream, in an all-caps font with shadows that show movement, imitating the pushes of skates on ice. Along the bottom edge, "based on the best-selling book series"

I am writing this mostly for people who may be coming around sometime in late 2026 or maybe even early 2027, when the release of the second season of the show is imminent; most everyone else who’s online at all right now has heard about the show, and probably has some idea what to expect–even though the discourse from mainstream critics continues to be juvenile and misogynistic (footnote 1).

Beware: explicit sex between consenting adults; partial nudity; swearing; smoking; drinking; a homophobic slur; death of a parent by suicide; death of a parent suffering from Alzheimer’s; set in professional hockey, but with little actual hockey; someone getting a concussion, and a hospital scene afterwards.

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Heated Rivalry, by Rachel Reid

16 Jan
Illustrated cover for the reissue of _Heated Rivalry_, showing two professional hockey players in gear and rival team uniforms, sans helmet; one of them is black haired and slimmer/smaller than the other, who has lighter brown curly hair; both look white. They're at center ice, in a face off on the red line, about to fight for the puck, and looking intensely at each other.

It’s been a month since I posted my review of the first book, so let us get on with the Game Changers book series reviews; please note: if you have already watched the Crave adaptation of the same title (trailer at the end of this post), but have not read the book, that there are a few differences between the text and the adaptation (most notably, Svetlana’s rôle was expanded for the show).

Beware: suicide of a parent in the past; death of a parent with Alzheimer’s; explicit sex between consenting adults; bisexual protagonist; drinking; anxiety; a protagonist in the autism spectrum.

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“Kirkyards & Kindness” by Kelley Armstrong

7 Jan
The cover for "Kirkyards and Kindness" where the bottom and top sections are divided by the title. At the top, a photograph of a white blonde woman with long hair, wearing what seems to be a teal/blue period gown, looking back to the reader over her shoulder, with a blurred background of some building façade with lighted gas lamps. On the bottom half there's a full shot of the back of a man wearing 1800s clothing and walking down a sort of foggy avenue with old fashioned gas lights.

I hope everyone knows by now that I’m very much a fan of this series, and therefore is not surprised I had preordered this story–or by the fact that between the reading slump and ::gestures at the world:: I’m reviewing it over a month after it was actually released.

Since shit is not likely to stop raining down all over our heads for a while yet, I’m going to try to follow Willa’s wise advice, and write something about what I read, rather than post nothing at all because writing a good review is too hard. So, here we are.

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Rosaline (2022) (sort of a movie review)

29 Dec
Movie poster for "Rosaline", shows a young white woman in 16th Century dress, sitting on a small antique table, legs crossed in a very modern pose; behind her, there's a very large painting of a young white man with long blond curls, standing close by and holding the face of a young dark haired girl with olive skin who is holding a large bouquet of flowers. They too are dressed in 16th Century clothes and standing on a balcony at dawn. In the style of rattle can graffiti writing, between Romeo and Juliet and Rosaline, the text "meet Romeo's ex" is scrawled in hot fuchsia.

In the spirit of avoidance, I came across the trailer for this movie on YouTube, and look, PERIOD COSTUMES. No one really expected me not to watch it, right?

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