going around. The penalty area. pucker.
No, we're not going to get all the obvious hockey puns out of our system before delving into the topic. hockey romance book genre. These are truly best-selling book titles.
If you've perused the romance section of any bookstore lately, you've probably noticed a few of these not-so-subtle covers sandwiched between Emily Henry's more classic beach reads, Carley Fortune's summer love stories, and Sarah J. Maas's. sexy fairies
Hockey romance books, a genre within a genre within a genre, are having their breakout moment as part of the rise of racy romances fueled by BookTok. On TikTok there are more than 200,000 videos of the genre tagged #hockeyromance. On Google Trends, the term “hockey romance” has been rising steadily since 2022, primarily in the US, Canada, and Australia.
Almost all of the Kindle best-sellers on Amazon's Sports Romance list are hockey romances, and the No. 1 best-seller on its most regular Kindle romance list is currently The companion, part of Stephanie Archer Vancouver Storm series. And last year, Hannah Grace Icebreaker It spent 44 weeks on the New York Times Bestseller List of Paperback Commercial Fiction, occupying the number one spot on December 31.
The growing interest in sports has even been attributed to books. The semi-professional Australian Ice Hockey League says BookTok has helped them triple their audience, and some teams, such as the Toronto Brewery Pinkies, frequently post videos of players reacting to scenes from some of the popular books.
Why are they so popular? According to the marketing intelligence service. K-lytics is due to the “broadly attractive alpha male characters.” Some have credited American singer Taylor Swift's relationship with Kansas Metropolis Chiefs player Travis Kelce with fueling interest in sports romance in general.
But there may be a simpler reason.
“Well, it's partly because they're attractive,” says author Jean Tempo Hovey, one half of the duo of contemporary romance writers who publishes under the pseudonym Alicia Hunter Tempo. Along with co-author Stephanie Jones, Hovey has written 24 romance books, and seven of them (plus one novella) are hockey romances.
And while all of his romances tend to include sex scenes, they just don't compare to hockey books, which “tend to be hotter than other genres,” added Hovey, 68, of Decatur, Alabama, with a Southern accent. slurring the words.
“It's determination. It's a fast game. They don't have time to think about the ice. With heroes, that translates to off the ice, and heroes can be a little braver but also very sweet.”
The romantic growth
Romance books have enjoyed a surge in popularity in recent years, driven largely by Gen Z readers, according to NPR. On TikTok, the hashtag #RomanceRecs has more than 390 million views, industry group BookNet Canada notes.
Research from BookNet Canada shows that romance book sales in Canada increased by 54 per cent in 2022 and continue to rise. Most of the Top 10 best-selling fiction books in Canada in 2023, according to BookNet Canada, were romance titles and “romantasía,” a genre that combines romance and fantasy.
AND Icebreaker, about how “sparks fly when a competitive figure skater and the captain of a hockey team are forced to share a rink,” It was ranked number 6 on the list.
Fans of the genre say it's more than just racy smut. They argue that romance novels are an important educational tool to promote conversations about healthy sex, consent, acceptance and equality.
The funny thing is that hockey romance books tend to be barely about hockey itself, and more about the tropes and archetypes that hockey can provide, said Duncan Stewart, a Toronto-based consumer forecasting analyst at Deloitte who specializes in in media and technology, including books. publication.
The characters are hockey players, they have hockey games and they talk about things like the draft, Stewart stipulated.
“But beyond that, there's not much hockey. There is almost no actual play,” Stewart said.
In that sense, the books are no different from the classic romance of a young woman who returns to her small town and falls in love with a local lumberjack, he added.
“They don't spend a lot of time talking about him actually cutting down trees. “He's a type of character.”
'A deep dive into culture'
Hovey admits he didn't know much, if anything, about hockey when he co-wrote his first hockey romance novel. Nikolai's Christmasin Alabama, where college football is life.
“We're not hockey people in Alabama,” he said.
But after the Crimson Tide lost the Iron Bowl at home to their rival, the Auburn Tigers, thanks to the infamous “six kick” in 2013, Hovey and Jones could barely handle the coverage, which was all over the place. That's when Jones started watching hockey.
“My writing partner said, 'I want to write a novella about hockey.' And I said, 'We don't know anything about hockey!'” Hovey said, laughing.
By this time, the duo had already written several other romance titles, including some about football and a short story about baseball. But nothing about hockey.
“Simply put, she convinced me. Of course, I had to dive deep into the research.”
That investigation included opening his home to youth hockey players for four years, Hovey said. Meanwhile, Nikolai's Christmas He did “very well,” he added. Then when they finished the rest of the Brothers of Beauford Bend series (which was otherwise not about hockey), they wrote another hockey romance series called Nashville Soundfollowed by another: the Good southern women series.
“Of course, I know a hell of a lot more about hockey now than I ever thought,” Hovey said.
Romance novels are making waves in sales in Canada and the United States. A Calgary sister duo hopes to turn what was once considered a guilty pleasure into a profitable passion. CBC's Terri Trembath reports.
'Thirsty followers editions'
However, the popularity of the genre has some drawbacks.
If hockey romance was already on your radar, it could be due to a controversy last year involving the Seattle Kraken. Alex Wenberg. As Rolling Stone said in August 2023: “For months, BookTokers have been publishing edits from thirsty followers about Wennberg and other Kraken players.”
According to the New York Post, some bookmakers used Wennberg as a “representative” of a character and were “obsessed” with him. The Kraken even got into this, posting some now-deleted videos of Wennberg walking in slow motion, according to ESPN.
Wennberg's wife, Felicia, complained on Instagram, saying some of the comments about her husband were “predatory and exploitative.” Wennberg himself finally issued a statement a few days later, saying: “Enough of the sexual harassment and harassment of our character and our relationship. Thank you for your understanding.”
“BookTok is super horny,” romance author Farah Heron explained on CBC. Shock last August. First it was a fantasy romance, then it was an extra spicy contemporary romance and now hockey is having its moment, he added.
“Hockey is actually the biggest romantic sports subgenre outside of Canada. It's not just Canadians who read it… There are places where hockey is not the most popular sport,” Heron said.
The author urged followers to treat people with respect.
“The authors are creating imaginary people so that you can be as thirsty as you want. You can write and talk about whatever you want about these imaginary people. But when you talk about real people, you are crossing a line.”
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