Breakaway (Scoring Chances #1), Avon Gale

Another m/m hockey romance, which I enjoyed, mostly because I really liked Jared Shore. He's a grizzled old veteran of the minor minor leagues, who loves hockey but knows his time playing is almost up. He mets Lane, a hot young prospect, who convinces him to not only get into a relationship, but to try and have the best season of his life, remember what he loves about hockey.

What worked less for me was Lane, who was aggressively weird in a way that made reading his dialogue difficult and confusing sometimes. I fully expected the book to address it somehow, telling us that Lane was on the spectrum, which would have been fine and interesting, but mostly it was hard to follow the conversations, and instead of fun and quirky it was distracting. It's also weird that he'd never had any friends -- almost like an alien dropped into the story, rather than a character with a  background. (His resolution with his parents was also very easy after a whole book of angst.)

Grade: C
#49 in 2017