Changing Lines

Harrisburg Railers Hockey, Book 1

De: RJ Scott, V.L. Locey

Narrado por: Sean Crisden

Can Tennant show Jared that age is just a number and that love is all that matters?

The Rowe brothers are famous hockey hotshots, but as the youngest of the trio, Tennant has always had to play against his brothers’ reputations. To get out of their shadows, and against their advice, he accepts a trade to the Harrisburg Railers, where he runs into Jared Madsen. Mads is an old family friend and his brother’s one-time teammate. Mads is Tennant’s new coach. And Mads is the sexiest thing on which he’s ever laid eyes.

Jared Madsen’s hockey career was cut short by a fault in his heart, but coaching keeps him close to the game. When Ten is traded to the team, his carefully organized world is thrown into chaos. Nine years his junior and his best friend’s brother, he knows Ten is strictly off-limits, but as soon as he sees Ten’s moves, on and off the ice, he knows his heart could get him into trouble again.

©2017 RJ Scott & VL Locey (P)2018 RJ Scott & VL Locey

Enjoyable

Solid purchase that I would recommend. I found the narrators voice fit well. well written with good characters.

I loved this series

I loved this book. There was absolutely nothing that I disliked about it. Two hot hockey players, okay Mads was retired, due to health reasons, falling in love with little to no drama was the best. Ten’s family accepting him being gay and accepting their relationship. Okay Bradly initially didn’t take it very well but I think it was more because he didn’t want to see him get hurt. Mads’ son accepted him and the relationship. And the team did as well. This was all a breath of fresh air. And this is the way it should be in real life! Acceptance!!!! I can’t wait to continue with this series.

So glad this came out in audio!

Changing Lines

5 Stars, Book & Narration

I did not want this book to end. I think that this book was put together well, and if this is what we have to look forward to in the rest of the series, I won’t hesitate to get my hands on the next several books. I think the collaboration between RJ Scott and VL Locey is a definite mark in the win column, this book turned out great and I was sucked in from the first few lines.

Oh, and then add in the fantastic narration by Sean Crisden and this book was basically perfect. Sean gave us a great performance (again), making sure the main characters and even the minor hockey players and family members were all given the correct voices and accents depending on where they were from. Sean even gives us some good Boston and Ukrainian/Russian accents too, it was awesome. This was another really solid narration from him. Sean is still one of my favorite narrators no matter how many books I’ve heard because he is always so consistent with what he gives us.

I was happy to see that not only do we get a great book and personal story for these two men, Tennant “Ten” and Jared “Mads”, but *gasp* we actually got see and learn about some hockey in this book as well. Sometimes with sports books we don’t actually get to see the sports being played or written in on-page and that was so not the case here. We got to see these characters put their hearts and souls into their sport as well as each other. Tennant is an upcoming hockey star on the new Harrisburg Railers team, and Mads is the defensive line coach. It was great to hear that Ten and Mads grew up together, that they had that background even though they fell out of touch. They get a second chance at getting to know each other again now they are both adults. The two of them together is seriously steamy H.O.T. and there are a few scenes that were pretty sexy, but I would have loved to see more of them getting personal together. There just wasn’t enough time in this book for them to get really in-depth, strengthen their dynamic and create enough chemistry and tension.

This book was really low angst and had virtually no drama. Ten and his brothers have an interesting dynamic though, all three of them being pro hockey players and getting competitive when their teams collide in a match. Ten is still the baby of the family and his brothers are consistently treating him as such throughout the book, always questioning his decisions.

Mads is the perfect older “hot” dad to a teenage boy Ryker. One thing I had issue with was how Mads always made himself out to be “old” but he was really only mid-thirties and Ten really wasn’t that much younger like 10-13yrs difference in age. I thought that the deal with Mads’s ex father in law, Ryker's grandpa, was an interesting situation all around. I didn’t get how they just let him act the way he did, almost like they were all afraid to stand up to him and put their foot down. He was the main drama piece in this book and I hated him each time he surfaced.

Omg, and the hockey players all playing Pokémon Go and creating their own Pokémon team was hilarious, I thought that was a really fun addition to this book, and made them see all that much more real to me. This book was really great. I would also like to add that Mads's son Ryker is younger like 17 or so in this one. But I would love to see him a few years down the line as the main character of his own book.

Recognition

Sean Crisden is rapidly becoming one of my favorite voice actors, more than a story narrator.  The reader/listener will soon forget that he is reading the story to you and fall into the pages of the book.  His characters are realistic and there is nothing that pulls your attention from the story which, to me, is the mark of an expert voice actor/narrator.
The cover designed by @MeredithRAuthor is perfect and I absolutely recognize Mads and Ten!

Sports romance is hot, a favorite of mine and authors Scott and Locey are well known for their mastery of sports/hockey stories.  Add in the age gap, the dynamic of older brother's best friend and the taboo nature of a relationship between a hockey player and the coach and you have the recipe for a great story.
This story has meat with multi-generational complex family dynamics involving both main characters.  Tennant has always been compared or at least compared himself to his pro hockey star brothers so his move to an expansion team was a big one and not favored by his family.  He needed to spread his wings and not just in his sport.  Coach Jared Madsen is raising a teenage son and his attention is split between his team and his son's development as a young man and a hockey player in the family tradition.  He has no time to devote to more than a coach-player relationship with his former teammate's brother although his mind and heart return to Ten.
This was a great start to the Harrisburg Railers series and the characters we meet here are interesting and a bit fun as well.  This, again, left me wanting much more.

The sizzle rating is 'hot' - "4 out of 5"
My rating for the narrator is 4.5, exceptional!
The story 4.5 stars - a top pick!

Fun, Sweet, and SEXY!!

Everything you could possibly want in a M/M Hockey Romance..., right?? Whatever! I found this series because of scoping out anything narrated by Sean Crisden's beautiful, sexy deep voice. I'd pay good money to hear him read the dictionary!!

R.J. Scott was a familiar name, but V.L. Locey was a new author to me, but I wasn't disappointed. Together they wrote a sweet, mildly steamy story that I found very enjoyable and it held my interest. Enough so that I purchased book 2 and, upon finishing that, ordered book 3 from Kindle. I expect I'll gobble up volumes 4-10 as well. Who knew hockey could be so alluring!!

Sean Crisden was truly the selling point, and I hope they'll select his talents for future enhancement of the other books. Did I mention his voice is absolutely delicious??? Just sayin'!

Great read/Listen

The characters in this series have been well developed. The universe/setting is pretty good, Good story development it is a shame that the story is not fleshed out more. It could be so much better.,

An alright book!!

The Story: 3.5 Pants Off

Tennant Rowe is a superstar in the making and when he decides on an up and coming team a few eyebrows were raised. Of course he could have gone with superstar teams most likely to win the Stanley Cup but Ten decides on the Railers with big disapproval from his family, but Ten is a big boy and he’s making his own decisions. While the Railers aren’t cloaked in history it’s the team he wants to join and the upside is that the team has Jared Madsen. An old family friend and someone Ten is looking to get up close and personal with. Yeh, they have history and Mads is a bit older but age ain’t nothing but a number after-all.

Downside, you can’t be gay in hockey. So when Ten finds himself telling his coaches that he’s gay he’s expecting the worst but what it gets him is a secret relationship with Mads and things are almost perfect. All that’s left is coming out to his family and maybe one day even publicly. Ten’s got hockey, love, and Mads, what more could he even want?!

First, things moved pretty fast from the get go. Ten is the new to the team and next things he’s sharing he’s gay, and professing his attraction to Mads. Their relationship moves pretty fast, and most of their loving happens off page so I sort of felt like I was filling things in. The hockey was too much of the story, and the romance felt like a backdrop but again I have no particular feelings for hockey. Ten spent most of his time dwelling on his brothers, and everyone else on the fact that he plays for a unknown team.

Throw in some conflict involving Mads and that pretty much made the entirety of the story. I was a bit more interested in a few side characters actually, so the rest of the series is peaking my interest.

Overall, an alright read. I can’t call it sexy or amazing but I can say I found it sweet. I enjoyed Ten a lot more than I did Mads. There’s still so much of the story that I feel needs to be explored, and I wasn’t a fan of how it ended. Changing Lines wasn’t horrible but I fear that it’s quite easily forgettable for me.

The Narration: 4 Pants Off

Sean Crisden did an amazing job bringing the characters to life. I’m in love with his take on Tennant, listening to his voice was far more enjoyable than the story and because of his narration I enjoyed it more. I’m positive if I’d read Changing Lines instead of listening I wouldn’t have liked it at all.

Sean was dramatic where he needed to be and sweet in others, definitely enjoyed that. Also brought a new voice to each character which strongly made them individuals. Sean Criden does an amazing job with whatever story you give him.

Great narration, funny characters, but felt incomplete

Sean Crisden was 100% as always! Tenant is probably the most fun character I’ve met in a story in a long time. His wit and banter was hilarious, especially the scene after Thanksgiving dinner. The only reason I didn’t give the story 5* is because the ending felt incomplete. I wish there had been just one or two more chapters so we could see the reaction from the big decision at the end.

Great start to the series

Having read the book last year I was excited to hear the audio version narrated by Sean Crisden as he was a new narrator for me. I thought Sean was a great match for the story as he had a really smooth and emotive voice, almost comforting and he did a great job distinguishing between different characters, it just seemed to work me. I find some narrators can grate a little after listening to them through a whole book but with Sean’s narration, I would have been happy to listen to the whole book in one session if that was possible! One highlight worth noting was the berry scene, which was white hot.

This book is a great start to the Harrisburg Railers series, I love a good book set in the ice hockey world and I could tell this series was gonna be a favourite one. We’re introduced to characters who all have an interesting back-story with lots of depth and there’s a lot going on to hold your attention straight from the get-go. I loved Mads’ hesitancy at the beginning; over Tennant’s age and the fact that they’re with the same team, but the lust and the deepening feelings override this and they find that this is more than just a hook-up. Here we have a May to December relationship between a Coach (who’s a single father to boot) and a player, so this pulled me in straightaway, and their slow start with no full-on sex told the UST and chemistry at it’s best. Ten coming out to his Mum and Dad was so well written, and I adored the great relationship that Ten had with Mads’ son Ryker. There’s a boat load of heartfelt interaction here, seriously, if you blink you’ll miss it, not just from the MC’s but the whole cast of characters and props to the authors for weaving the tale of the romance, the hockey, the team interaction and the family so beautifully. A great start to the series which just amps up the anticipation for more.

This book was adorable.

I enjoy hockey books when they are with older guys. I enjoyed that there an age gap and they were friends prior. Just adorable.