Defending the Reaper

The Playmakers Series Hockey Romances, Book 5

By: G.K. Brady

Narrated by: Tor Thom, Whitton Frank

Length: 13 hrs and 27 mins

Publisher's summary

Take one grumpy hockey player, add one frazzled landscaper, and mix together not-so-gently in one car crash. Will they come out of this with their hearts intact?

Blizzard captain Dave Grimson’s life is as tangled as a wad of skate laces—and it’s a mess of his own making. Used to being in charge, “the Grim Reaper” has become the team leader in name only. Adding insult to injury, he finds himself dumped and single. Though he’s determined to piece his life back together, it’s time to leave his team and his city behind. What he needs is a trade and a fresh start. Dating? He’s leaving that behind too, until he collides with Ellie Hendricks. Literally.

Ellie is fighting to keep her landscaping company afloat before it gets buried under the mountain of debt her ex left behind. The last thing she needs is Dave Grimson crashing into her life. Besides, Dave is big and growly and so not her type—even if she did have time to give him a second look. Which she doesn’t.

Dave’s determined to make up for the damage his careless behavior has caused Ellie. What begins as a good intention, however, leads somewhere he never expected, and his well-guarded heart starts to show some cracks. Ellie’s unlike any woman he’s ever known. She’s unimpressed by his money, his celebrity, and him. All she wants from Dave is to have her van fixed. But he didn’t get where he is by backing away from challenges, and he’s not backing away from this one either—until he has to face-off against his demons.

As Dave lowers his defenses, Ellie catches a glimpse of something tender—and very compelling. But Dave has secrets he’s locked away, and she can’t solve them or his mixed signals. To understand Dave’s every unspoken word, she’s going to have to read between the lines.

Keeping it casual is the smart play, but Dave and Ellie’s mutual attraction won’t be denied, and it pulls them into the deep end…until those secrets come home to roost, threatening to crush the shaky trust they’ve built. Can they keep their heads above water, or will they be caught in a surge that drowns them both?

©2019 G.K. Brady (P)2023 G.K. Brady

🎧 It’s finally Grim’ s turn ❤️ …

This was a solid redemption story. I have been excited for Grim’s chance at love since he fell from grace back in Gage’s story, and I enjoyed the result overall. I love a redemption story, and while I wish there had been more scenes of Dave rebuilding and repairing the connection to the team, I get why other choices were made. He makes an impulsive decision within the first moments of the story that looms for the rest, and that tension, though not what I expected, was done really well to anchor the plot. I just love the secondary characters in the Playmakers series roster, so I always want more of the guys together off the ice. Still the moments between them that are here are enough to tide me over til the next audio.

I loved the relationship between Dave and Ellie. From their meet-cute via vehicular t-bone, to square-dancing and food box auctions, to the quieter moments when they were just being together - I really enjoyed their love story. In typical Grady fashion, we have some adorable dog moments, as Dave and Ellie have 2 lovable pups between them. I appreciated that it wasn’t all smooth sailing, couch snuggles, and dirty talk. Each MC had their demons and doubts to overcome, but the connection was there from the first sparks. And even though Brady once again fell into the less appealing cliche of including an evil ex for Dave which plays into the inevitable third act break up, it wasn’t the only element at play in that conflict. As in previous books in the series, I thought other tensions were more compelling to drive Dave and Ellie apart for a time than a rather one-dimensional manipulative, materialistic man-eater. But they are great together and their friend/family circles mesh well, which makes for some cute scenes with them, Finn and Sonoma.

The audiobook was another enjoyable installment in the series. Tor Thom as Dave is growly yummy-ness for the ears in intense and passionate moments, but he also plays the quieter redemption moments beautifully. Whitton Frank returns to the series (she previous voiced Natalie in book 2) to portray Ellie and she does just as fine a job as she did the first time around. Ellie has a lot of self-deprecating internal asides, and Frank was deft at handling those. One area where both narrator performances were a let down for me was when they put on their opposite sex voices - both make for less appealing versions of their counterparts. Thom’s version of Ellie and Frank’s of Dave often took me out of the moment, especially in intimate scenes. Still, this is often a pitfall with dual narration, and listeners just have to deal; not all productions can be duet and not every narrator can put a believable spin on multiple genders. The audiobook is worth listening to regardless, and once again, I wait impatiently for the next Playmakers audiobook. It really is an entertaining series.

I received an ALC copy of the audiobook via Home Cooked Books and read via KU. All opinions are my own.

Great hockey series

It’s always a good story when each installment is a true standalone. You’re going to want to read each story, but they all standout on their own. My only downside was when the female narrator spoke the male parts. I kept thinking it was a different character because it sounded so off. But, this is another great story in the line of a great series.

Grimm Reaper.

Absolutely love this series! Story of second chances in love and life.
Tor Thom and Whitton Frank did a great job!
Highly recommend this book.

Love A Cowboy

Yee Haw partner, this book is interesting but fun. I like the whole Wookie thing. I think Ellie and Dave seem to be a great couple, But the cousin and step brother surprised me. My favorite part was the dance. I like the narrators, they did a great job bringing everyone to live. Listening to this audiobook fly right by and screaming for more, thankfully it's part of a series. A series I now have to listen to.

Strong FMC

4 stars for story / 4.5 for narration

My favorite thing about this story is how real and flawed the relationship between Ellie and Dave is. It’s so relatable and that helped me connect so much to these characters. Dave has made huge mistakes and is working on many relationships in his life and is so vulnerable and just wants to make people happy. Ellie is a strong independent woman but still lacks self confidence and it really affects her end of the relationship and makes you want to scream at her on several occasions. Lots of emotional responses to be had while reading this story.

The narration was good. Tor Thom as always knocks it out of the park!! He is one of my favorites for a reason and I could listen to him talk for hours!!! Whitton Frank does a good job as well. It took me some time to adjust to her take on Dave’s character but the rest of it was so good it didn’t detract too much for me.

A Soft Wookie

This was my first book by G.K. Brady, and although party of a series, it is a good standalone. Dave “The Grim Reaper” is Captain of the Blizzard’s hockey team. He had made some bad choices, and now is living with those consequences. Just when he decides he needs a fresh start and starts inquiring about be traded, things were about to get interesting. Who knew that crashing into Ellie would change everything. This was a wonderful story about heartache, poor decisions and overcoming those. There is hot chemistry between Elle and Dave. Narrated by Tor Thom and Whitton Frank. They both did a phenomenal job. Tor captured Dave’s broody and soft side. Whitton was a perfect Elle. I was given the audio arc for my honest review

Redemption

I had previously read this story and enjoyed listening just as much. Dave is trying to redeem himself after making bad decisions; Ellie is rebuilding her business after her ex left it in shambles. Funny how an accident changed the trajectory for both of them.

Contemporary

I enjoyed this contemporary romance about Ellie and Save taking a chance on love after bad pasts. It was well narrated by Tor Thom and Whitton Frank.

My favorite so far!

Defending the Reaper is book #5 in The Playmakers hockey series and probably my favorite, which is saying a lot as I absolutely LOVE LOVE LOVE this series. Dave Grimson (Grim) is known by his fans as The Grim Reaper for his play on the ice. He's also recovering from a doping scandal, a hand injury, and losing his girlfriend. Grouchy is just one word to describe him. Ellie is a landscape architect with a struggling business. When a traffic collision brings these two into each other's world, sparks fly...and not just the good kind. He's trying to find his place again, she's trying to build a life again. These stories are heartwarming, funny, spicy, and have kick-a$$ playlists that I just love!

The narration was sensational. Tor Thom is a favorite narrator for me. He's the perfect grouchy Grim that oozes smeggsy! Whitton Frank is new to me and I enjoyed her performance as well. 5 boot-scootin' stars!!

Terrific Story & Narration🎧Riveting & Emotional!

GK Brady pens another winning novel set in her “Playmakers” series, a sports romance novel. Each book features different lead characters and their story stands on their own. This fifth book is Dave Grimson's and Ellie Hendricks’ story. Their first interaction was not the best, he t-boned her van with his sports car, not only totaling the van but ruining her day, everything inside the van and the job she was heading to. Ellie owns a landscaping business, a business is that is struggling, so during the off season she started doing outside decorations for the holidays and garden parties. Dave has a lot on his mind, and was not paying attention when he was driving. He is not happy where he is. His past mistakes have cost him the respect of his teammates and he is looking to be traded. It was his inattentiveness that caused him to crash his car and Dave tries to make things right for Ellie. It turns out that Ellie is the neighbor that his cousin, Somona, was trying to set him up with. Both these characters had their issues and their struggles, which made that real. Both had loser exes too, though Ellie’s was not in the picture, Dave’s was and she was manipulative and I knew she was nothing but trouble the moment she was introduced, high maintenance for sure. I enjoyed how everything played out in this book, the writing, plot and world building are fantastic, as are the character growth and development. The story is entertaining and captivates your attention from start to end. G.K. Brady, thank you for another fantastic story and emotional rollercoaster ride.

🎧📚🎧   And for the terrific narration, Tor Thom and Whitton Frank were the storytellers and did a great job portraying the characters, humanizing them, giving each their own voice and personality. I think it would have been even better had this been a duet performance or that Tor Thom performed Dave’s role the entire book, because he was a natural in the role and aced it. Frank was fabulous as Ellie, and while she changed it up while covering the role of Dave changing her voice to sound deeper, but it sounded too gruff almost like it was painful for her to drop into that range, and I can not imagine it being easy to do for a length of time, so kudos to her for that. They set the perfect tone for the story, captured all the characters’ emotions and had you feeling every single one. Thank you for another great listen.