A review by rachelj81416
The Proposal Play by Lauren Blakely

5.0

I seriously love Lauren Blakely. I haven't read a book from her that I didn't adore yet...and I've read a lot of those in the past year. I fully attribute my new love of sports romance, specifically hockey romance, to her Love and Hockey series, which just released the third book, The Proposal Play!

In The Proposal Play, best friends of 10 years, Maeve and Asher, spontaneously wed in Vegas during a whirlwind weekend trip, fulfilling their marriage pact from years ago and heading into their next Great Adventure. They weren't planning on the weekend photos to leak, or to go viral, or to stay married. Between Maeve's rocketing art career and Asher's work on his new non-profit while continuing his pro-hockey career, there isn't a good opportunity to let the world know the marriage was just for fun, or to end it amicably for the public. As Maeve spends more intimate time with Asher, she starts realizing what their friends already know: Asher could actually be in love with her...and she might actually be wildly in love with me him. Navigating friendship, romance and intimacy, careers, self-love, mental health, and grief together shows Maeve and Asher how living life together could be, and maybe they want to keep doing just that. It IS a "friendship on fire." Or maybe they realize this was all a dream and they're better off as friends. Since it's a hockey romance, we know how it ends, but the ride getting there sure is a fun one! 

You'll love this book as much as I did if you enjoy hockey romance, friends-to-lovers, he falls first, he's been secretly in love for years, marriage pact, marriage of convenience, forced proximity, spice, and interconnected stories (you could read this without reading the others in the series, but I would recommend it to get the full impact of the character dynamics).