Her Man Advantage: Post 3

Chapter 2: The Stinky Hockey Man Meets the Heroine

Chapter two starts from the heroine’s perspective. (And OMG I am so incredibly grateful that this novel isn’t perspective jumping like Play the Man did.) The heroine is filmmaker Jennifer Hunter, and she’s currently avoiding Axel because he’d pounded on the conference room doors and didn’t even bother to take off his helmet. (I’m not sure how she knew that latter part since she didn’t see him.) Somewhere, Axel is demanding to know where Jennifer is (she can hear him), but she’s got her arms folded on the “cold steel railing that circled the practice rink” (14).

Has everyone who writes these things only ever seen seriously old-skool rinks, outdoor rinks, and The Mighty Ducks? There’s no place in any average rink that has a place where you can fold your arms on the railing unless you’re on the players’ bench. Everywhere else has, y’know, plexiglass to stop the pucks from hitting you in the face. So the Phantoms’ practice rink is either very odd, or the writer has not done any research, or Jennifer’s face is smooshed into the glass.

Nevermind, let’s go with that last one.

Jennifer is avoiding Axel in part because he’s a very large, sweaty man who is stomping around and in part because she doesn’t want to be making this documentary. She’s “an activist for social change” and is completely uninterested in athletes. She’s been tasked with making something commercially viable (this documentary) in order to gain funding for the project she actually wants to do (“about the way girls used social media to ostracize those they rejected socially” (17), inspired by the way her sister, Julia, had been treated.)

But she’s there to do the work and Axel finds her.

Thick, dark stubble didn’t hide one heavily scarred cheek. His accent made her want to listen to him speak for a long time so she could trace the cadences and vowel sounds (14).

Well, it’s a short book. There has to be immediate attraction.

Even without the skates he must be at least six-foot-five. His chest was broad enough that she could have lain on him like a bed and had room to roll around (15).

First, that’s a really weird metaphor. Fortunately, the author seems to realize that because Jennifer even thinks it’s “an odd image.” Second, he’s still in his gear—shoulder pads and chest padding. Admittedly, not padding like a goalie (I’m constantly surprised when I see Roberto Luongo or Mike Smith without their gear on. “You’re so skinny!”) but still. Of course his chest is broad. That’s not really a description that can accurately be made until he’s out of his gear.

…the scent of pungent male sweat assailed her nostrils. … no amount of wind power would freshen up a place built on undiluted testosterone (15).  But as he leaned in closer for the customary greeting, the sweaty musk of his workout hit her. Damn near choked her. … His sea-blue gaze twinkled with the sadistic urge to kill her with sweat-stink (16). …Axel had assaulted her nostrils with deadly intent (16). “And choking to death in noxious locker rooms was in (my job description)” (18).

“I was anxious to find you before the full effect of my workout died down.” He waved a hand around his chest to waft the scent of sweat her way.

Covering her nose with one hand, she used the other to point at him accusingly. “I knew you looked sadistically pleased when you shook my hand. You were trying to asphyxiate me” (18).

The biography of the author says she’s a mother of sports-obsessed boys. I think she might have had to wash some hockey gear in her time because this is quite the amount of text spent on the unique aroma of hockey stink. Mind you, I don’t think it’s testosterone Jennifer is smelling—I think it’s ungendered hockey fug, but still.

The coach introduces Jennifer and Axel and she nearly asphyxiates from the smell. She plays it cool, saying she’s glad to meet all the players so she can get ideas for storylines. This freaks out Axel, although she, unlike us readers, doesn’t know why. She also suggests he might have a girlfriend who would like some screen time, which seems to upset him further. (Since Jennifer has been “coaching nonprofessional actors into evoking a mood on camera” she can tell what he’s thinking as “the nuances of body language were well-known to her” (16). I suppose it’s an improvement over Body Check’s Hayden being able to tell what Brody was thinking based on his eyes.)

Jennifer tries to convince Axel of why she’s there and why giving some backstory is important (otherwise it’s just a hockey game broadcast). Axel ponders this “scratching the inside of a shin guard with his hockey stick” (18).

It’s nitpicky of me (that’s the point of this blog, though) but that sentence doesn’t make sense. Even if you assume the narrative means “under a shin guard” not the actual inside of the shin guard which probably doesn’t get itchy, what with being made of plastic and not alive, I’m unclear as to how he’d be doing it. Shin guards go on under hockey socks, and then you tape all of that in place. It would be just a bit less difficult to scratch (absently, no less) under a shin guard with a hockey stick than reaching an itch under a cast.

There’s a bit more back and forth and then Jennifer suggests that Axel show her around after he washes up because she’s drawn to him. That said, her obstacle is already set up in that she won’t let herself act on that spark between them because she might have to “extract a story line from him that he wouldn’t like” (19).

Dunh dunh dunnnnnhhhhh.

Play the Man: Post 6

Chapter Three: I’m Beginning to Hate This Couple

I get that the author is trying to show us that there are problems in this relationship. I also accept that I know I couldn’t possibly be happy spending most of my life taking care of my significant other, whereas other people take great joy and satisfaction in doing that sort of thing. So I know that I am not critiquing this in a completely balanced way. But I’m already annoyed because this couple makes pretty much zero sense to me. Jenna is supposed to be smart and an all-around good person, but she seems to only like Ryan for his looks. And he’s …. got pretty much nothing I find redeemable.

In this chapter we finally learn that Jenna is a graduate student (flashback to Body Check again. The similarities are starting to weird me out). She’s at the Art Institute of Chicago studying art history (again with the similarities! Do art history people have a thing for hockey players?) The two of them wake up, and Jenna tries to start her very busy day, but Ryan wants sex. He asks if she can’t miss just one day’s class and Jenna points out that in graduate school classes seldom meet and each one is important. Having multiple degrees, I can confirm her point.

But Ryan pushes, both physically seducing her and guilting her since he’s about to leave for a five day roadtrip. Jenna points out that if he’s going to miss her, he could meet her for lunch to spend time together. Ryan initially declines.

“No offense, babe, but I can talk to you over the phone from the road. I can’t, however, do this” (23).

Where the “this” in question is sucking on her nipples. She acquiesces and is late for class.

Afterward, Ryan changes his mind and meets Jenna for lunch. This scene starts from his perspective (none of the scenes since the third in chapter one have remained from one perspective. Yes, this is driving me nuts).

Now he watched as she went on and on about something having to do with her class or whatever. … it made her happy. That’s all Ryan cared about. When she was happy, she glowed, and he’d do anything to keep that fire in her lit. He continued to watch as she talked animatedly, even though he wasn’t truly listening (24).

I’m glad that Ryan genuinely wants Jenna to be happy and that he’ll do whatever it takes for that to happen (except, I guess, set a wedding date). But to literally not care about her passion, even to the point where he consistently doesn’t bother to listen, that’s just patronizing and obnoxious. I mean, I’m not saying he should start taking art history classes, but if he loves her, he should at least learn a little about her interests. They don’t have to share every interest ever, but I have to believe that she knows more about hockey than he does about art history.

(And fair’s fair. Remember back in Body Check that I found Hayden’s refusal to learn anything about hockey, and condescendingly (in my opinion) agreeing to attend hockey games but bringing class notes with her, was equally problematic. But by contrast, in that book Brody not only liked how Hayden lit up when talking about art history, he actually joined in the conversation.)

Eventually, he cuts into her gushing about Chagall to give her her engagement ring which she’d forgotten to wear. She’s mortified to have left it behind and calls herself a horrible girlfriend, but she does tease that if  Ryan hadn’t made her late, she’d not be rushing and thus forgotten it.

“I know, I know,” he replied, finding humor in the way she threw the blame around. “It’s all my fault” (25).

The give and take in most relationships would include this dialogue but not claiming that the other “threw the blame around.” I mean, she apologized, took blame, then joked, then after this comment, she apologizes again.

Then, after he puts the ring back on her hand, she just basks in “the way his thumb rubbed over her fingers” because ordinarily he doesn’t hold her hand in public. This continues to support my point that Ryan just lays claim on Jenna when he deems it necessary (grabbing her in chapter one and pulling her into his lap despite her discomfort) but not to make her happy (holding her hand in public.)

I really don’t like this couple. I liked Jenna at first, but the longer she stays with this guy and the more I learn about their relationship, the less I like even her. Worse yet, this scene ends with the following:

Jenna placed her hand back in her lap, glancing down at the giant pink diamond. As gaudy and showy as it may have been, it was hers; she’d put in the time, the dedication, and the work. She deserved it (25 emphasis original).

Really? She’s deserved it?

Initially I was rooting for this couple to break up so that Jenna could be with Nick. Now I’m rooting for Nick to go find some nice girl elsewhere.

Play the Man: Post 1

Chapter One: Introducing the Engaged Couple

I’m not sure what to expect with this novel. Body Check provided so much fodder that I’m nervous that this one will suffer by comparison. The title suggests there should be cross-dressing, Twelfth Night style hijinks but I’m pretty damn sure that’s not the case, alas. Also, this is the third book in a series, I believe, and I have not read the first two.

The cover blurb: Jenna couldn’t be more thrilled: after eight years of dating, she finally gets to marry her college sweetheart and dream man, Chicago Blackhawks Captain Ryan Lisenbigler. While Ryan loves his fiancée more than he can say, he’s in no rush to get to the altar. As they struggle with their differing attitudes towards their upcoming wedding, Ryan’s teammate Nick battles with his newfound, taboo feelings of infatuation for Jenna. Emotions run high, and soon Jenna, Ryan, and Nick each finding themselves having to make very difficult decisions regarding what they want in love—and life—and what they’re willing to do in order to get it.

Okay, reading that synopsis vaguely hints at a threesome, but I suspect that’s as unlikely as wacky cross-dressing hijinks. Sadface.

Let’s talk about the cover for a moment because it’s interesting. If you are unable to see the image I’ll describe it. It’s a drawing, with a pink circle in the middle which might be a pale version of a face-off dot, but I can’t guarantee that that’s true because there’s also a line through the circle. In the center there is a ring with a large pink gem. On either side is what I think is a hockey stick but they are incredibly oddly shaped. They might be sticks as seen from above at a faceoff. The sticks are wood, though, which makes very little sense for a contemporary novel, and have white tape wrapped around the blades. Irregular not-quite-cursive words sprawl across the entire cover, reading “PLAY” and “MAN” in large text and “the” in very small text inside the ring. The M and N of “MAN” curl around the hockey sticks’ blades.

The overall appearance of the font suggests nothing so much as an octopus. That might be hockey related, had the book been about the Detroit Redwings, given the unfortunate tradition of that team’s fans tossing octopi onto the ice, but in actuality this book is about the Chicago Blackhawks. The coloration loudly declares that this is a “chick lit” book.

As with our previous novel, the first chapter accomplishes the introductions, although unlike Body Check we meet three main characters. The entirety of the first chapter takes place in a bar, but much of it is less scene and more holy-carp-backstory, which isn’t as exciting as it could be.

Our main character, Jenna, is contemplating her new engagement ring, which leads to the masses of backstory. When the blurb says that Jenna is “finally” marrying her college sweetheart, it isn’t kidding. They’ve been together already for eight years, having met at Dartmouth. After Jenna graduated, Ryan was already playing for the Blackhawks and asked her to join him in Chicago, which the narrative assures us was his way of proposing commitment.

Evidently it took his mother’s interference for him to finally propose. In fact, she packed the picnic basket “with sparkling white wine, chocolates, cheese, and fruit” and sent them out for fireworks.

For reasons unclear to me, at this point the text switches to italics. I assume it’s supposed to be a flashback, as it’s the scene of Ryan asking Jenna to marry him, complete with dialogue and such, but it’s still odd since it was already set up by the non-italicized bit earlier explain his mother set things up. Since the scene is from Jenna’s perspective, I’m not sure how she could have known that about Ryan’s mother.

The overwhelming emotion that comes through in the description of Ryan’s proposal is relief. Relief that finally he’d made it official, of course, since Jenna had been waiting around for so long. But also relief that she hadn’t disappointed her parents.

…they hated how he wouldn’t make the big commitment to their daughter, and they didn’t appreciate that she was willing to wait this long to get one. Her mother and father had a hard time explaining to their socialite friends that their daughter still hadn’t married the man she had been dating since her freshman year of college (6 emphasis original).

I can understand putting in a lot of time into something and not wanting to stop because you’ve already put that first amount of time in. But it reads like this is why Jenna has stayed, mostly through inertia and a fear of having wasted time. This pressure from her parents is equally problematic. Why should Jenna care if her parents have trouble with their “socialite friends”? She’s not there with them. One should not base one’s life decisions on one’s parents’ opinions, particularly when their opinions are based on difficulty with their snobby friends. Apparently her parents even pressured her to give Ryan an ultimatum.

But, now she’s engaged and she is at a bar along with the entire Chicago Blackhawks team, celebrating. Except she’s not really celebrating because she’s not particularly into crowds or bars. Also, the Blackhawks seem like asshats.

All right, let me back up here. The real life, our world, NHL Chicago Blackhawks are my least favorite NHL team in part because they really do seem like asshats. Also, their fans, at least when they come to my team’s arena, are jerks. Doesn’t matter if their team wins or loses, they’re awful to the opposing team’s fans.

So that may color my view of the fictional Blackhawks in this book, but I kind of don’t think so.

…but she knew the guys were horrible tippers. They weren’t stingy, by any means, but they just didn’t understand that the concept of twenty percent didn’t compute when they left the place trashed in their wake (7 emphasis original).

Specifically, Ryan seems to be a bit of an asshat, too. Or, perhaps more accurately very self-absorbed.

For example, Ryan’s choice of engagement ring for Jenna is entirely not her style—she describes it as his. The narrative tells us that Jenna “was a simple girl” and that a “traditional solitaire” would have fit her personality best. What Ryan chose better suited him, as “outgoing and boisterous and, yes, a little gaudy” (7).

It was a cushion-cut, two-and-a-half carat pink diamond set in white gold, in a diamond-encrusted micro-pave mounting (7).

I don’t know what half of that means (and I don’t currently have internet access to look it up) but starting with pink and ending in encrusted, it sounds pretty awful to me.

When the scene switches to Ryan’s perspective, the narrative tells us that he thinks Jenna “was a drag when she came out with the boys” and he enjoys himself more without her. He calls her “uptight” and not “sexy, but rather…a classic beauty” (10). His reason for waiting so long to ask Jenna to marry him is that he’s “only twenty-seven” (emphasis original). Later, we see that “Ryan grabbed his Jenna’s hand” (12). His possessiveness via the narrative is disturbing.  It must be an authorial choice in that without “his” there it reads just as clearly. (There are no other Jennas in the scene.)

Oddly, the narrative slips into Jenna’s POV for a moment and while that’s not particularly consistent writing, the little blip tells readers a lot about this couple.

Ryan took his seat…then he snaked an arm around her waist and pulled her into his lap. Jenna thought it was too intimate of a position for present company, but he wouldn’t let her get up (12).

Again, Ryan is staking his claim on Jenna, just as with the enormous engagement ring, his inner thoughts calling her “his,” and putting her on his lap in front of all of his teammates, including his best friend who had been flirting with her. He isn’t too concerned about her leaving him. His reaction to his mother telling him that he might lose her was that “Jenna was so much a part of him that she would never leave him or do anything to hurt him” (10) so his claim isn’t to keep her with him; it’s too show her off, to show everyone else what he has. She’s valued as an object.

When Jenna goes to get another beer for Ryan, we get further insight into this relationship and how Ryan values his fiancée.

Even after eight years together, she had never stopped putting in the effort needed to maintain their relationship. She didn’t come home after a long day and immediately put on ugly, frumpy sweatpants. She cooked all his meals… (14).

All of this would be fine, particularly as we also learn that he’s very attracted to her and considers her a “caring, loving, thoughtful woman (14). However, we don’t see any reciprocation. When Jenna describes Ryan, it’s in terms of her love for him. This strikes me as a terrible relationship, which I think is the author’s intent, and not worth saving, which I’m not sure is the author’s intent.

This third break of the chapter switches perspectives several times (Ryan pages 9-12, Nick (one of the teammates) 12, Jenna 12, Nick 12, Jenna 12-13, Ryan 13, Jenna 13, Nick 14, Jenna 15.) You could argue, I suppose, that this scene has simply become omniscient, but there’s no division between the 3 pages of Ryan’s perspective into omniscient the way that there is between the section of Jenna’s POV or Nick’s. It’s distracting, and frankly an editor ought to have taken it out. And yet, there’s important character information conveyed here, more so than in the single-perspective scenes that rely so heavily on flashback. Still, jumping from head to head, perspective to perspective, is distracting and problematic, and I sincerely hope it doesn’t continue throughout the novel.