Against All Odds
Series: Holt Hockey, #2
Author: C.W. Farnsworth
Publication Date: February 2, 2024
Publisher: C.W. Farnsworth LLC
Genre: New Adult, Contemporary Romance, Sports Romance
Note: This review is for an ARC and is my unbiased opinion.
Rating: ★ ★ ★ ★ ½
Synopsis:
Rylan Keller is dreading the start of spring semester. After choosing a college across the country and spending the past fall abroad, she’ll be a Holt University student. Worse than starting over at a new school? Starting over at a new school where your dad is the head coach of the men’s hockey team. And reluctantly agreeing to tutor a player, then coming face-to-face with the guy you thought you’d never see again.
Aidan Phillips has a reputation on campus. One he’s carefully curated to include limited reliability or responsibility. Outside of hockey, he spends his free time drinking, partying, and flirting. Often all three.
He’s a player off the ice as well as on it. Gorgeous, carefree, reckless. His one goal is to finally win Holt a championship, which he can only do if he keeps up his end of the tutoring arrangement. Hooking up with his tutor would be stupider than failing in the first place, even if the tutor in question wasn’t his coach’s daughter.
Rylan is determined to excel at Holt and make her fresh start a success. To finally have some fun, and not with a hockey player. Except, the more time they spend together, the easier it is for Rylan to look past Aidan’s facade. The harder it is to hold back.
But no matter how tempting giving in might be…the odds are stacked against them.
I honestly can’t get enough of C.W. Farnsworth’s books. I get excited for all of her new releases, but I love that she was inspired to go back and add more books to the Holt Hockey setting. I enjoyed Famous Last Words, and I was excited to get a book about Conor Hart’s best friend and teammate Aidan Phillips.
Aidan was a college hockey playboy who lost his playboy mojo after a vacation hookup. He’s drifting aimlessly through college, hockey, and life in general. When Aiden fails a class and hockey is in jeopardy, his coach assigns his daughter to tutor Aidan. It should be easy for Aidan to keep his hands off his coach’s daughter, but it’s not when Rylan shows up to tutor him.
The last thing Rylan wants to do at her new school is tutor one of her dad’s players, but she doesn’t really have a choice and it’s the least she can do. Rylan’s dealing with a lot of regrets and is hoping transferring to Holt will fix things for her. She’s just as surprised as Aidan is how hard it will be to keep her hands to herself when it comes to her new tutee.
Aidan’s privilege and aimlessness should have been annoying. He had so much to be thankful for. Learning why he felt the way he did about everything helped me empathize with him more. Underneath his careless attitude, he was a guy who really did care and want to do well. I loved how Rylan inspired him to change his ways in several different ways in several different aspects of his life. I also loved how Aidan brought some things into focus for Rylan. Her regrets seemed simpler than what Aidan was going through, but they impacted her current choices and how she saw her relationship with Aidan. I loved how she worked through her thoughts and feelings and came out with a better understanding of herself and life. Aidan and Rylan’s personalities complimented each other well and they had fantastic chemistry. The stages of their relationship felt true to college students, and I enjoyed the way they worked through them both together and apart.
This book also had some great side characters. It was a pleasure seeing Conor and Harlow again. I loved where their relationship was. I also loved Conor and Aidan’s third roommate. I’m curious as to who he is going to end up with! I am also curious about Isla and what came next with her basketball player crush.
There were two little things that bugged me a bit when I was reading this book. One was a flashback Aidan had. It was early on in the book, but I thought it would have been a better prologue. Only because it was the only true flashback, and it disrupted the flow of the present for me. That being said, I still loved the content and was happy it was included. The second thing was something only a Washingtonian like me might find fault with. There is a moment early on where someone tells Rylan they are from Des Moines and then follows it with Iowa. Rylan says she knows Des Moines is in Iowa. The problem with that for me is there is a Des Moines, WA. If you’re from Western Washington like Rylan is, that designation of Iowa versus WA would be a thing. That’s probably not something most readers are going to notice, so not a huge deal.
Overall, I adored Aidan and Rylan’s romance. It was both complicated and simple at the same time. They felt like a real-life college couple working through feelings and growing pains. I can’t wait to see more of them as side characters in the next book in this series.