Winging It (Cate Cameron)

Disclaimer: This Entangled Teen Crush book contains adult language, ice-melting kisses, and a swoon-worthy hero. This fake relationship romance will have you wishing for a hockey player of your own… 

Natalie West and Toby Cooper were best friends growing up, on and off the ice. But when Toby’s hockey career took off, their friendship was left behind. Now Natalie has a crazy plan to land her crush — Toby’s biggest rival — and she needs Toby’s help to pull it off.

When Nat asks Toby to be her fake boyfriend, he can’t say no. Not when it means getting his best friend back. But Natalie is all grown up now, and spending time with her — even when it’s just playing hockey together — stirs up a lot of feelings, old and new. Suddenly pretending to be interested in her isn’t hard at all…if only she wanted him and not his enemy. 

Hockey tore them apart. Can it put them back together?

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As it has been usual lately, I read this eARC as a buddy read with Cátia @The Girl Who Read Too Much, go to her blog in the next couple of days to read her take on this book.

A while back I read book 2 of this series, Playing Defense, and I really liked that one. I equally liked this one, with an added bonus of two of my favorite tropes being at play here.

Much like the previous book, I really liked the writing. And more importantly, once again, the characters felt their age. They read like teenagers, doing the wrong things most of the time, but trying to find the right way.

I’ve mentioned this before, but I’m a huge fan of the best friends turned lovers and the pretend relationship tropes, and once again, we had both here. I thought the development of both of this situations was very well done.

In general I liked both main characters, though Nat frustrated me a bit, but I can’t really fault her. She’s a teenager, and like all teenagers she has her crush goggles for most of the book, crushing on someone who truly doesn’t deserve her. I did like her growth though, and I really loved Toby’s part in it. Toby was seriously awesome. I really liked how honest he was with Nat, not taking her crap about his success, and opening her eyes to what she still could do to grab her future. I also really liked that he was willing to put her happiness and whatever she wanted, first.

They were amazing as friends, and amazing as everything more!

I really wanted to beat the hell out of Scott, the dude was an asshole! I wanted to shake Nat and make her wake up and see what was right in front of her! Still, he had his moments, and he wasn’t 100% bad… just 95%… I initially thought that Dawn would be a problem, being Toby’s ex girlfriend and all, but I was happy about how Cameron wrote their relationship.

Ultimatly this book has some nice messages, like how you should always be yourself with the person you love… you shouldn’t have to think about what to eat or wear when you love someone. Also, it’s not because things look perfect, that they are…

It’s a very cute and great YA contemporary romance, with a dash of hockey – which you by now know that I love. So, give it a go!