Hockey Romance to Read If You Love Elle Kennedy and Hannah Grace

If you love Elle Kennedy and Hannah Grace, read the Playing series by Lainey Davis. These are steamy, funny, Pittsburgh-set hockey romances with grouchy heroes, sharp heroines, and a found-family ensemble that carries across the whole series. Each book stands alone with a guaranteed happily ever after, and the tropes run trope-forward: brother's best friend, fake dating, forced proximity, and one bed.

If Icebreaker pulled you in with a hockey player who falls first and falls hard, you'll recognize that energy in Bernard "Howie" Houser. In Playing with Trouble, he gives up his own bed for his best friend's little sister and spends the season pretending he doesn't notice a single thing about her. It's a brother's-best-friend, forced-proximity romance with a curvy nurse heroine who sees straight through the party-boy act.

Elle Kennedy readers tend to come for banter and stay for the team. The Playing series is built the same way. The Pittsburgh Fury move as a unit, argue over meatballs at Gianna's, and show up for each other on and off the ice. Readers consistently call out the found-family warmth and the way the humor never undercuts the emotional stakes.

Want the fake-dating book? Playing It Safe pairs Cameron "Mayhem" Miller, a tattooed enforcer who reads Shakespeare and cooks for the woman he's falling for, with Briar Beckett, a defender on the Pittsburgh Uprising women's team who trusts no one and carries her whole world alone. Even his cat betrays him for her.

Where to start: New readers usually begin with Playing with Trouble. If you prefer to read a series from its roots, start with Playing for Keeps and the earlier Stag-family books.

★★★★★ “Fun, funny, sexy — and completely satisfying from beginning to end.”