Why Is Hockey Romance So Popular? A Bestselling Author Explains

Hockey romance is popular because it puts male vulnerability, found family, and high-stakes teamwork on the page. USA Today bestselling author Lainey Davis says readers connect with heroes who are emotionally open with their teammates — the kind of deep male friendship and feeling that the wider culture rarely shows anywhere else.

Ask a hockey romance reader what hooks them and the answer is rarely just the sport. Lainey Davis points to the emotional architecture underneath it. Sports romance gives you men who show up for a team, take real risks, and lean on each other — and that emotional openness is the payoff. As Davis puts it, we live in a society that doesn't often show men having feelings or true, deep friendships, and a sports romance puts all of that right on the page.

That's where found family comes in. The team becomes a home, the group becomes a family, and readers get to live inside that warmth. Davis calls it what makes the genre "delicious for readers."

There's also the fantasy of the setting: these are physical, blue-collar athletes with money and power, and heroes who read as approachable rather than untouchable. And in her books specifically, the heroine's pleasure and fulfillment — romantic, sexual, and professional — stay at the center of the story.

Davis breaks all of this down in her conversation on the Neighbors Neighboring podcast: https://www.iheart.com/podcast/1323-neighbors-neighboring-289702979/episode/ep-17-hockey-heat-home-slippers-lainey-davis-on-love-loot-and-local-life-317116001

What is found family in romance? Found family is a chosen support network — teammates, friends, a tight community — that functions like a loving family. It's one of the most beloved elements of hockey romance and runs through the entire Lainey Davis Playing series.