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The Play of His Life

Amy Aislin (Goodreads Author)

3.72 · Rating details · 61 ratings · 28 reviews

Former best friends turned lovers Christian and Riley haven't seen or spoken to each other in six years...is there a better time than the holiday season to reconnect with your favorite person?

The last person Christian wants to run into on a visit home to spend time with his mom over the holidays is his former best friend-turned-lover-turned-ex. But there Riley is, in all h ...more

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ebook, 149 pages

Published April 28th 2017 by MLR Press

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3.72 ·

Rating details

· 61 ratings · 28 reviews

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Apr 28, 2017 Aeren rated it it was ok

El trope de antiguos amantes que han roto y se reencuentran me encanta, no es un secreto, sin embargo, siento decir que esta novela no ha cumplido ni una sola de mis expectativas (que no eran altas, ojo, novelas así son mi equivalente a regalarme un caramelo). La narración me ha resultado incómoda, los pov se mezclan de vez en cuando, no se si es un autor novel o no, pero hay cosas que se solucionan con un buen beteo. Por último, y hago "spoiler" : la premisa del libro se basa en que Christian, ...more

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Nov 09, 2017 Lisa The Novel Approach rated it really liked it

Shelves: contemporary, second-chances

~ 3.5 Stars ~

I’ve recently become a fan of Amy Aislin and her swoony little novellas. First, As Big as the Sky, and now her release from this past spring, The Play of His Life. After reading As Big as the Sky, I went and checked out her back catalog, and immediately pounced on this sweet-sounding, friends-to-lovers story. Friends to loverssssss, y’all. My total weakness and happy place. The Play of His Life is not without faults, however. In fact, it has two pretty major ones, in my opinion. O. ~ 3.5 Stars ~

I’ve recently become a fan of Amy Aislin and her swoony little novellas. First, As Big as the Sky, and now her release from this past spring, The Play of His Life. After reading As Big as the Sky, I went and checked out her back catalog, and immediately pounced on this sweet-sounding, friends-to-lovers story. Friends to loverssssss, y’all. My total weakness and happy place. The Play of His Life is not without faults, however. In fact, it has two pretty major ones, in my opinion. O.O But, despite the story’s flaws, I still really dug these guys and this book.

Christian and Riley grew up together. Inseparable since second grade, and finally becoming more than just friends their sophomore year of high school, theirs was as strong as any friendship, or any romance, could be. Until Riley got a hockey scholarship to the University of Denver, and Christian moved west to go to college in British Columbia—thus beginning the dreaded long-distance relationship. They went from seeing each other every day for ten years, to only on occasion, when they could swing it, until eventually, Christian couldn’t take it anymore and broke things off between them.

Now, seven years later, Christian is home visiting his mom for Christmas when he runs into Riley—thanks to some meddling from his mother—at the new bakery in town. The bakery that Riley opened after a career-ending hockey injury found him moving back to their small hometown in Ontario. It’s the first time they’ve spoken or seen each other in six years, since hooking up after Christian’s dad’s funeral, and Riley’s middle-of-the-night disappearing act. The pull and attraction is brought right back to the surface, as they both realize that neither one of them is as ‘over’ the other as he thought he was. I loved these two lines:

“The familiarity made Riley’s heart ache for the lost years between them.”

And…

“Riley had always meant home and belonging and safety.

The book is full of super swoony, romantic goodness, as well as lots of great dialogue and funny moments. But, there were also lots of ‘JUST TALK ALREADY!’ moments, as well as two fairly significant plot points which were both left unresolved that had me wanting to pull my hair out. First, in the very beginning, when Christian first arrives at the bakery, a big deal is made of a Now serving alcohol! sign in the front window. The alcohol turns out to be Shimmer—a mysterious drink that smells like strawberries but tastes like something different every time you drink it, depending on what you mix it with, and has a different effect on the drinker, depending on the mixer as well. Shimmer is made out to be extremely mysterious, almost magical, really, so much so that I thought there was perhaps going to be some paranormal element to the story. Sadly, the plotline was never fully developed and was dropped just as quickly as it appeared.

Second, and this one reeeaaaally bothered me, Riley calls Christian ‘T’ but Christian has never known why. It was the nickname Riley gave him early in their friendship, and has stuck through the years, but Christian has no idea what it stands for, and Riley isn’t talking. Throughout the book, Christian asks Riley, and throws out guesses as to what it might mean, and in the end, it seems we’re finally going to find out…and then nothing. Not gonna lie…to not get the satisfaction of finding out the meaning behind the name was a pretty major letdown.

Head-scratching and/or frustrating moments aside, though, I truly did still enjoy the book. I found myself smiling and ‘awwwww’ing my way through the thing. This is the power of second-chance, friends-to-lovers stories! They can overcome some pretty serious issues, and still make you feel good. 😊 I’m pretty happy to have discovered this author. And, now I find out she has a Christmas novella coming out? Holiday stories are another Achilles heel for me, so go ahead and sign me up for that one, too.

Reviewed by Jules for The Novel Approach ...more

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Apr 30, 2017 Anke marked it as nope

The blurb was very interesting, therefore I put it on my wish list. I was on the verge of preordering it, when I saw the possibility of reading a sample on amazon. So, downloaded and just now I tried it and have to say: thanks, amazon, for saving me some $. The writing style got on my nerves during the first few pages and it was already clear that this would have been a DNF.

Sadly there was only one other review so far and in Spanish - I am curious what was mentioned there.

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Jan 05, 2018 Joyfully Jay rated it really liked it

Shelves: kenna

A Joyfully Jay review.

4 stars

This was a short, sweet, low angst story, and I enjoyed it. Christian and Riley are cute, and they made me smile. Their chemistry was obvious, and they fit well together. I particularly liked Riley. In fact, even though there wasn’t much time for too much character development, Riley was pretty well fleshed out…just a little more than Christian. The boys made me laugh more than once, and I appreciated that. Also, they were very sexy together. Since they’d been lover ...more

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Jul 13, 2017 Barb ~rede-2-read~ rated it really liked it

Shelves: for-review, favorite-couples, favorites, friends-to-lovers, hawt, read-2017, sweet

This was a delightfully sweet story of two young men who grew up together as best friends, became high school sweethearts, and then separated when they couldn’t keep up a long distance relationship during their college years.

Christian is a marketing/graphic designer in Vancouver while Riley is now retired from professional hockey and living back at home in their small town across the country. He’s started a bakery with the wife of a former team member and is enjoying his life. But he misses Chri ...more

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Jul 01, 2017 Lisa rated it it was amazing

Shelves: 05-mm-read, xxxx2017-read-a-thon, m-m, dbml, xxx-2017-july

I was given a copy of this book free by the author in exchange for an unbiased review.

Riley and Christian met as children years ago, the only 2 non english native speakers in school.
Through the years they had a relationship but then one day they didnt.
Back on the East Coast, Christian is sent by his mom to buy bread from the store. Unbeknownst to him, Riley is co-owner. Its like they were never apart.

I loved this book , right from the very first sentence to the last. Riley and Christian were the ...more

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Aug 01, 2017 Ann added it

Shelves: boymeetsboy-review-books, country-boys-and-small-towns, friends-to-lovers, miscommunication-station

Review on the blog 08/08 and then here

**a copy of this story was provided for an honest review**

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May 08, 2017 Lucy rated it really liked it

The Play of His Life is part of the MLR Shimmer series, where the stories are loosely tied together by the name of the place that serves Shimmer, Warm Glow (here, it is a bakery) and the booze itself, Shimmer. Shimmer causes different reactions in people depending on what they use to mix it. This is a story of two men with a history who just maybe have a second chance.

Christian’s mother is a little sneaky, sending her boy to the bakery when she knows he is going to run into Riley, his ex-best f The Play of His Life is part of the MLR Shimmer series, where the stories are loosely tied together by the name of the place that serves Shimmer, Warm Glow (here, it is a bakery) and the booze itself, Shimmer. Shimmer causes different reactions in people depending on what they use to mix it. This is a story of two men with a history who just maybe have a second chance.

Christian’s mother is a little sneaky, sending her boy to the bakery when she knows he is going to run into Riley, his ex-best friend and former lover. I have to be honest, I didn’t love Riley. I ended up being okay with Christian wanting Riley (you know, as if he needed my permission) but Riley himself pulled a really nasty move at a bad time, even worse when you realize that he had been Christian’s best friend, so wasn’t there when Christian needed him most.

The fact that Christian takes blame for things, “I’m sorry for not being strong enough to hold on to you” made my heart hurt for him. The first time they break up was so understandable and so sad for them. I don’t want to say they have misunderstandings, because it seems deeper than that. “Is this why you won’t come home? Because you think I don’t…I don’t want you here?” Riley thought he could have it all – hockey and Christian.

Riley had been a pro hockey player and remained friends with many of the players, so he brings Christian to a party where he gets to meet famous players. Christian proceeds to act like a total swooning fanboy and it’s adorable. “I scared him away, didn’t I?” Whatever, he didn’t even care. “My life is made. I can die happy now.” Cutest thing ever.

There are so many clues that these two never stopped thinking of each other and I liked that. From the T to the scrapbook to the hospital visit to the gifts in the closet, they wanted to be there for each other but just didn’t make it work. There were a few times I wanted to shake them and tell them, “One of you SAY SOMETHING!” But, particularly in the case of Christian, I got why they didn’t. Why they were a little afraid. I ended up pulling for them and hoping things would work. There’s hockey in the story but it’s more of a backdrop than an active character and that worked.
...more

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Jun 19, 2017 Jenny Wood rated it really liked it

Christian and Riley are exes, broken up 5-6 years ago, because they didn't talk to each other.
This whole story was a big... WILL YOU JUST TALK TO EACH OTHER! lol, it was frustrating.
But also cute, because as best friends turned boyfriends', I love the friendship and banter between the two, where they're friends first and everything else second. The way they talk to each other and pick on each other is adorable.... especially about Christians fear of ghosts. Totally relatable, by the way.

Life ...more

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Jul 14, 2017 Michelle rated it liked it

Shelves: m-m-romance

3 stars

**I received a copy in exchange for an honest review through the DBML program**

The Play of His Life follows Christian andRiley as they rekindle their relationship over the course of a week during the Christmas holiday. They had been friends for years before finally getting the courage to become a couple and risking their friendship. They broke up in college because of the distance and hadn’t seen each other for four years. Christian then gets tricked into going to Riley’s bakery for an er ...more

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May 13, 2017 Lily rated it really liked it

Shelves: christmas, second-chance, 4-stars, aww, novella, sports-theme

This is a lovely, sweet story from a newly published author. You can check out some of Amy’s other writing on her website as there’s a couple of free reads there.

What I like most about this story is that it is a second chance romance. Riley and Christian had already gone through the friends to lovers transition, but had split six years previously because they couldn’t cope with a long distance relationship when they’d started different colleges. And that’s where this story starts. They’ve alread This is a lovely, sweet story from a newly published author. You can check out some of Amy’s other writing on her website as there’s a couple of free reads there.

What I like most about this story is that it is a second chance romance. Riley and Christian had already gone through the friends to lovers transition, but had split six years previously because they couldn’t cope with a long distance relationship when they’d started different colleges. And that’s where this story starts. They’ve already got loads of history behind them and were clearly still in love with each other. Yes, there’s a lack of trust on Christian’s part because Riley had left him without a word to continue his hockey career when they’d hooked up again one night and he feared Riley would do the same to him again. And Riley was thinking Christian didn’t care for him because he had no intention of moving back to Ontario. God, if only these boys talked and said exactly how they felt and what they wanted life would have been so much easier for them. But then, us readers wouldn’t have gotten all the lovely angst and anticipation about what was going to happen when Christian returned home after the Christmas holidays. It was great they still got along so well and had fun together despite all their doubts and uncertainties. It was how it used to be between them. The scrapbook and necklaces were lovely touches to their story.

My one main grumble is what appears to be a couple of inconsistencies in the story that should have been picked up by the editing team. The main one being that Christian didn’t know he was entering Riley’s new bakery when he was sent by his mother to buy a loaf of bread. He wasn’t expecting to see Riley, nor did the possibility even cross his mind. Yet in chapter four we see that Christian had saved a newspaper cutting about the opening of the bakery and so was well aware of Riley’s new career and the location of the building. I hardly think this could have slipped his mind, nor did he comment on the fact at the time.

If you overlook these few issues, this enjoyable story is well written, with a distinct voice for each character. There are some touching moments and some great scenes between these guys. Although originally published in April, I can see this becoming a popular Christmas/holiday read for many, and I look forward to more stories from Amy in the future.

Review also posted on my blog:
https://lilygblunt.wordpress.com/2017... ...more

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Jun 15, 2017 Natosha Wilson rated it it was amazing

Can two men that was once best friends and lovers but lost it all because they could not take the distance between them, find each other again years later? Or will this be the closure that both needed for so long now so they can both move on with their lives?

That is what this book is about. It is about two men who meant so much to one another that not only was hey best friends but they was so much more then that, they was lovers also. The thing is though the distance that was between them was ju ...more

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May 12, 2017 Susan65 rated it really liked it

The Blogger Girls

I loved Christian and Riley’s story. Of course, they play hockey, they are friends to lovers, they are hot in the sack, and they are already out and proud. So many of my favorite tropes that I was destined to read and love this book. Even though the story starts with them being estranged, I was thrilled that it didn’t dominate the storytelling. It was enough that they eventually talked it out, but I am so glad they didn’t dwell on it for the whole book. This was another case of ...more

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Jun 11, 2017 Cee Brown rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: abc-reads, disability, lgbt, mm, second-chances, two-pov

.•★*) .•*)
(.★*..•`★¤Making Goals...¤★*..*ˑ★

Riley had always meant home and belonging and safety.

They had always meant so much more to each other than just friends; until they weren't. Now Christian was back home for the holiday and Riley was back in his life. Christian's mother took it in hand to play matchmaker, knowing that the two belonged together. There was a distance at first, and I wondered if these two would truly get back together. But with Riley a protector and Christian, someone who ...more

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Dec 31, 2018 Fritz42 rated it really liked it

Shelves: 2018-books, fiction, holiday-christmas-stories, m-m-romance, nook-lendable, sports

This was a cute little story, centering around Riley and Christian, who had grown up as childhood friends that turned into boyfriends. College and hockey opportunities forced them apart, and the difficulties of a long-distance relationship ended what was so good for both of them.

Now, years later, Christian is home for Christmas, and his mother sends him to the local bakery to buy bread. Walking in, he comes face to face with Riley, and he quickly realizes that his feelings for the guy haven't w ...more

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Jul 11, 2017 Londra Laine rated it really liked it

A free copy of this book was provided to me by the author in exchange for an honest review.

Christian and Riley's love story was a sweet, funny, and sexy! Amy Aislin used the mm hockey romance, which I loved, and made it fresh and a little different. What I loved about the MC's relationship was how it spanned over many years. I also really enjoyed the some of the side characters like Christian's mom and her girlfriends and some of Riley's teammates. The scene's Amy painted of the two of them int ...more

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Jun 28, 2017 blub rated it liked it

Shelves: mm-romance, dbml, friends-to-lover, m-m-family, holiday-themed, reunion-second-chances, 2017-read, sports, relationship-issues-i-e-breakup, angst

I liked this story but it took some time for me to figure that out. The story is only ten chapters long and it took a little more than half the story for me to figure that out. The narration is a little weird. There were points in the story that I wasn't sure whose POV the feeling and thoughts were coming from, whether it was Christian or Riley, which forced me to reread certain passages.

For stories of this type i.e. second chance/reunion stories I would like to see the character that did somet ...more

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Jul 06, 2017 Silvia rated it liked it

I was given a copy of this book free by the author in exchange for an unbiased review.

This book is something between a novella and a book (only 10 chapter)....two former best friend (and lovers) meet again after 6 years...
i must admit i was tempted to give up it didn't "clicked" with me immediately maybe it's the style of the author who tried to put some humor in the story.

Since it was a second chance story i was hoping to have some more angst but here everything goes smooth no bump on the road ...more

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Jul 15, 2017 Elle W. rated it liked it

I received a copy of this book in exchange for an unbiased review as part of the MM Romance Group's DBML program. To begin I will say that the story-line was very good. It is a friends to lovers story although their relationship began and ended a few years before the story begins. Amy Aislin does a great job of not just introducing Christian and Riley to us but also in letting us feel just how close to each other they were, still are. The nature of their relationship is clear from the first page ...more

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Jun 29, 2017 Sharon Cox rated it really liked it

Shelves: gay, m-m, romance

I received a free copy of this book from the author in exchange for an honest review.
Christian and Riley were friends turned lovers and then turned exs. They broke up because they could not deal with a long distance relationship but, when Christian comes home for the holidays and his mother sends him to Riley’s bakery, something is rekindled.
This book engaged me from the start. I quite liked the writing style and the story was lovely. I was quite happy to keep turning the pages, so to speak.
I r ...more

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Nov 19, 2017 Dixiecowgirl rated it it was amazing

Christian and Riley have a second chance to create the future that they both want, if they can share their dreams and really talk with each other. My heart hurt with the loss that both men experienced because they were not together. They lived, they did well, but they were not complete. They have a chance this time to get it right and i loved their coming together!

So close, yet so far is what comes to mind with this relationship and the problems that result from their lack of communication. Two ...more

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May 17, 2017 Evelyn Senyi rated it it was amazing

The prefect book to curl up with on a cold night

This fun, sensitive and witty read from debut author Amy Aislin will have you both laughing and shedding a tear or two over her MM romance. I’ll admit, this is not my usual genre, so I was surprised by how much I enjoyed this book. The characters are sweet and loveable, yet still flawed and relatable. The story grabs you from page one and keeps you turning the pages late into the night. The romance is steamy, but also not over the top. The one warn ...more

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Jan 08, 2018 Meg rated it really liked it

Shelves: m-m, fluff, contemporary

The Play of His Life is a second-chance romance featuring a ex-professional hockey player-turned-bakery owner (random) and his ex-boyfriend/ best-friend. This was short, sweet and low-angst, with a bit of steam. I could have done with the MCs actually talking to each other instead of trying to mind-read, but this wasn't irritating enough to really ruin my enjoyment of this. I suspect this will turn out to be a pretty forgettable read (and it would be 3-and-a-half stars if goodreads allowed), but ...more

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Nov 29, 2017 Suze rated it liked it

3.5*
I did like this story - there were parts I liked more and some a bit less.
It is a second chance story, the remeet of Christian and Riley orchestrated by Christian’s mum.
Very much a character driven story, it is all in the now but we do learn about the guys being friends since 7 and their eventual breakup through reminiscing.

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May 10, 2018 Novel Ninja rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Sweet

Very sweet little book that features Christian and Riley and their second chance at love. Good writing, though I’m not a huge novella fan.

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Oct 19, 2017 Pates rated it really liked it

Super cute and sweet. These guys were adorable.

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Oct 23, 2017 Jules Lovestoread rated it really liked it

3.5 stars. Ultimately, I adored this super sweet, friends-to-lovers story. <3

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Dec 05, 2018 Saba rated it it was ok

Shelves: delicious-mm, holidays

The premise was interesting, love me some French Canadian hockey players and second chance stories are my jam- but I didn't really connect with this one.

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M rated it really liked it
Jan 02, 2018

Simone rated it really liked it
Aug 13, 2018

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About Amy Aislin

Amy Aislin

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I started writing on a rainy day in fourth grade when my class was forced to stay inside for recess. Tales of adventures with my classmates quickly morphed into tales of adventures with the characters in my head. Based in the suburbs of Toronto, I'm a marketer at a large environmental non-profit in Toronto by day, and a writer by night. Book enthusiast, animal lover and (very) amateur photographer ...more