Power Play

BTU Alumni Series, Book 1

By: Alley Ciz

Narrated by: Ariela Crow

Hockey players are off limits...especially if they're on your brothers' team.

The last time Jordan did that, it ended in disaster. It was easy to promise her brothers she'd never date another one of their teammates again. Until she meets Jake. The spark she feels when she spends time with him makes her promise harder and harder to keep. Surely, her brothers would understand breaking this promise if it means following her heart. Wouldn't they?

Never sleep with a teammate's sister.

This is the universal rule of athletes everywhere. Until he meets Jordan. As soon as Jake sets eyes on her, he wants her. The goalie's job is to see missed shots and failed opportunities on the ice. This is one shot he's not going to miss, no matter what obstacles get in his way.

Contains mature themes.

©2019 House of Crazy Publishing, LLC. (P)2019 Tantor

Power Play

After reading the U of J series I got hooked on Alley Ciz. So I went back to the BTU Alumni. This is a brother’s best friend/teammate trope. Jordan is coming home to go to school because she misses her home. Jake is on the same team as Jace and Ryan so he is off limits to Jordan. I love the way Alley Ciz writes her characters. I loved this book.

Great Narration

I read the ebook and loved listening to it for the second time. The narrator did a great job of voicing the many characters on this book. Definitely one I will listen to again.

Good listen

This is a good one. I started with the spin off series and have worked my way back you can tell this is an earlier work but still a good story with great narration. I do wish we had a little more in depth with their actual relationship and I thing the epilogues should have been put in reverse order.

Entertaining story

But it should be in the YA section? Kind of a lifetime movie and print

Love these characters!

This was my first audiobook from this author and I am invested in this series now! I liked the bigger plot of the book and was happy to see the guy get his just rewards after everything he did to Jordan (he was the definition of a monster). The angst in this one was pretty high haha and it felt more like high school a little bit than college, but I enjoyed it nonetheless. I especially loved the characters, with Jordan and Jake being at the top. OH I do with the author didn't make a character named Jake and one names Jase because on audio it got confusing if you didn't hear the right one haha. Like if they were friends and mentioned a lot I wouldn’t have had such a hard time sometimes 🤣 Yay for the rewind feature haha. OH and I kept getting confused who was the twin versus the older brother haha.

I really liked Jake and how he wanted to be there for Jordan and how slow he took it. I loved the tenacity of Jordan and would totally want her as my bff if characters were real. I loved seeing them get together over time, letting it slowly develop despite the promise she made to her brothers. I loved the small siblings in this one, they stole the show! I loved when they found them asleep and were trying to hide. They hopefully get together in the future when they are all grown up, they are an adorable pair already haha. I loved how the 2 main characters treated their loved ones siblings too. The parents and other adults were awesome in this book too. I got a good handle of all the people and their connections and then the epilogue got me all confused again when a ton of new people were introduced haha. I am wondering which of the people in the books get their own story, I have some favorites I hope get their time to shine. I also liked seeing Ryan and Maddie get together too. The 3 ladies and their gay bff were an amazing bunch.

Narration was done well (4 stars) and I will be checking out more by this narrator for sure. I will say I was sometimes annoyed with the Jersey accents but it made sense because of where these characters were from. I did get confused a couple times when the accents didnt line up with the right characters (normally they didn’t have a thick accent and then all of a sudden they did). I thought the feistiness of Jordan was perfect and the adorableness of Jake was spot on. OH and don’t even get me started on the young siblings. They were absolutely perfect and made me smile and giggle so much every time they were on. That was my favorite part ❤️

Listening through the series now, already on book 3! I am enjoying these lighter stories and love the world this author has created. Definitely recommend 😊

🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟

𝗧𝗿𝗼𝗽𝗲𝘀: Hockey Romance, Collage, Brother’s Best Friend, Brother’s Team Mate, Chosen Family, Secret Relationship
𝗢𝘃𝗲𝗿𝗮𝗹𝗹 𝗥𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗴: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟
𝗦𝗽𝗶𝗰𝗲 𝗟𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗹: 🌶️🌶️🌶️
𝗖𝗵𝗮𝗿𝗮𝗰𝘁𝗲𝗿𝘀: 💜💜💜💜
𝗧𝗲𝗮𝗿𝘀 𝗟𝗼𝘀𝘁: 💧
𝗣𝗹𝗼𝘁 𝗗𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗹𝗼𝗽𝗺𝗲𝗻𝘁: 🖊️🖊️🖊️
𝗣𝗢𝗩: Dual
𝗙𝗼𝗿𝗺𝗮𝘁: Audiobook
𝗧𝗪: One character has experienced abuse in a past relationship that showing as a flashback in this book.

𝗜 𝘀𝘄𝗲𝗮𝗿 𝘄𝗲 𝗮𝗿𝗲 𝗺𝗲𝗮𝗻𝘁 𝘁𝗼 𝗯𝗲 𝘁𝗼𝗴𝗲𝘁𝗵𝗲𝗿, 𝗶𝗳 𝗼𝗻𝗹𝘆 𝘆𝗼𝘂 𝘄𝗼𝘂𝗹𝗱 𝗵𝗮𝘃𝗲 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗰𝗼𝘂𝗿𝗮𝗴𝗲 𝘁𝗼 𝗴𝗼 𝗳𝗼𝗿 𝗶𝘁. 𝗧𝗼 𝗵𝗲𝗹𝗹 𝘄𝗶𝘁𝗵 𝘄𝗵𝗮𝘁 𝘆𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝗯𝗿𝗼𝘁𝗵𝗲𝗿𝘀 𝘄𝗼𝘂𝗹𝗱 𝘀𝗮𝘆.

Jordan transferring to BTU after two years at NYU, two years where she hid from her past. Jake is the goalie for the BTU Hockey team and plays with two of Jordan’s brothers. The attractions is instant when they see each other, too bad Jordon promised to never date another one of her brother’s teammates.

Jordan and Jake are the ultimate relationship goal! I loved the instant attraction between these two, but they had so many hurdles to overcome in order to be together. The friendship groups that belong to both Jordan and Jake are awesome as well, and provide great entertainment. This book is absolutely amazing!

Okay

Ariel Crow did a great job narrating this audible. Story was good I like it. But story could have been done in half the time. Writer does duel points of view, Words & scenes seemed the exact same at times. So to me it was a waste of time & didn’t add anything for the story. It cute how the ladies beat the guys in all beer games.

Repetitive

There are so many scenes that are exactly the same just from two different POVs when there was no need for it. I kept thinking I was accidentally hitting the back button.

Story was so overdramatic

Maybe it’s a me thing, but I do not understand why this book has so many great reviews on goodreads and Amazon.

The idea and storyline grabbed me and I was excited about this book when I found it. But the execution was lacking for me.

I can deal with books that need a certain suspension of belief. But I just couldn’t with this book. It was so ridiculous how everyone treated Jordan. She was like the female return of Christ. That’s the way everyone acted. She was missed by her brothers and their teammates so much and yet at the same time nobody let it slip that she was a girl? So the new guys were all expecting a male sibling? But at the same time she was so close to all these guys that they all had stories and missed her. That’s a small detail. It was the over the top way they treated the heroine. It was so unrealistic. She was basically a perfect character. She was funny, and loved by everyone, extremely loved by everyone. She won every game she played, she put fear in all these college boys with her threat of “payback” or “revenge” pranks. It was so over the top.

Everything in her life was so dramatic. Honestly I couldn’t stand being around girls like this when I was younger. Everything that happened to them needed to be talked about, to death. And everything was more dramatic and important when usually it was exactly opposite. All Jordan’s friends talked about was what was happening with Jordan. There was no depth outside of what was happening in Jordan’s life.

Maybe I have read too many darker themed books lately, but I thought what her ex did was tame. After her nightmares and her keeping secrets about what actually happened with him, I was expecting to find out he kidnapped her and tormented her before she was found. But no, he pushed her down the stairs, which is bad yes, but she didn’t want to tell Jake because she was afraid he would
Look at her differently? It’s SO stupid!!! And dramatic!!

Another issue I had with this book was after a scene would end or chapter would end and it would switch POV’s, and instead of continuing with the story, it would backtrack and we would reread the scene from the their POV. It just made me want the story to end. Which I’m assuming is not the authors aim when writing a book.

As far as steam factor, the cover is more steamy than the one intimate scene in this book.

This book was a big eye roll to me.

Just ok

I’m probably amongst the minority on this opinion but sorry not sorry. I have to say first off, I did not like Ariela as the male narrator she was great for the voice of Jordan but the males and other females were just not right. The attempt at a Jersey accent on the characters was not working. I felt like I was watching an old mafia movie or something it was so over the top.
The story itself was ok, I’m not a fan of the “trickle reveals” I’d rather know the backstory from the start. I chose this book because I enjoyed the u of j series Alley wrote and it kind of follows that same storyline. Like I said it was ok but I don’t see myself listening again like I do with other books I’ve enjoyed.