Face Off Review — Is It Worth Reading?

Updated on October 8, 2026

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Verdict: The only Kindle Unlimited hockey romance we found where a woman plays in the NHL, and the hockey is genuinely argued about — held back by a historic premise that readers keep saying the book does not follow through on.

Best for: Readers who want an athlete heroine rather than an athlete’s girlfriend, who like a captain whose love language is doing things, and who can accept fast physical chemistry in a book marketed on tension.

Heat level: ★★★★☆ (4/5 — “explicit open door” on romance.io, from 227 reader ratings)

Rating: ★★★★☆ (3.8/5 — a 4.03 Goodreads average across 141,240 ratings, marked down because the premise is the part readers say under-delivers)

Tropes: Teammates, rivals to lovers, friends with benefits, first woman in the league, found family, forced proximity, acts-of-service hero, dual POV, interconnected standalone, no third-act break-up.

This is an LRR evidence review. We have not read this book cover to cover; every claim below is built from named public sources — Goodreads, StoryGraph, romance.io, Amazon, long-form blogs and the author’s own published content warnings — and where the evidence stops, we say so rather than filling the gap.

Face Off is Chelsea Curto’s 2024 series opener and the reason our sports romance Kindle Unlimited guide has a female-athlete section at all: Emmy Hartwell is the first woman signed to an NHL roster, Maverick Miller is the captain who has to make it work, and the arrangement they come to is supposed to last exactly one season.

It carries a 4.03 average across 141,240 Goodreads ratings, 4.05 on StoryGraph from 5,600 reviews at a 2% did-not-finish rate and 4.06 on romance.io from 227. The reviews divide on one specific thing, and it is not the romance. It is whether a book built on a woman breaking into the NHL actually does anything with that.

What Is Face Off About?

This is a sports romance where the sport is not decoration, and on our own Sports Centrality scale it is one of only nine books in the Kindle Unlimited catalogue we rate Core Sport: take hockey out and there is no premise left. Emmy is not an athlete’s girlfriend, a team physio or a PR coordinator. She plays.

Emmy is introduced through what she is carrying — the first of anything carries the whole category on her back — and Maverick through what he decides to do about it, which is mostly practical rather than declarative. The book is dual point of view, which matters because you get to watch him choose to make the locker room work rather than being told he did.

What Makes This Female-Athlete Hockey Romance Work

• The hockey is real enough to argue about: five independent reviewers debate league mechanics, roster eligibility and how her teammates treat her. Nobody argues about the rules of a sport that is not on the page. romance.io readers tag it hockey 24 times against sports 24 — the only book on our sports shelf where the specific sport is as salient to readers as the genre.
• An athlete heroine that the tag data actually supports: 23 romance.io readers apply the athlete heroine tag. That matters because on our shelf that tag is wrong three times out of four — elsewhere it gets attached to a PE teacher, a dancer and a physiotherapist. Here it is correct.
• No third-act break-up: named approvingly by multiple reviewers, alongside praise for two adults communicating like adults. If manufactured separation ruins books for you, this one does not do it.
• Acts of service over declarations: the most consistent thing said about Maverick, and the reason the romance holds for the readers it holds for.
• The author publishes her content warnings, and they are specific — including on-page hockey fights and injury. That is rare on this shelf, and it independently corroborates that the sport is being shown rather than referenced.

Book Synopsis

Emmy Hartwell has spent her career being the only woman in every room she has played in, and now she is the only woman in the National Hockey League. The D.C. Stars sign her, and the signing is a story before she has taken a single shift — a headline, a marketing opportunity, and for a good number of people around the sport, a problem.

Maverick Miller is the captain. Whatever he privately thinks about how this happened, the locker room is his responsibility, and a divided room does not win anything. He does not have the luxury of being ambivalent about her, and neither of them has the luxury of the thing that starts happening anyway.

What they agree on is a boundary: whatever this is, it ends when the season does. She has a place in the league to earn and nothing to spare for a scandal; he has a room to hold together. The question the book runs on is not whether two people in the same building will end up in bed. It is whether the first woman in the NHL can afford to want anything that is not the job.

My Review

Start with what is genuinely rare, because it is rare. Of the thirty-four sports romances we verified in Kindle Unlimited, five have a woman who actually competes, and this is the only one where she competes alongside men at the top professional level. That is not a small thing in a subgenre where the default is an athlete hero and a civilian heroine, and readers have been asking for it for years.

The second real strength is the hockey world itself. We grade this book Core Sport on our own framework and the evidence is unusual: readers do not praise the hockey, they litigate it. One objects that women cannot compete on the same roster as men. Another says her teammates do not treat her differently because she is a woman. A third wants more of the struggle of being a woman in the league. People only take those positions about a book that has put them in a position to. Add the author’s own warning set naming on-page fights and injury and you have a novel that is genuinely inside the sport.

And now the correction, which is a correction to us as much as to anyone. When we first classified this book we graded on-page sport HIGH. Doing the full sweep, we found a reviewer who wished for more of the hockey itself, and two more who say the historic premise goes unexamined — one writes there is “no meaningful mention of any consequences related to this historic role”. A third disagrees and specifically praises “the casual sexism, the underestimation, and then watching her absolutely prove them wrong”. That is three voices, split two to one against. We have moved on-page sport from HIGH to MODERATE on the strength of it. Core Sport stands, because the premise is inseparable from hockey. How much hockey is actually shown is a smaller number than we first said.

The dominant romance complaint is the burn. This is sold on rivals-to-lovers tension and it is not a slow burn: two StoryGraph reviewers flag insta-lust, none call it slow, and one writes plainly that there was no chemistry and no build. Alongside that, several readers find the spice repetitive and the mid-book dialogue circular, and a recurring word in the negative reviews is “overhyped”. This is a book with 141,240 ratings and a 4.03 average — the enthusiasm is real, and so is the backlash to it.

What to reset before you start: expect a fast physical relationship inside a slow professional one, not the other way round.

My honest note: The best premise in Kindle Unlimited sports romance, executed as a warm, explicit, very readable team romance rather than as the book about a woman breaking the NHL. If the premise is what you came for, calibrate. If a captain who quietly makes things work is what you came for, it delivers completely.

Element	In Face Off
Central relationship	Emmy Hartwell & Maverick Miller — the first woman on an NHL roster and the captain responsible for the room
Sport	Hockey — professional, NHL
Sports centrality	CORE SPORT — remove hockey and the premise does not exist
On-page sport	MODERATE — revised down from our initial HIGH; see the review above
Core tropes	Teammates, rivals to lovers, friends with benefits, found family, forced proximity, first woman in the league
Heat level	4/5 — “explicit open door” (romance.io, 227 ratings). Several readers find the spice repetitive rather than insufficient
Burn speed	FAST — two reviewers tag insta-lust, none call it slow burn, despite the rivals-to-lovers framing
POV	Dual
Series	D.C. Stars book 1 — interconnected standalone. Full HEA, no cliffhanger, and notably no third-act break-up
Kindle Unlimited	Included, verified on the Amazon product page on 22 August 2026
Content notes	Author-published at authorchelseacurto.com, including hockey fights with blood and punching, mention of hockey injury, sexist comments by side characters, explicit content, light choking with permission, alcohol, parental abandonment, foster care and childhood cancer mentions. Reader-sourced additions on StoryGraph include misogyny, sexual harassment, sexual assault, gaslighting and emotional abuse — 33 reviews carry the sexual-harassment tag

Is Face Off on Kindle Unlimited?

Yes. Face Off is included with Kindle Unlimited as of 22 August 2026, verified on its own Amazon product page by reading the Kindle format swatch rather than trusting a search tile. Check the current status on Amazon before you download — three books left the programme overnight while we were rebuilding the guide this review belongs to.

Audio inclusion is unverified. The audiobook is a Podium Audio release from April 2026, roughly two years after the ebook, and whether narration comes with a Kindle Unlimited subscription is a separate entitlement we have not confirmed.

How Spicy Is Face Off?

Band 4 of 5 on romance.io, labelled “explicit open door,” from 227 reader ratings. The more useful detail is the direction of the complaints: on this book readers do not ask for more spice, several say there is too much of it and that it repeats. Combined with the insta-lust flags, the practical read is that the physical relationship arrives early and stays busy.

The element worth flagging in advance is not a kink but the ambient sexism. It is in the author’s own warning set as “sexist comments by side characters,” and StoryGraph readers add misogyny, sexual harassment and sexual assault tags, with 33 reviews carrying the harassment tag. Some readers find that material the point of the book and some find it under-explored; both reactions are represented in the reviews. If you want the same explicit level with more of the sport on the page, The Dugout is the closest thing on our shelf.

Who Should Read This Book?

You’ll likely love it if: you want a heroine who competes rather than watches, you like a captain who solves problems instead of announcing feelings, you want a hockey world that has actually been thought about, and no third-act break-up is a selling point.

You may want to skip it if: you were promised rivals-to-lovers tension and need a real burn, repetitive spice wears you down, you want the historic premise interrogated rather than used, or ambient sexism in the background is not what you read romance for.

In short: the best premise on the shelf, delivered as a warm team romance rather than as the novel that premise implies.

What Readers Are Actually Saying (October 2026)

This book is being carried by scale rather than by criticism. There is no Publishers Weekly, Kirkus, Library Journal or Booklist review, which is normal for a self-published original, and the only long-form piece we could reach is a wholly positive write-up at Cantina Book Club describing it as highlighting both the plight and the power of women in sport. What is actually happening is 141,240 Goodreads ratings and a brand-new audiobook edition in April 2026 opening a second route in. Reddit: unknown / not accessible — reddit.com is blocked from our research environment and we have substituted nothing for it.

Why readers love it (according to the discourse): the banter between Emmy and Maverick, first. Then Maverick himself, consistently described through acts of service rather than declarations. Then the found-family team cast. Then two structural things readers name approvingly and specifically: no third-act break-up, and two leads who communicate like adults instead of manufacturing misunderstandings.

What readers argue about and complain about: The spice, first — not its presence but its volume and repetitiveness. Second, the burn: sold on rivals-to-lovers, delivered as insta-lust, with one reviewer stating there was no chemistry and no build-up. Third, circular dialogue through the middle. Fourth, thin character development. And running under all of it, the word “overhyped”. The genuine split is the one that matters most: three reviewers engage directly with the first-woman-in-the-NHL material and they divide two to one against, with the critics saying the historic role carries no consequences on the page and the defender praising exactly the opposite — the casual sexism and the proving-them-wrong. A reader picking this up for the premise rather than the romance is the reader most likely to be disappointed by a 4.03.

On audio: narrated by Laura Horowitz and Adam Gold in duet, 12 hours 23 minutes, published by Podium Audio in April 2026. A Libro.fm listing exists but the site was unreachable from our research environment on the day, so we are not linking an edition we could not open.

The series question worth asking first: it resolves completely — full HEA, an epilogue, no cliffhanger and no third-act break-up. D.C. Stars is the each-book-a-new-couple model, so nothing is required before or after it. If you want more women who actually compete, the rest of that list is short and mostly not hockey: Kulti (professional soccer), From Lukov with Love (figure skating), Settling the Score (Olympic soccer) and Wild Pitch (Major League Baseball).

Frequently Asked Questions

Is Face Off on Kindle Unlimited?

Yes, included with Kindle Unlimited as of 22 August 2026, verified on its own Amazon product page rather than a search tile. Enrolment changes without notice — three books left the programme in the twenty-four hours before we checked. Audio inclusion is a separate entitlement and we have not verified it.

Is Face Off a slow burn?

No, despite the rivals-to-lovers framing. Two StoryGraph reviewers tag it insta-lust and none call it slow burn; one writes that there was no chemistry and no build-up. The physical relationship arrives early. What is slow is the professional situation, not the romance.

How much hockey is actually in Face Off?

Moderate, and we revised that down. The premise is inseparable from hockey and five reviewers argue about league mechanics and roster rules, which is why we rate it Core Sport. But one reviewer wished for more of the game itself and two say the historic premise goes unexamined, so we moved on-page sport from HIGH to MODERATE.

Is the heroine really an NHL player?

Yes. Emmy Hartwell is signed to an NHL roster and plays alongside men, which makes this the only book of its kind among the thirty-four sports romances we verified in Kindle Unlimited. Twenty-three romance.io readers apply the athlete-heroine tag, and on this shelf that tag is usually wrong — here it is correct.

Is there a cliffhanger or a third-act break-up?

Neither. Face Off resolves with a full HEA and an epilogue, and multiple reviewers specifically praise the absence of a third-act break-up. D.C. Stars follows a new couple each book, so nothing needs to be read before or after it.

How spicy is Face Off?

Band 4 of 5 on romance.io, labelled explicit open door. The notable thing is the direction of the criticism: readers do not ask for more, several say the spice is repetitive. Expect an explicit book with a physical relationship that starts early.

Does the author publish content warnings?

Yes, and they are unusually specific — including hockey fights with blood and punching, mention of hockey injury, sexist comments by side characters, light choking with permission, parental abandonment and childhood cancer mentions. Only twelve of the thirty-four books on our sports guide have an author-published set.

If You Loved Face Off, Read These Next

If the athlete heroine is what you want more of, Kulti gives you a professional footballer with her own national-team ambition and a much slower burn. If you want the sport even more present on the page, The Dugout is the most baseball-dense book we verified and the woman is the expert. And if it was the team-as-found-family register, Rewind It Back builds a whole five-book series around one. All three sit on our best sports romance on Kindle Unlimited guide, and the wider shelf is in Book Reviews.

The Bottom Line

This is the most ambitious premise in Kindle Unlimited sports romance and the only one that puts a woman on an NHL roster: the hockey world is genuinely built, the captain is the kind of hero readers finish books for, and the structural choices — adult communication, no third-act break-up — are the ones people keep asking for. Against that, it is sold as rivals-to-lovers and reads as insta-lust, the spice repeats, the middle circles, and two of the three readers who engage with the historic premise say the book does not follow it through. Come for the team and the captain. Do not come for the barrier-breaking. Check Face Off on Amazon →

The Eikna Overall Ranking

On the Eikna scale, Face Off ranks as a landmark-premise team hockey romance — the only Kindle Unlimited book we found with a woman playing in the NHL, held back by a fast burn and a premise it uses more than it examines, and best approached for the captain and the locker room rather than for the barrier.

The Evidence Scorecard

Overall ★★★★☆ 3.8/5

• ✓ 4.03 Goodreads average across 141,240 ratings
• ✓ Core Sport — hockey is inseparable from the premise
• ✓ Only NHL-playing heroine on our verified shelf
• ✓ Two of three readers say the premise goes unexamined

Romance ★★★★☆ 4/5

• ✓ Banter is the most-praised element
• ✓ Acts-of-service hero named consistently
• ✓ No third-act break-up, named approvingly
• ✓ Two reviewers flag insta-lust, none call it slow burn

Characters ★★★★☆ 3.7/5

• ✓ Emmy competes; the athlete-heroine tag is earned
• ✓ Maverick praised for what he does, not says
• ✓ Found-family team cast works for most readers
• ✓ Thin character development is a recurring complaint

Writing ★★★★☆ 3.6/5

• ✓ Dual POV shows the captain choosing, not being told
• ✓ Adult communication instead of manufactured conflict
• ✓ Author’s own warnings confirm on-page sport detail
• ✓ Circular mid-book dialogue named by several readers

Emotional Impact ★★★★☆ 3.7/5

• ✓ Casual sexism lands hard for the readers it lands for
• ✓ Locker-room acceptance arc is the emotional spine
• ✓ 2% did-not-finish across 5,600 StoryGraph reviews
• ✓ Historic role reported as carrying no consequences

Heat Level ★★★★☆ 4/5

• ✓ romance.io band 4, “explicit open door”, 227 raters
• ✓ Physical relationship starts early
• ✓ Author warns for light choking with permission
• ✓ Readers say the spice repeats, not that it is missing

Ending ★★★★☆ 4.3/5

• ✓ Full HEA with an epilogue
• ✓ No cliffhanger and no third-act break-up
• ✓ New couple each book, so nothing else required
• ✓ Resolution arrives without testing the premise

Re-read Value ★★★★☆ 3.8/5

• ✓ 141,240 ratings and still accumulating
• ✓ New Podium audiobook opened a second route in April 2026
• ✓ Team cast rewards continuing the series
• ✓ “Overhyped” is a recurring word in negative reviews

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