Exclusive Interview
Emily Rath Reveals Fifth Jacksonville Rays Book Leads (Exclusive)
Hold the pucking phone. Emily Rath just revealed who the leads of her fifth Jacksonville Rays book are!
In an exclusive interview with Swooon, Pucking Around author Emily Rath confirmed that she has selected the throuple — we’ve got another why choose romance on our hands! — who will lead the next book in her viral steamy hockey romance series centering around the Jacksonville Rays.
Rath recently published her fourth Jacksonville Rays novel, Pucking Strong, which follows the MM slow burn romance between star forward Henrick Karlsson and the Rays’ assistant physical therapist, Teddy O’Connor. While this pairing may have felt out of the blue, Rath recalled that the couple had one scene in Pucking Around, and she has been shipping them ever since.
While sitting down with Rath to discuss the fourth book in her series, we had to ask the author what was next for the Jacksonville Rays. “I have always said that this was going to be a five-book series,” Rath said. Seeing as all four books (so far) have followed different character pairings with their own first-person narration, it’s clear that Book 5 will expand the Pucking family even further.
“Keep your eye out for Hunter DeGraw,” Rath teased. “He’s the new Australian cutie [that took on the role of] the goalie now that Ilmari (one of the Book 1 leads) has retired. As for the other two characters? Rath was excited to reveal that the fifth Jacksonville Rays book will be an FFM romance, following two women and one guy in a polyamorous relationship.
“We started with Jake Compton in Book 1 and are finishing with Amy Compton in Book 5,” Rath told Swooon. “So Book 5 is Jake’s twin sister. She has been abroad in Japan, living her, you know, STEM woman dreams. She’s a robotics engineer. And for reasons unknown to you, as of now, she will be coming back to town!”
“[Amy’s] book will be FFM,” Rath continued, “So it’s going to be Amy, and a team statistician named Roshni, and then Hunter. It’s going to be a ton of fun, as Hunter is this super quirky himbo that loves Godzilla and rock collecting, and he’s just gonna fall to his knees for these amazing, brilliant women.”
While Rath couldn’t share anything else about the plot of her final Jacksonville Rays novel, she was happy to give a window into the writing process. The queer joy I feel that I finally get to put some sapphic energy into this series is amazing,” she told Swooon.
Jacksonville Rays Book 5, Emily Rath, Release Date TBA
