First I’d like to thank NetGalley and Grace Reilly for the opportunity to read an Arc of her upcoming book . In exchange for my honest review.

Isabella and Nik are just 😍. From the beginning you just fall in love with them. I do wish you got more of their relationship starting. The book starts out after they have a summer relationship, only to have Isabella wake up alone and not hear from Nik. That is ..until he takes the fall for his teammates and finds himself expelled. Forced by his grandfather to give up on hockey and go into the family business. In exchange he will get him into another school just as good. The school of course just so happens to be Isabella’s ..oh and her brother’s…..who just so happens to be nik’s biggest rival . You watch as the couple struggle to focus on school, keep them a secret as well as falling deeper in love .Overall loved it ! Would read the series. Recommend to anyone looking for a cute college sports romance 🥰

Wicked Serve is the fourth in the Beyond the Play series by Grace Reilly and follows college hockey player Nikolai "Nik" Abney and volleyball player Isabelle "Izzy" Callahan.

With summer's end, Nik and Izzy thought their fling was over. Izzy would return to McKee, forget all about the boy, buckle down, and earn back her place on the volleyball team. Nik would simply go back to his own college. Problem solved. But when Nik is forced to leave his university, he ends up right in Izzy's backyard, making it impossible to forget their time together; both how it started and ended. But their attraction is undeniable and unavoidable on their small campus.

Nik and Izzy are outstanding characters and I enjoyed both of them. Izzy was positive, driven, and outspoken but also suffered from self-doubt, never thinking she was good enough, and frustration. Through her and Nik’s struggles, we also see the importance of a solid support system.

It was Nik though who stole my heart. His backstory was tragic and gave me anxiety with every phone call he received. The author did a great job of making the reader feel that tension and showing how abuse/abusers can warp one's mind. The mental health rep in this book was great. I loved that it took priority.👏 He's also big on grand gestures and you gotta love that.

The main couple’s relationship was pleasantly non-toxic. They were both endlessly supportive of one another and talked openly, which I appreciate. Although I felt like one character pushed more about the other’s past and I'm not how I feel about that. The book also felt slightly too long for a sports romance.

Overall, I enjoyed the focus on mental wellness, self-awareness and found family in this one. The theme of pursuing your dreams and discovering your joy was also especially noteworthy. Plenty of swoon-worthy and steamy moments round out this heartfelt hockey romance. If you're a fan of the sports romance genre, check out Wicked Serve.

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐.25
Tropes:
🏐 Forbidden Romance
🏒 Scarred hockey player hero
🏐 Grumpy x Sunshine
🏒 He Falls first
🏐 Brother's rival and teammate
🏒 Found family
🏐 Mental Health Rep

Wicked Serve
By Grace Reilly

older brother’s rival
sports romance
dual POV
secret summer fling
hockey x volleyball

This was such a fun a low stakes, light and fluffy romance! I really enjoyed reading about Nikolai and Isabelle, they were so sweet and had such a cute and healthy relationship. I absolutely loved Nikolai’s relationship with Connor! and basically all the Callahan family interactions.

I hate third act breakups and I want to say that there isn’t one here, just a bit of an odd moment. I did expect a bit more plot out of the book but I appreciate there wasn’t any unnecessary misunderstanding or stubbornness that usually comes with secret relationships. I originally planned to give this a 3.5⭐️ because of the issues I mentioned but I’m rounding up to a 4⭐️ because it was a little addictive and I love it when I can’t out a book down.

I am a huge fan of how Nikolai decides to take charge of his life to better his future! I appreciate all the cute glimpses into the other Callahan couples 🫶🏼 I’m super intrigued by Bex and James so I’ll be turning back to read their story!

Thank you to Valentine PR, NetGalley and Grace Reilly for this gifted arc!

Wicked Serve by Grace Reilly is book 4 of the Beyond the Play series. This book is focused on the youngest Callahan sibling Isabelle. She's a great volleyball player and taken on an interest in event planning. Nikolai is hockey player who was captain on the rival colleges team but now finds himself at McKee which is the same college as Isabelle. These two had a summer fling and it seems to pick up at school. Seeing as Isabelle's older brother is the captain of the hockey team, they sneak around so he doesn't find out. I love the family dynamic with Isabelle and her siblings. Even her parents! Nikolai and Isabelle are perfect for eachother and exactly what eachother needs. I love their chemistry and how much they care about eachother. I love this series and author!

5/5 ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Wicked Serve
Author: Grace Reilly
Beyond the Play #4
Sports romance

Ahhhh! Thank you so much Netgalley and Avon and Harper Voyager for this ARC! As soon as I saw this I had to request it immediately. This was my first in the series I have read by her and it was everything. Nikolai and Isabelle had a secret fling over the summer and they thought it was going to end there. However, Nikolai gets transferred to her school, and to her brother (his rivals) hockey team. Izzy is trying to win back her position on her volleyball team, and the coach is pretty much out to get her. She has to try her best to stay focused and not on Nikolai. I’m sure you can guess how that turns out. This book was surprisingly full of spice.. 🔥. I really enjoyed all the characters in the book and the storyline. I also really enjoyed both Nikolai and Izzy’s side stories. Him with his drama with the relationship with his father, and her struggles with her family life too. I haven’t read the other books in the series but I’m definitely going to try tackle them all this month now. I really loved this and thought it was the perfect sports romance read. 🏐🏒

Let me start by saying that I absolutely love this book!!! Grace Reilly is extremely talented and such a queen of sports romances.
I’ve had the absolute pleasure of being a beta reader for this book last summer and I love so much how it turned out in the end!!!
This book is cute, fun, romantic and spicy all at the same time. And even though the book is long, you get SO addicted to the story and the characters that the pages seem to fly by.
Izzy and Nik are so absolutely perfect together!! And I love how their relationship focus on dealing with their insecurities and their trauma before they can be happy and together.
And, like in all Grace Reilly’s books, we have the most amazing found family trope ever. I’m so sad to say goodbye to this series. But so happy with their stories!!

read this one if you love:
sports romance
hockey mmc x volleyball fmc
brother’s rival turned teammate
college romance
found family

I love the Callahan family and I was looking forward to Izzy's story. I've been waiting for 9 months for this story and I loved the ARC copy. There are a few changes that I am hoping for in the final version, and I will definitely be rereading this book, but I have to say it did not disappoint. It's been a bittersweet moment reading this as I can tell it was coming to an end despite there being so much future for Izzy and Nik, Seb and Mia, Cooper and Penny and James, Bex and Charlotte. I hope we get a spin-off series in the future for the next generation of Callahans because I cannot get enough of this family.

But for now, let's continue with the story of Izzy and Nik. I had seen so many teasers of Nik's past that I was curious to hear his backstory. I was convinced that it was going to be a bad boy turned good who found love but I was completely mistaken. Nik is a solid guy, someone who takes his responsibility as team captain seriously and looks out for his team, no matter what the consequences are for him. That is exactly what happened and because of that, he found himself at McKee, with the girl that he spent his summer hooking up with. Nik needs to start now with a new hockey team and hopefully make it to the Final Four, make new friends, and finish his degree, all before giving up his passion and submitting his life to his grandfather's business. While he loves hockey, he can't go down that path; it's too close of a reminder to his father. The bright spot of his year is Isabelle. He only wants to help build her up, be there for her and bathe in her sunshine, and pamper her like a princess.

Isabelle is a spunky social butterfly. We have seen her in each of the previous books with her brothers, so we know that she is the only girl in the family and the youngest, so obviously, she is spoiled by her brothers, who are very protective over her. But don't let that fool you, she is independent and resilient on her own. As a Callahan, she is competitive and athletic and strives to be top of her game in her sport. However, coming from an athletic and over-achieving family, she also sometimes feels inferior to her brothers and thinks that she has to earn her spot in the family. This causes her to have an inferiority complex. However, Nik is her cheerleader, always boosting her up and treating her right. Izzy took a few years to find her passion, trying out different activities in her youth, until she discovered and fell in love with volleyball. Once she started, she strived to be top of her game, but college has been tougher than expected and her coach didn't see her the way she thought she was playing. That didn't discourage Izzy, as she is determined to prove her coach wrong this year and earn the position that she wants on the team.

It's a year of big changes for Izzy, too. She finally becomes an aunt, plans her brother, James's wedding to Bex, learns to step away from one of her passions, and learns to trust herself and guys in relationships. Nik is it, and he is perfect for Isabelle, and she is perfect for him. There are traumas that Nik has to learn to overcome and decide on what future he wants before he deserves to be with Isabelle.

I love the dynamic of the Callahans and how they love and support each other. While Stealing Home wasn't my favorite of the series, and I absolutely love James and Cooper, I think the winner for the best brother goes to Sebastian. He is the calm, intelligent voice of reason for all of his siblings, and he demonstrated that again with Izzy, supporting her relationship and secrets but also making her realize her worth. The partners that the Callahan boys have found are not only perfect for them individually, but they are wonderful sisters-in-law for each other and mix perfectly with Izzy. Nik also finds his footing with the guys, especially Cooper, despite the animosity we saw between them in Breakaway (which, btw, I was expecting them to butt heads a lot more in this book but they seemed to just accept each other and let everything from their past be water under the bridge from the moment that Nik started going to McKee).

Do I recommend this book? Absolutely! Is it my favorite within the series? No. I was expecting it to be for some reason but it doesn't top some of the other relationships within the Callahan family. However, the family dynamic in this book is my favorite.

Thank you, Valentine PR, Netgalley, and Grace, for giving me the opportunity to read Wicked Serve as an ARC copy before its publication. I've been so excited to get to read an ARC book before.

I loved this book so damn much. Idk even where to start. The beautiful relationship between Isabelle and Nikolai, the mental health aspect of living up to familial expectations, the positive promotion of therapy and how it's ok to not be ok. I am in love with this book and I'm terribly upset I can't reread this again for the first time. There's so much more I want to get into, but I can't without spoiling things. Just read the book! It's beautiful.

I LOVED THIS BOOK!!!

I was so thankful to get an ARC for this book! I remember when I started reading this series and not many people knew about it but I was in love with it. The way the Grace Reilly writes her characters and stories feels so real. This book might just have been my favorite of the whole series. I could tell I was going to have a soft spot for Isabelle the moment we first saw her and I just loved her and Nik's story. As somebody who played volleyball forever I loved seeing that represented here. And who doesn't love a good hockey romance? It was just everything and I'm so sad to see these characters go but you can count on me rereading these over and over agin.

Thank you so much Grace Reilly and her team for the ARC!!

Wicked Serve comes out August 13th!! Go pre-preorder so you can fall in love with these characters ASAP!!

We love a good hockey romance around here!!!!

I loved this series and was so happy that Izzy was getting time to shine among the Callahan brothers

Nikolai and Izzy were EVERYTHING!! The spice was insane

Hockey x volleyball
Sneaking around
Brother rival turned teammate


Overall rating: 4.5 ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Spice level: 🌶️🌶️🌶️🌶️

A hot summer romance between a volleyball player ho is working for the mother of a popular hockey player. Sounds hot, yes? Except, she is the sister of a famous athletic family and the sister of the captain of a top college hokey team. The glitch? the hockey player she is involved with is the captain of the rival college hockey team. Steamy reuniting when he is now on the same team as her brother. Can they keep it a secret? How can they reveal the truth with out killing the hockey team unity? Nikolai is the son of a famous hockey player who has left the USA for Russian hockey team. The background history is as complicated as his relationship and love for Izzy, the daughter and sister to a famous athletic family. What will happen and how many glitches will Izzy and Nikolai face? Will they find their forever love? A sizzling hot romance tale. Thank you Ms. Reilly.

the STEAM!! the chemistry!! the background characters!! i loved niks and izzy’s story together and individually - they were REAL, not completely unrelatable like some books. i loved that the growth also focused on Nik- most books, character arcs are only focused on the FMC! i loved the third act - it wasn’t a shitty convenience part like some books! i didn’t realize that it was a series but can still be read as a standalone, though i plan on reading the rest of the series bc i loved the callahan siblings so much!

I really enjoyed this one. It had the sports, the emotional turmoil, and all the character development you could want. Each character had nice depth and humanity, and there was never one time that I didn't root for the relationship. Nikolai brought a cultural element to the series that I loved to see, and Isabelle was extremely relatable and kind. This was a nice ending to a really good series, and I can't wait to recommend it!

Thank you so much to NetGalley and Macmillan for my Advanced Reader's Copy.

Thanks for letting me try this. I requested without looking at co tent warnings because I enjoyed other books in the series. However, some of the content is not for me.

Isabelle and Nik have this summer fling that extends into the semester as Nik transfer to McKee. Their relationship is doomed from the start since Nik is Isabelle’s brother’s hockey rival. I love a good found family and the Callahan’s show that well even if most of them are blood related. The plot drove itself along as Nik’s childhood is shown through. There was a decent about of spice throughout the book; some I thought weren’t really necessary to the plot and could be skipped without missing any plot points. This book is in a series but can be read as a stand alone, though reading the previous books will help with recognizing some of the side characters from the previous books. Overall, I enjoyed this book and would recommend. Thanks to Valentine PR, publisher, and author for this free eARC.

Wicked Serve is a sizzling, heart-thumping rollercoaster of a sports romance that you won't be able to put down! Nikolai, the brooding hockey star, and Isabelle, the determined volleyball player, share a chemistry that's hotter than a power play in overtime. Their secret summer fling reignites with fiery intensity, making every stolen moment and furtive hookup deliciously irresistible.
The author masterfully blends sports rivalry, heartfelt moments, and scorching romance, all wrapped up in the chaos of college life. Isabelle's fierce drive and Nikolai's tortured past add depth to their whirlwind relationship, making you root for them at every turn. And let's not forget the koalas—just the quirky touch to keep you grinning.
Wicked Serve serves up all the swoons, spice, and sports drama you crave in a new adult romance. Grab this book and get ready for a wild ride with Nik and Izzy!
Thank you to NetGalley, the author and the publisher for providing me with a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review!

“Isabelle.”
“My sunshine girl.”

“A girl like her needs it dirty, no matter how sweet she seems.”

“You’ve always had a wicked serve.”


Let me start by saying I thought the book had a really good foundation. Brothers rival and sneaking around?? Oh yes. However, the book just came up flat for me. I think the beginning is good, it had me giggling and blushing. As I was working my way throughout, I became bored and the book just seemed to drag for me. Sticking it out to the end though it was cute. Nikolai held the book for me though. Izzy drove me nuts, respectfully. I thought she was kinda of bratty and childish. The talks of panic attacks and therapy that was represented through the story was amazing, especially with it being focused on a guy! So so important.

Overall I would recommend it, it was just wasn’t the book for me!

I loved this book! I am a hockey romance girl for sure and I loved the added element of Volleyball in this one. Both the main characters were so likable and they obviously cared deeply for each other. I loved seeing each of their POVs because you get to truly see how they see each other.

𝑰𝒇 𝒔𝒉𝒆'𝒔 𝒔𝒖𝒏𝒔𝒉𝒊𝒏𝒆, 𝑰'𝒎 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝒈𝒖𝒚 𝒘𝒉𝒐 𝒉𝒐𝒑𝒆𝒔 𝒊𝒕 𝒏𝒆𝒗𝒆𝒓 𝒔𝒕𝒂𝒓𝒕𝒔 𝒓𝒂𝒊𝒏𝒊𝒏𝒈.


This was longer than it probably needed to be, but it was still worth it. I liked that both characters were athletes. I also liked the suspense and drama with Nikolai's family. I absolutely loved his nickname and when he tells her what it is and why I melted. 🫶 I'm a little bummed the series is over, but I think this ended well.

🏒 He Falls First
🏐 Secret Summer Romance
🏒 Brothers Rival Turned Teammate
🏐 Grumpy x Sunshine
🏒 Hockey Player x Volleyball Player
🏐 Close Proximity
🏒 Forbidden Romance
🏐 Dual POV
🏒 Mental Health Rep

Book Review - Wicked Serve

Wicked Serve -Advanced Readers Copy (ARC) REVIEW


I was lucky enough to receive an ARC of this book, this is my personal and truthful review.

I absolutely loved this book, truthfully I was worried that I wouldn’t like this book as much as the first two but I definitely found that this book was the best out of the series. The backstory of these characters was deep and provided a great foundation to their storyline.
I really liked that the characters from the previous books were included in this book but they didn’t take over the story, they were definitely in the background but they absolutely were beneficial to the storyline.

Tropes:
•hockey romance
•college
•secret romance
•close proximity
•brothers teammate

Quick Review:
It was suppose to be a summer romance. They went to different colleges however he was kicked out of his college but now he has a spot on the college hockey team (her brothers team) and now goes to the same college. However they can’t seem to stay away from each other, but her brother and him are rivals. Can the pressures from his family and the past change what he has been working towards and will it keep them together or push them apart?


#bookreview #arc #romance #book #romancebooks #mustread #hockeyromance #arcreader #books