Brooke has had her fair share of hockey boyfriends. With a hockey coach for a dad, she's followed the sport and experienced its lifestyle since she was a kid. She's thrilled with the opportunity to work with the catering team at the Stars and Stripes Hockey Tournament. When a charming hockey player asks for her number, she considers getting to know him while they're in DC for the tournament.

Through the Perilous Fight is the sixth book in the Stars, Stripes, and Hockey Nights series. There were a few things I liked about it.

1. After reading some of the other books, I loved returning to the tournament to follow a couple of other characters. The idea of hockey's greatest players gathering in Washington DC over the 4th of July to play a tournament is really fun.

2. Brooke and Jackson have a 'vacation relationship,' and they admit that at the end. I loved that the two characters realized they needed to experience a relationship in their real lives before they would know how good of a match they were.

3. Jackson's pre-game ritual of making mac and cheese did lead to homemade mac and cheese at my house. I can’t complain about that.

Unfortunately, there were a lot more things that I did not like about this book. In no particular order, here are my thoughts.

1. Brooke and Jackson negotiated and agreed to having a fling within the first 37 pages of the book. I didn't feel a connection between them at all. It felt like a business deal, not a romantic one.

2. The nicknames made me cringe. Jacksy and Brookie...? Why?

3. There were so many abrupt endings. I felt like I was left hanging repeatedly. For example, Jackson is thinking about a specific lunch date, and how it could be a 'hinge moment' for him and Brooke. We read about them on the way to said lunch, then boom, chapter ends, it's the next day, and there is barely any mention of this super important lunch date. What even happened? Was it good? Was it bad? No idea. The story moved on.

4.  The character's mood swings gave me whiplash. Mostly Brooke. She's completely irrational. Don't even get me started on the third act break up. First, I was mad at Brooke for being irrational, then I was mad at Jackson for thinking he was the one who messed up.

5. There were several inconsistencies in the story. For example, when Jackson was making mac and cheese in the hotel kitchen for the first time, he wanted a wooden spoon. Brooke told him they didn't have any, so he used what they had. Towards the end of the book, all of a sudden, he's using a wooden spoon. Where did it come from? There was no mention of acquiring a wooden spoon. That would have been a very nice thing for Brooke to do. Another example is that for the majority of the book, we understood that making mac and cheese was Jackson's pre-game ritual. He did it for every game. Towards the end, it says something about it being a home game ritual. So, he only does it for home games? Then why has he been making mac and cheese this whole time?!?!?!?

Ultimately, I don't think I was invested in Jackson and Brooke's romance because of the way it began. I didn't feel a special connection between the two of them. It seemed like they were both nice people who enjoyed each other's company (when they were thinking clearly) but the relationship didn't go much deeper than that. Mostly, I enjoyed reading this story so I could then discuss how much I didn't like the story with my sisters...