This fourth book in Ari Baran’s Penalty Box series is a second-chance romance featuring two top-flight hockey players who are at or near the end of their playing careers and are not handling the prospect of change at all well. It’s an emotional and very messy story, somewhat darker and more sombre in tone than the previous two books in the series, and while it does end with an HEA, the journey is a tough one, strewn with avoidance, poor communication and denial.

Goaltender Interference is very much a character (rather than plot) driven story with the focus firmly on the internal lives of the two protagonists, their thoughts and feelings about their renewed romance and their struggle, in different ways, to come to terms with big changes in their lives.

Aiden Campbell (I loved that his nickname is ‘Soupy’) is thirty-six and has just retired as the starting goalie for the New York Liberty. It’s immediately clear that he’s not coping well with retirement and that he’s deeply depressed without realising it. After so many years in which most of his waking moments were dictated by routine, he’s struggling to adapt to a life in which that routine is now redundant, a life without the one thing that gave him a sense of self. He tries to find things to occupy his time but he’s not feeling any of it; he’s is badly adrift and has no idea of who he is outside of hockey or what he wants to do with his future. And while he knows, deep down, that he needs to find a new purpose in life, he has no real idea as to how to go about it, and no real drive or enthusiasm to do it.

Matt Safaryan is Captain of the Montreal Royal and is the team’s heart, soul and backbone. He’s played for Montreal for his entire career, but isn’t sure what he’s going to do when his contract ends at the end of the coming season. Thirty-six isn’t old by any means, but it’s ancient in hockey years and he’s no longer able to ignore the aches and pains from injuries sustained over the years, and knows he won’t be playing for much longer. But he’s not ready to retire yet – he’s got a few more playing years in him, despite having a chronic knee injury he knows he’s going to have to nurse very carefully through the season if he’s going to make it to the end of it.

A few weeks after his official retirement, Aiden reluctantly agrees to go out for a drink with Gabe Walker, his protégé and now the Libs’ starting goalie. Buzzed after a few shots, Aiden is preparing to pay the tab when he looks up – and into the face of Matt Safaryan, standing just a few feet away. It’s the closest they’ve been to each other off the ice in a decade, and Aiden feels as though he’s been gut-punched. After a few awkward moments, Aiden beats a hasty retreat, shakes off Gabe’s concern and makes his way home, but even being in familiar surroundings can’t shake off the feeling of being on the verge of panic. He’s just downed a generous class of whiskey when the doorbell rings – and he opens the door to find Matt standing on the stoop. Aiden knows what they’re about to do is monumentally stupid – but they do it anyway and Matt leaves straight after.

Aiden and Matt first met as rookies, and not long afterwards, entered into a secret relationship which lasted for several years – until Matt bought a ring and Aiden turned him down. The break-up devastated both of them, leading Matt to seek comfort at the bottom of a bottle and Aiden becoming even more tightly controlled than ever. That they didn’t break up because they stopped loving each other is very clear and is what makes it all the more heartbreaking – and it’s just as clear that they still haven’t fallen out of love. After a week of late-night hook-ups, Matt returns to Montreal feeling confused and heart-sore, while Aiden is going round in ever decreasing circles in New York, tourturing himself with all the what-ifs? he’d tried to stop thinking about years ago. It’s the thought of spending the rest of his life in this kind of awful limbo that finally gives Aiden the courage to pick up the phone and text Matt. The ice broken (pun not intended!), they start calling and messaging regularly, and over the next few weeks, they both realise that the sense of connection they’ve been craving and have never found with anyone else, has re-established itself between them. After the way things ended the last time, entering into a relationship a second time is surely not a good idea – but an impulsive invitation from Matt for Aiden to visit Montreal soon finds them doing just that and entering into a kind of easy domesticity as Matt starts preparing for the new season and Aiden finds purpose in taking care of him.

But they don’t talk. They don’t talk about what they’re doing, they don’t talk about how they feel and they don’t talk about the future. Matt knows Aiden is not in a good place but doesn’t know how to help him, and doesn’t want to risk saying or doing something that will cause him to bolt, so he just coasts along and hopes that love will be enough. There’s no doubt about the strength of their connection or their love for each other – but because they show that love through sex, it takes a while for the fault-lines in their relationship to really become apparent. They use sex as an avoidance tactic; they’re both finely attuned to each other when it comes to the physical and know how to give each other what they need – but the longer they go without addressing the issues lying between them, the greater the fallout is going to be. The author does a fantastic job of subtly ratcheting up the tension and permeating the story with feelings of uneasiness and uncertainty so that the reader is constantly waiting for the other shoe to drop.

Goaltender Interference isn’t an easy read but it’s a compelling one, and the depiction of a character in the grips of depression is one of the best I’ve read. The crushing loss of identity Aiden feels after retirement leaps off the page – he’s completely adrift without the one thing that has defined him for so many years and he simply can’t work out how to make a life without it. It’s not that he doesn’t want to – he tells himself several times that he needs to find something else to do with himself – he just can’t see himself doing anything else. And while Matt isn’t there yet, he’s in denial and, like Aiden, hasn’t made any plans for life post-retirement.

The characterisation of both leads is excellent, although Aiden feels somewhat more fully developed and rounded than Matt does. I’m not sure why that is, although perhaps it’s because Matt seems to be more self-aware and self-actualised; we’re told that he went to pieces after Aiden dumped him and that he went through therapy and rehab – but we never see any of that so by the time we meet him, he’s got his shit together. Aiden, on the other hand, is a complex mess, and has a lot of work to do – and here I have to mention that I really appreciate the way this author shows that people with mental health issues don’t have to be ‘fixed’ before they can have a happy ending, and that simply talking to a therapist isn’t going to help unless you are prepared to actually help yourself. Aiden is probably somewhere on the autism spectrum (reading Ari Baran’s newsletter after I read the book is enlightening on this), and while certain aspects of his personality have contributed to what made him such an outstanding goalie – intense focus and a need for routine among them – they have also left him particularly vulnerable to depression once hockey is no longer part of his daily life.

So yes, Goaltender Interference deals with some ‘heavy’ subjects, but there is plenty of humour and there are lighter moments to enjoy, too. The small, well-rounded secondary cast of players, friends and family add colour to the story, and while the romance is angsty and bittersweet, there’s never any doubt that Aiden and Matt truly belong together and that their hard-won HEA is very well-deserved. I’m not sure if this is the final book in the series – I’d happily read more – but if this is the end, I’ll be keeping an eager eye out for whatever Ari Baran comes up with next.