Exploring the Appeal of Enemies to Lovers with Ruby Rana

Do you love the enemies-to-lovers trope as much as I do? Author Ruby Rana joined us to share her unique take on this beloved romance trope, diving into the emotional depth and nuanced character dynamics that make it so captivating.

Ruby Rana is an elder millennial who writes spicy, funny, and heartfelt romance about sassy brown girls. She excels in sending messages where autocorrect has gone terribly wrong. When she's not battling typos, you can find her explaining Midwestern slang to her East Coast-raised husband, being used as a jungle gym by her young children, or experimenting in the kitchen.

In this episode, we're discussing:

• How Ruby Rana's debut novel "Snapshot" expertly blends the enemies-to-lovers trope with a hockey romance backdrop, creating a story of childhood friends turned adversaries.
• The importance of portraying realistic emotional scars and growth, highlighting how past traumas can shape a character's present-day actions and perceptions.
• The value of supportive female friendships in Ruby’s books, providing a safe space for her characters to be their authentic selves.
• Insights on how the enemies-to-lovers trope allows for meaningful character development, as the characters learn to love each other despite their differences.
• The athleticism and camaraderie within the world of professional hockey, which serves as an engaging setting for Rana's stories.

Feeling inspired to dive into Ruby Rana's unique take on the enemies-to-lovers trope? Discover her novels and connect with the author on social media to continue the conversation. Romance readers won't want to miss this insightful discussion!

CONNECT WITH RUBY RANA:

Website

Instagram

BOOKS/AUTHORS MENTIONED:

Snap Shot (Amazon)

Butterfly Effect (Amazon)

Played by Naima Simone (Amazon)

Scribbles Book Shop

Steamy Lit

Running list of books mentioned (Doc)

Thank you for listening to the We Read Smut Podcast! If you enjoyed this episode, take a screenshot of the episode to post in your stories and tag @WeReadSmut. Don’t forget to follow, rate, and review the podcast.

Connect with Alesia:
Storygraph

This podcast was produced by Galati Media.
Proud member of the Feminist Podcasters Collective.

Chapters

• 0:00 Enemies to Lovers Trope Overview
• 4:02 Character Dynamics and Emotional Layers
• 9:36 Realistic Portrayal of Emotions and Growth
• 10:58 Importance of Female Friendships
• 21:39 Character Development and Enemies to Lovers Trope
• 29:41 Challenges and Process of Writing
• 32:49 Hockey as a Setting and Characteristics
• 44:10 Reader Engagement and Book Availability

Transcript

Alesia Galati: 0:00

Is it just me, or is there something so incredibly satisfying about watching two people who absolutely cannot stand each other fall head over heels in love? Today, we're dissecting enemies to lovers and its glorious appeal with incredible author, Ruby Rana. Listener, discretion is advised. This podcast contains mature content intended for adult audiences only. Ruby, I am so excited to dive into all things enemies to lovers with you. But before we get into that, I want to remind our listeners that enemies to lovers are different from rivals to lovers. Rivals to lovers, I like to think of almost as like academic rivals to lovers, or career rivals to lovers, where you're maybe in the same corporate space or the same academic space, and you're competing for similar titles, similar awards or recognition. Yeah, and you kind of hate the other person because they're going after the same things you are. Maybe you've won some they've won some, as you kind of hate their guts, but at the same time, there's a bit of angst that can happen in there, and eventually some love maybe. So that is different, but enemies to lovers. You know, a lot of people are like, oh, people say enemies to lovers, but it's not really enemies. But I feel like you really put the enemies and enemies to lovers. So let's dive into your first book, your debut snapshot, kind of give us a little synopsis of that and how the enemies lovers trope plays into that.

Ruby Rana: 1:45

Sure. First of all, thank you for having me. I'm so excited to be here. And yeah, so snapshot is about Landon Roddick. He's a star hockey player, and he gets caught in a postseason scandal. They're on their way to the Stanley Cup, and photo releases of him in a position against his condo with a previous staffer and all hell kind of breaks loose. Things go viral. The person involved gets, you know, on a mic and says all this stuff, and it really messes with his head, and Stanley Cup fades away. They don't make it to the championship. The management hires a lawyer to just recover his reputation, because he's kind of the golden boy. He has never done anything like this. He's never been involved in anything like this. Like this. He's not like the bad boy. And so they hire one of the best libel lawyers in the country, in Canada, and when they finally meet, it so happens that it's his childhood friend who they used to play hockey together as kids, and for some reason, she has held a grudge, and she just hates him. He has no idea why he has fond memories, but they navigate through that. He tries to figure out why she's acting a certain way towards him, and tries to rekindle their friendship, gets to the root of it, and then finds out a bunch of personal things about her, and realizes that he just wants to keep up with it, that he has this childhood crush that is like kind of coming true now that he could actually do something about and they come to a friends with benefits agreement, And she has rules because her boundaries have been crossed before and their lawyer clients, so it's strictly forbidden. So yeah, and it's just kind of how they fight with their feelings, especially the lawyer Indira deve she, she, like, knows in her heart what her feelings are, but she fights them through so many layers because she believes that there's nothing that could make her fall again for someone like him. So I think there's a lot of push and pull in that. But I have a problem with just writing men who are down so bad. You know? I think that's like the line of like enemies to lovers. People love that switch when it's like true hate towards the other person. But I think that what happens with me is because I don't know, I just don't like the idea of hating a woman. I think he's just he likes her. He wants to be liked by her, as like a person, as a friend, as a romantic learner, but he also doesn't want to be disrespected. He also doesn't want to be accused of things he hasn't done. Like he can handle the bickering. He can handle the banter. He will shoot off remarks just as good as she does. But I think he's still inside. He's just down so bad. Yeah, and for her, it's just like a hate to love thing that I hate, that I like someone like him, I hate that I still have this childhood crush that was nipped too early, and we, like never got that chance. And fear, like fear of rejection, fear of so many things that is from her past that she's just afraid that it'll happen again. So I think those are all the layers and then just figuring out their boundaries and figuring out who they are to each other, from lawyer client who don't really like each other to friends who have like an understanding, who have boundaries, and seeing those boundaries pushed again and again. And both people agreeing to those, both people agreeing to that consent of, okay, let's new rule or Nix that rule. Forget about that rule. Like the rule doesn't work for us anymore. Let's just keep going to finally admitting what their actual feelings are and then blossoming from it. So yeah, that's a long summary, but, yeah, it's a long book, guys, it is,

Alesia Galati: 6:01

but I think it's so good. And what I love about your enemies to lovers is that it was actually a practical reason why someone would really hate someone else, without spoiling it, like overhearing something or having those, like, very middle school or, like, early teen everything is the biggest deal in the world. Yeah, I try to think about that, especially as a mom, thinking about, like, how my kids react to things. They're 10 and seven, and I'm like, oh my god, it's not that big of a deal. Like you have your whole life ahead of you. But then I have to remember, how did I feel when I was that age when, you know, I didn't get to go do the thing that I really was looking forward to, or I was disappointed. And so have to remember, Oh no, this is actually the biggest moment of their life right now, and how I react has an impact. But then thinking about your characters and what they went through at that time, a very pivotal moment emotionally. And there were a lot of additional things right, without getting too many spoilers away, that were impacting the way they felt about themselves, the way they were living up to, like peer pressure, and so to have that mixed like that, and then to see each other years later, and her being like, Man, fuck you. I do not like I think was such a I don't want to say relief, but the way that you approached it was such a relief, because I feel like a lot of authors almost take the over the top. This doesn't make sense enemies to lovers, almost for like the effect of it. For example, I was reading a book where the it's this really rich hockey player. He's drunk driving. He hits a girl she ends up losing out on her ballet career. His dad pays her and her mom off a year later, his hockey career is now completely ruined. So it dark, hockey, college romance, but opposite sides of the track. They end up seeing each other. He knows exactly who she is. She doesn't really know who he is, because she doesn't remember a lot of that night. And then, like, her ballet career was ruined, his hockey career was ruined. But he blames her for his absolutely terrible decision, and the way that he approaches it is very like, you ruined my life. Like, okay, man, Baby, what are you doing? And I feel like that as an example that kind of enemies to lovers, just feels like you're going for some type, oh my gosh, where it didn't really feel genuine. It didn't feel like they actually hated each other. It felt like he was just being an asshole, which I don't think is enemies to lovers, but I think a lot of authors tend to use that as a way to make it an enemy's lovers. And I love that you do not

Ruby Rana: 9:08

well. I mean, every author has their own little style, and every reader also has their own preferences. A lot of readers, like those kind of guys, they like to see the arc of the development from that. I honestly, I like it too. I like seeing the idiot asshole, but I feel like, for I don't know why I do this, but I feel like, for me, the FMCS are the idiot asshole. You know what I mean. Like they their anger is misdirected, their feelings, while valid, are not always placed at the right person. It's maybe at a situation that was in the past, at another person, but the person in front of them is right there. So it's let me just do it, and that's like a very human thing to do, but I feel like a lot of times. It happens to the men in these stories, they behave like this. But I feel like I just tend to make the women like this, and maybe it's because I'm like this. I have done that in the past. I probably still do that. You're annoyed about something, and then my husband shows up and I just explode at him where he doesn't deserve it, or anything like that, but things from our past trauma, people and relationships that we've had in the past affect those actions. And I wanted to play into that, and I had gotten some feedback on you're a 27 year old woman, how can you just hold on to something from middle school? But sometimes like, scars can run really deep. And then, like, you forget about things. You live your whole life. You go to high school, you go to college. For India, she went to law school. She's, like, incredibly successful. But like, obviously, Landon meant something to her, that friendship meant tempting to her. It was like at a point in her life where she didn't have a lot of support in general, in something that she wanted to do and ultimately gave up, but like he was that one person who she thought she could trust, and when that trust is broken, it just leaves a scar, and then suddenly this person is back in your life, and you have to be professional with them, and then they're acting like nothing happened and that they like you and all this kind of stuff. Like it toys with the emotions. I know that if I saw somebody from middle school who didn't treat me well, now I'd probably be like, civil and respectful, like whatever, but I would still remember the things that they said and did to me and how they made me feel. So I feel like that's what I tried to highlight. I don't want it to be like, Oh, they're so immature. Like that, she hung out. But I feel like people think that 27 year olds 30 year olds are a certain way, but we're all human. Obviously, they're mature in different ways, but I'm also super immature in other ways. I know my humor is immature, but it's just funny. I mean, sometimes it's just funny, and what makes me laugh and a 20 year old laugh could be the same thing people in their 20s do act inappropriately, as do women in their 30s, too. So we're not about making good decisions all the time. Here. Could make a lot of mistakes. We have a lot of flaws. We try to make up for it. We say sorry and move on. So yeah, yeah.

Alesia Galati: 12:28

I think, I think it's silly to assume that our past doesn't have any impact on how we approach life now. I mean, even me, I had friendships in high school where I was really good friends with someone, and I'm the kind of person where you're my best friend, you're my only best friend. It's you and me to the end of the world. That's how I was as a teenager, and just very possessive of my friendships. And then so in this one friendship, my cousin shows up. He starts dating my friend. They break up, she stops being friends with me, and then go on to college. Same thing happened. I had this really good friend. My cousin, comes along. He's the problem. I'm the cousin to get away. He did later, apologize, like years later, but, you know, like, I lost out on really good friendships. And so then that impacted a lot of my adult friendships, of being like, well, I don't want to get too close, because then anything a dumb cousin can ruin this relationship, right? And so it really did have a huge impact on how I approached friendships and how much I let people in, because it was a repetitive, a repeated thing that happened to me, and so I don't think it's immature. I think that it's so often we see our reactions, and this is something that I've done a ridiculous amount of work on, because I have a lot of trauma from my childhood and growing up in a cult and a lot of other things. And that is my first reaction, my first thought, my first want to respond, I'm not responsible for that. That is my brain trying to protect me. That is my trauma, saying, hey, alert, something is scary, and that's okay. That's what makes me human. It's then that okay. Pause. Is this actually true? Does this person actually hate me? Is my spouse actually really trying to make my life miserable? No, I have to pause and think, Okay, what do I know to be true? Okay, cool. Then, how do I approach that? And I think that takes so much self work that a 27 year old, especially, I'm into astrology. If you're going through your Saturn in return, you're going through a lot of stuff during 27 to 30 already, of who in the. Called am I? So no, it's not weird to me

Ruby Rana: 15:03

at all. Yeah. And I mean, I guess I've been 27 and I know how just chaotic life can be, that your life is still changing. You're still forming this person at 27 I was definitely not the same person I was in college, but I'm definitely not the same person I am now. And I think it's a process. It's a revolution, of you're constantly changing, and this idea of like people in their 20s and 30s should have it all together, that's just not true. People in their 20s don't have it together. People in their 30s don't have it together. People in their 40s and 50s don't have it together, but it's just in different aspects. You may know one thing about your life, you may have stability in one part of your life, but other things may not be and again, it's always changing. And so I think we need to get rid of that idea that, Oh, that's okay for like, college people, because they're like this, and they're still learning, but you're still learning in your 20s too, and you're still learning in your 30s as well. So, yeah, I just sometimes I feel like that kind of criticism hurt almost, because I'm like, well, that's me, you know what? I mean? Like, I've done some stupid shit. I have made dumb mistakes over and over again, and I'm an adult. I'm 30. I was like that when I was 27 you know what I mean? So then it feels like an attack on my being, and I try not to think of it like that, but it does hurt sometimes when they're like, Oh, they're so immature. They're supposed to be 27 it's like, have you met any 27 year olds? Have you met any 20 year old hockey players? Because they are insanely immature. They play sports professionally, like they play games for a living. They are immature. I'm not saying that they can't be mature in certain situations, but they are very immature in other situations. So it's just a thing. They don't have to be this super mature person all the time, especially in their places of comfort or friendships, where they are in their safe space and they are free to be who they are. That's very interesting to me, to see the expectations of 20 and 30 year old. I

Alesia Galati: 17:13

think too, there are a few different things where my brain is going with this. It's like one. I think also in the romance community, there's almost this 18 is automatically you know everything about yourself, and you're able to make huge life decisions for yourself, and you're so mature. And so that's really interesting, that we those kinds of storylines tend to get pushed in romance. So I like that you're combating that two I love that you're you mentioned the friendships, the friendships that you create in your books, I think is and I haven't read the second one yet. It will be out by the time this goes live. But the friendships are just so deep and so trusting and just I love that you have those really healthy female friendships placed in there before we get back into the enemies to lovers and like growing the characters with that. Why do you think that having those really supportive female friendships was important to your characters.

Ruby Rana: 18:22

So for Indira, especially, first of all, She's the eldest daughter of three girls, so her house is overrun with women, and she's the eldest one, so she's considered to be more responsible. There's more expectation of her. But you know, with her friendship group. I think it's really important for her to have because of the trauma that she's had with men in the past, she doesn't trust men as easily. And Gabe, who his her college roommate, they've maintained their friendship throughout the years. And Bear AZ B, who is her legal secretary. Obviously, there has to be a level of trust there as well. And Sheena, her childhood friend. I think it's really important to have those friendships. I know that I am lucky enough to have these lifetime, long friendships. I have friends who I've known literally since I was born, two years old, eight years old, and we're still friends. We have kids the same age. We all have partners and and things and houses to run and all this kind of stuff, but we make time for each other, and on the day to day, we may not talk, but every couple of weeks, we're in the group chat, and every year we get together. And so I've been really lucky to have those testaments of lifelong friendship, and we've literally been through every phase of life together. That whole process is so important because it just you supported each other through the years. And for Indira, it's just that's her safe space. And. And she gets the most crap from them too. They know what makes her uncomfortable, they push her buttons, they make fun of her, but they're also the ones who are there for her when they know it's most important and vice versa. No questions asked at the end of the day. That's her crew. She is just well supported in that, and I just wanted to highlight that, because I think it's so important that there's no like jealousy, there's no competition. They're successful, they're smart, they're doing their own thing, but they get together, they have a lot of fun, and they bond over anything that they do. So I really enjoyed writing that friendship, because it's like an ode to the friendships that I've been lucky enough to have over the years.

Alesia Galati: 20:45

Oh, that's so beautiful. I love that so much, and that you were able to have that experience as well. I'm someone who there's maybe one or two people that I still interact with from my childhood and then my adult friendships. I'm in my 30s, the other one's in her 40s, and the other one's in her 50s. It's like the three of us. We get together, we talk about everything. We're sending messages. If one of us is struggling, we're always there for each other to lift each other up. And we've actually never met in real life, which is so wild to me. That's amazing, but it's so beautiful to have those friendships, to be like, I'm struggling, or I don't feel supported, or I just need to vent, right? To have someone that we can vent to, who's not going to be like, judging us or or even giving advice, right? Someone to just say, I hear you and I see you. I think is, it's such a beautiful thing thing to have, especially as women. So I love that you put that into your books. Now, enemies to lovers is such a beautiful way to grow characters, like we talked about, even with the versions that I don't prefer, there still has to be growth for it to be like, No, you're an asshole and you don't deserve this girl right there. You have to grow as a person. And so how do you think that with your characters specifically? And if you want to go into Book Two, how does this enemy silver trope allow for these characters to develop and grow together and separately? Because I think that's such an important part of the books that you write is that they do grow individually, well together, without a bit of CO dependence, meeting each other for their own future and growth. So how do you think that trope really allows for that character development?

Ruby Rana: 22:34

It's just that idea that someone cannot like you. Someone cannot like your qualities, your traits, your habits that they find irritating, whatever it is, but they can still love you despite all of that. You can be X, Y and Z and still be loved by someone that you're worthy of love, despite differences, despite arguments. And I think when you don't see eye to eye with someone, it's really hard to love them. It's really hard to accept them. And I think that is the appeal of enemies to lovers, that someone sees your flaws, somebody sees the things that they don't actually prefer in a partner, but they're able to love you, and they do. They actually love you despite everything else. I think friends to lovers is very sweet, but I think enemies to lovers just has a little bit more tension with snapshot and Landon and Indy, it's almost frenemies, or like maybe one sided enemies, because Indy is fighting her feelings so much. I feel like Landon has just succumbed. He knows, but I don't think he knows to the depth he's down so bad in the beginning, but it's not until towards the end, when he realizes that it's always been her, that he has held a place for her for so long that he didn't know, even subconsciously, what he was doing, and that she had always been this source of calm and comfort for him without knowing it, you know. And I find that to be really beautiful. I love that, that, yeah, he's down so bad in the beginning, and yeah, he's like, horny or whatever for her, but it's because of who she is and how, even as a kid, she stood up for herself, and how she wouldn't take other people's crap, and how she just fought for herself, and then kind of understood was that caring, comforting person when he was going through a tough time as a 12 year old, his parents were going through a divorce at that time, and that's really hard for a middle schooler. It's a confusing time, especially when they're trying to co parent. So everyone's just still in everyone's lives. There's some big changes there. It's hard to ex. Up. Do you still love everyone? But it's still a big change and a traumatic experience to have someone outside of that who's objective and just caring, even if they don't feel like they're caring, it meant something to him, and I think it just deepened as their relationship progressed, whereas, like Indy was, you know, definitely didn't like this guy, even though she'd been obsessed with him. And then the truth comes out that even despite hating him all these years, she still followed his career. She still did these little celebrations when he had big successes and kept up with it. And I really enjoyed watching her just fall for it, to see that okay, he truly cares about me. He is showing me in so many ways. He is showing me in all of the love languages, how much he cares for me and what he's willing to put on the table for me. And I think that slow realization is really nice to see, and then just, it's awesome to just accept, finally, yeah, like, this is it. I fought it for so long, but you're it, so I like seeing that with butterfly effect. With Book Two, it's a little bit different. Again, I still have a problem with writing men who are down so bad, but in this case, in Wade's case, it's a little bit of hate to love, because he really likes this person. He really likes Gabe. He's desperate to show her who he actually is, because he's been pretending to be someone who is acceptable to his world, acceptable to his teammates, acceptable to the sport, acceptable to women. And he is so tired of playing that person, he knows that he's not that person. Not many people get to see who he actually is, and he's just desperate to show her that he's not the person she thinks, and she's so adamant that he is the person that he's showing she's so adamant that she hates him because he's embarrassed her professionally. She feels even though it's a little bit misdirected, she feels humiliated by the fact that he was the one who caught her ex fiance cheating. That's, obviously, it's completely misdirected anger, but it's still, it's still anger. You know, I hate this guy, plus he's like a notorious Playboy, just like her ex. There's all these reasons to hate him, yet there is an attraction. There is this undercurrent of like magnetism between them. She's also eight years older, so she finds him to be really immature, especially in this like chauvinistic fuck boy jock that he pretends to be in front of his peers in front of the cameras, and she finds it really irritating, but when he slips her these little glimpses of who he actually is, she softens. She doesn't want to believe it, but slowly, she starts to see what he actually is, and that uncovering is really a joy to see how Wade slowly opens up his self to her and her slowly getting rid of all of the layers that she's put up for herself, all of the walls she's put up for herself in terms of what She expected him to be like through this fake dating thing. They have a history, they had a kiss, they had a one night stand. She considers them to be mistakes, and then all of a sudden, they're caught in this fake dating publicity stunt, and she doesn't know what to do with it. But that process of them learning about each other, learning again, one what their boundaries are, how who they are is shaped so much by their past and societal expectations, and just getting rid of all that when it's just them too, and how they can just be themselves, it's really, I really enjoyed watching that happen and unfold, and then they can, just like unabashedly, without shame, just be themselves. And I love that when they are their true selves, they too, they both accept each other fully, without criticism or judgment, all the banter and stuff is like superficial thing, it's fun, it's funny, but when it comes down to it, who they really are to each other and who they are to themselves is a really fun and joyful process. I really liked seeing it. It was nothing like India and landed so I liked that a lot. The

Alesia Galati: 29:58

way I cannot wait to devour that book. I keep sending you DMS and being like Room A

Ruby Rana: 30:06

I meant to finish writing it so long ago, meant to publish it so long ago, but life happens, and I've just had to figure out when I could actually make it happen. And again, these characters did give me a little bit of trouble. So I had to really figure out, you know what they were trying to tell me. Other authors have other processes. I don't know. I don't make these things up for the characters. They just do it to themselves. You know what I mean? Like they appear and they just tell me things. They tell me their story. And sometimes it changes. Sometimes they have said one thing, but it's actually something else. And so sometimes the first thing they said doesn't make sense to me, and I'm like, What is going on? And eventually they just reveal something else. And then I'm like, Oh, okay. Now this makes sense. Now this makes more sense for your character. And so it's been a process of filtering through the brain dump and actually putting together words that make sense for them and their story. And I'm really excited to share how it turned out. It's significantly shorter. Alesia, it's so much shorter. Snapshot was almost 150,000 words. This is 80. It's 80,000 words, so it's like almost half. And yet I felt like, do I need more words? Am I doing justice to their story? But I felt when I wrote the end, it felt complete. Yes, it felt okay. I could beef up some of this, or I could change the order of some of this, something like that. But the story, I'm like, their story is complete. So I just didn't want to just add random stuff, just to fluff it up or beef it up for any reason. But I think that in being able to consolidate their story in a concise way, that's what's right for it. That's what it needed. That's how long the story should be. I'm sure there's more scenarios and bonus stuff that I could come up with. Like, they'll say something to me in a couple weeks, and I'll be like, Okay, put that into a bonus chapter somewhere. But I just feel like it was complete. It wasn't didn't feel like anything was missing or didn't make sense. My style is still really ridiculous. I think it's silly. There's a little angst. There's still that. I feel like it's still very much my style of writing, but I think it's improved. And it's their voice, it's their voices that are really shining through.

Alesia Galati: 32:38

Oh, that's so fun. And I think that makes for the best kind of story, right? Is that it's no this, yeah, story, and they said, This is it, and so that is it, and that's okay. I love it, yeah? So why hockey? I believe you were born and raised in Canada, right?

Ruby Rana: 32:56

I was born and raised in the US Midwest, so I actually, I had been reading some hockey romance around the time that I got the idea for snapshot. But again, it's just crazy how the human mind works. I had the idea, partially based on me as a 12 year old hockey player in the Midwest who was the only girl on the boys team. There was no girls team. Hockey is not very popular in the Midwest other than like the northern Midwest, like Minnesota, Wisconsin, it's more popular there, but it's not that popular in other parts. Again, we had one in middle school, like the under 13 League had basically one team per district, per school district. People are into football, basketball, other sports, just not hockey. And hockey was not new, but, like, they had a brand new ice rink, and I had been ice skating for some time. I danced in the past. I was a little bit of a rebel. I did a lot of other sports, and I just really wanted to try it. And basically people told me I couldn't because there was no girls team. And I was like, then I'll try out for the boys team. What's your problem? So it was based on that. But there was no crush. I did not have any support. I did not have a friend on the team. None of those guys liked me, but I was a goalie and I was a little chunky, so that's the part working. That's like my love for hockey came from that I've been watching hockey for ages. It's really fun to watch. It's a really fun sport. I lived in Chicago for eight or nine years of my adult life. I watched the Black Hawks, and I was there for two Stanley Cup wins. So it was a lot of fun. It's just a fun sport, and those guys are, like, true athletes. I feel like for almost any other professional sport, the skills are so specific. They're so specific to. The sport that they really hone in on those skills. But for hockey, they have to do so much at the same time. They're skating, they're holding a stick, they are managing a puck, they're avoiding being checked. There's so much agility and strength and power and speed and everything all combined. And you're on ice, you're on ice skates. There's so much skill. It's really true. Because, again, I've met many hockey players throughout my life, whether in my middle school and teenage years, they're like, good at all sports. They can pretty much play any sport, and it's because they just have they do all of the things on the ice. It's really fun to see those guys play professionally. If you've ever seen their like, behind the scenes stuff. They're a bunch of goofballs. They're just giant children, pranking each other, goofing off, having like, crazy parties. You know what I mean? Like, just their lifestyle is so demanding, but also so fun, and it's fun to write about. Again, they have very demanding lives, just with the sport and travel, and so they experience a lot of things, and then also just it's not huge. Like, football teams are like 100 people, hockey rosters are like 25 to 30 max. So that's a very tight knit group of men who are with each other for a long time, throughout the season, on the road and practices, they become brothers, you know. So that also is something that I wanted to have, those like healthy male relationships as well. And there is a little bit of difference between snapshot and butterfly effect in that, because Landon has grown up with healthy male relationships, even though his parents were divorced, his dad was a very present parent. He has men in his life who have always been there, whereas in Book Two in Butterfly Effect, Wade has an absentee father. He was raised by his mother. He has daddy issues. He doesn't form male relationships quickly, other than superficially, and that kind of adds into who he shows his teammates, who he has played, because in the past, who he is was not accepted, and so he plays a part to feel accepted in this community, in his team again for the cameras, because who he pretends to be is more socially acceptable than who he actually is. And so his relationships with his peers, you see a few glimpses of it, but you can see why he gets along better with women, why he trusts women, and you can see his just trepidation around men, older men, Dad figures, and just a little bit of a barrier. Eventually, there are people on the team that he's closest to, but sometimes he doesn't show them all of himself either, and it's nice to see that eventually he does, eventually he's able to be his true self and his peer group. And yeah, yeah, I

Alesia Galati: 38:07

think that hockey players are so extremely athletic. I want to say it was a Alexandra house book where one of her part of our hockey series, or maybe it was a different one. It was a black romance specifically. And they were talking about this girl brings home this hockey player, and her family is like, Oh no, no. It wasn't Alexandria house. It was someone else. Her family's like, oh no. We're football players in this house, or we're football I was in this house, and like, hockey isn't even a real sport, and they like, try to, like, make him feel bad about what he has to go through to be a hockey player. And so I was like, oh my goodness, I can't imagine it takes so much focus, and, like you said, athleticism. And so then I had a whole discussion with my husband. I was like, Who do you think is more athletic football players or hockey players, and he watches football religiously. And he was like, football players. And I was like, I disagree. And here's why it turned into this whole discussion about all the things they have to go through. And I don't think we even came to an agreement, quote, unquote, right? I was like, This is how I feel. This how you feel, cool, whatever. Moving on. I'm done talking about sports. So that was, I think, a really fun and interesting conversation to have, and I think it's something that, especially as Americans, I don't think that the average American thinks about, especially if you don't, yeah, watch hockey

Ruby Rana: 39:38

in their sport, they have to be really aggressive. And sometimes I feel like readers love the Alpha hole, you know, they love the male character to have control, but again, also, they're very agile. And then you see them on screen, and see them be just absolute Golden Retrievers, and they're super rich. There's all sorts of things that are enticing about professional hockey players. College hockey, totally different thing. But I think professional hockey, these are the things that are enticing and it's fun to be a part of. It's it's gotten so widespread. It's really amazing how widespread it's gotten. But yeah, I'm definitely not from Canada. It just made sense for the story to be in Canada, and so that's why I did it. I think it's really funny. This is not the first time somebody thought that I was born and raised in Canada. They're like, why else would somebody write about a team in Ottawa, Canada? And actually one of my, one of my beta readers, and a reader who's read snapshot after it was released, she's from Ottawa, so she gets like, a kick out of it, because the Ottawa Senators, the actual NHL team there, is, like, notoriously bad. And she just finds it hilarious that I have created this, like, superstar team in autumn, and I really enjoy it. It's really fun. They're based off of a mixture between the Boston Bruins and the Pittsburgh Penguins, and you can see that reflected in their colors, like black, white and gold. But yeah, both of those teams, I have huge respect for them. They have some incredible players just the way they work as a team, and it's just they're fun to watch. They're fun as people, as athletes, to watch, but also just the behind the scenes, in the locker rooms, all the stuff that they pull it's just fun to see them as groups of men, and so a lot of like, little hijinks and shenanigans are based off of those teams, and as well as the skill set for athleticism, I

Alesia Galati: 41:49

love that, though I think that it's adds more of a depth to the sport. When you are a fan, I think a lot of people, especially authors, who are like, dabbling into hockey romances. It doesn't feel like you even like the sport. It's sprinkled in there, almost as an afterthought. But when you with your book, I feel like it really came through of a really intense sport. And wow, this is probably the first one that I've read where I could actually understand maybe what was going on without being like, what? What's happening as someone who does not watch it? Yeah,

Ruby Rana: 42:27

there's so many like terms and lingo, whatever slang that is only pretty much known to like the hockey community, or people who even the fans, if you watch it, then you understand. But I highly recommend anybody watching it. It's a lot of fun to watch. It's very entertaining to watch, even if you're, like, not really into sports, it's a lot of fun to watch. I just recommend anyone who reads hockey romance, who enjoys hockey romance, watch a game. Does it matter if it's minor league? You know, it doesn't matter Junior League, whatever, even, like the Women's Hockey League is so fun to watch. They're incredible athletes. It'll make more sense if the stuff that you've been reading actually references hockey. It's not just about a hockey player. Sometimes hockey romance is like that, and that's okay too, that it's just a hockey player. It's oftentimes that like that their whole life. Hockey is so much of their time, such a big chunk of their year, whether it's training or playing or being on the road postseason, if they're any good, and then they do it, you know, again and again, and maybe they get traded, and then they have to play for another team, and they have that's just constant going on. And I feel like you can't cut it out of their life, because it's so many hours of their day, so many months of their year. So you have to mention it. That's like such a big part of who they are. And I love being on the ice and in the game, those scenes make me laugh so much. And the locker room stuff, the locker room stuff, is so silly. It's totally immature, totally silly, but it's a rom com, guys like, it's supposed to be funny and silly, right? It's fun.

Alesia Galati: 44:06

I love it. Oh, Ruby, this has been so much fun for anyone who's like, Yes, I need to read these books. Where can they find you? Get to know you stalk you on social, all that fun stuff. So

Ruby Rana: 44:18

I'm on Amazon. That's primarily where you can find my books. I'm in several indie romance bookstores, a couple of Barnes and Nobles scribbles bookshop run by Haley Dicker, who is a wonderful sports romance author herself. She has signed copies of snapshot. She's also doing pre orders for Butterfly Effect, steamy lit down in just outside Miami, is also going to be doing a pre order for butterfly effect, and they have snapshot as well. So there's a lot of places. Amazon is the primary place, but scribbles bookshop if you want a signed copy, if you read it on K. You or read it on the Kindle, and then want to, you know, have the physical copy. Scribbles is a great place, because you get a little swag, you'll get it signed. I love that bookstore. She does such wonderful work with indie authors. So yeah, you can find me at all those places, and if you search for me on your favorite independent bookstore, especially if it's a romance theme. You may find me there. I've been lucky enough to connect with a lot of those bookstores, and they've been so kind and gracious to stock my books, either online or order. You know that you can place an order and they can call it in and send it out to you. So yeah, and we'll

Alesia Galati: 45:38

make sure that we have those linked in the show notes in the description. That way, if anyone is driving or doing other stuff, you can grab those links as well. Ruby, thank you so much. This has been so much fun. Thank

Ruby Rana: 45:50

you. I had a blast speaking with you about this. Thank you so much.

Unknown: 46:02

You.