Review: The Cutting Edge + an interview with author Lisa Daily

I am so excited to be sharing my review of The Cutting Edge by my friend Lisa Daily + an exclusive interview with Lisa.
Enjoy!

ASIN: B0BTK3QFX4
Publisher: Siesta Key House
Release Date: 06-17-2023
Length: 225 pp
Source: Author for review
Buy It: Amazon/ B&N/ IndieBound

ADD TO: GOODREADS

Overview:

A laugh-out-loud hockey romantic comedy perfect for fans of Pippa Grant, Meghan Quinn, Icebreaker by Hannah Grace, and the Pucked series by Helena Hunting!

Logan Rivers is a star pro hockey player for the St. Pete Slashers -- and he's in a slump.

He hasn’t scored in 3 games and it’s starting to freak him out. Enter Coco, who strikes a deal with an assistant coach to be Logan's lucky charm to pay off her training expenses as an Olympic figure skater. Everything is looking up for both of them.

She’s almost got her debt paid off and the Slashers are on a winning streak. There's only one problem: she doesn’t know how to tell Logan she’s been lying to him the whole time.

If she can just keep her secret until the playoffs are over…
Click BUY NOW to snag this swoony, steamy, hockey and figure skating romance.

My Review:

The Cutting Edge
St. Pete Slashers #1
Lisa Daily

 

It’s a rare talent that can give an NHL superstar who still has all his own teeth and a world class figure skater the appeal and humility of a boy and girl next-door but Lisa Daily nails it with, The Cutting Edge, the debut in her new St. Pete Slasher’s Hockey series, a FAB rom-com staring her two over the top stars who are down to earth and genuine. Coco is a delight, she’s spunky, brave, and vulnerable with the biggest heart. Logan is a hot hockey God and a big teddy-bear who lets his precious 5-year-old daughter give him mani-pedis and a good man who’s not looking for love but opens his heart when it hits him like a puck to the head. Lisa delivers a hat trick with a laugh-out-loud, witty dialogue, a sweet story and a stable full of unforgettable characters especially Logan, Coco their besties and Poppy, the pint-sized star that absolutely steals the show, as an added bonus you’ll get a hint about book 2 in the series. If you love sports romances, a great story, fabulous characters, the novels of Kristan Higgins, Susan Elizabeth Phillips or the romances of this amazing author you’ll find yourself laughing out loud as you stay up until the wee hours to finish this unputdownable novel.

Logan Rivers Captain of the St. Pete Slashers hockey team hasn’t sunk a puck for too long and this slump is starting to worry him, the team will never make it to the playoffs if something doesn’t change. Then he accidentally beans his daughter’s stunning skating teacher with one of his 103 mile per hour shots, it puts her in the hospital with a concussion and just like that his life and luck change forever. Now he just needs to find a way to keep this good luck charm by his side.

Coco Charmand a world class competitive figure skater, has dreamed of Olympic gold ever since she was a little girl and after years of 5am practices, special diets and other sacrifices when she came in 4^th at the last Nationals and blew her Olympic chance her parents pulled the plug on financing her career. Ever since she’s been scrimping and saving paying for coaches and lessons for one last chance to go for the gold. Then wham just like that she’s in the hospital with a concussion thanks to a slap shot gone wrong from the stick of a handsome hockey God. Just when her dream of Olympic gold seems farther out of reach the Slasher’s coach offers her a chance to make some easy money that may just get her back in the game.

When a good deed goes bad these two pros will need to learn what’s important, being right or being loved.

 

Interview with Lisa:

I met Lisa Daily virtually many moons ago when she was the publicist for one of my favorite indie publishers, Oceanview, they like her are based in the sunshine state and one day I happened to see a rom-com by a Lisa Daily and asked if she happened to be that Lisa Daily, turns out she was. I read the book, loved it and an instant wo-mance was born. Since then I’ve learned that Lisa has worn many hats, author, publicist, writing coach, dating expert and TV star. Plus back in 2020 she interviewed moi about reviewing,

Part 1 link -https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=htWRH2zuUVU&t=12s

Part 2 link - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=htWRH2zuUVU

But this is the first time I’m interviewing her so sit back and learn a little about this master wordsmith, a woman of many talents including an incredible romance novelist.

 

Lisa Hi! Welcome to The Reading Frenzy.
You’re too kind!  Thanks for having me!

 

I absolutely LOVED The Cutting Edge the first in your new St. Pete Slashers Hockey romance series.
Tell my readers just a little about it please.
First, let me just say thank you so much. I was on vacation when I first read your review and it absolutely made my entire week.

The Cutting Edge is about an Olympic figure skater and an NHL hockey player who get to know each other when he accidentally knocks her out with a puck.

 

Why a Hockey romance series?
This is a bit funny. I have always really loved hockey (and hockey players) since I was a teenager and you could go see the semi-pro hockey team for $5 with your student ID.

I hadn’t really considered writing a hockey romantic comedy until I read Helena Hunting’s Pucked series. I’m often compared to her (which I find insanely flattering) and I loved the series so much I started thinking about writing a hockey romance series myself. I’ve always written stand-alones, and I was also looking for a way to make my fans who love series happy, so I thought writing about a team would give me a chance to write books that felt like stand-alones but were interconnected.

These days, I’m more of a Pittsburgh fan (you’ll find lots of nods to the Penguins in the book)

  

The more I read the more I loved the book, the story, the characters, the humor and just everything about it.
Thank you so much. It was so much fun to write!

 

Do you have a favorite character, or would that be like picking a favorite child?
It is like picking a favorite child. Logan’s daughter, Poppy, is a scene stealer, and I love that about her. She was so clear in my mind from the first scene, and I love that so many readers have completely fallen for her.

I love how Coco is so unapologetic about her Olympic ambitions. She has a limited time window to achieve her goal of Olympic gold, and she’s not letting anything stand in her way.

Logan is one of my favorite heroes. He’s this big manly hockey star, and he’s so comfortable in himself that he’ll let his young daughter paint his nails in team colors without getting all weird about it. I find that kind of confidence soooooo appealing. If you watched Jason Momoa’s character in Fast X, he has the same vibe. He’s absolutely ruthless in the film, but he’s also weirdly enlightened in some ways. I love that energy.

 

I mentioned in my review that these two over the top characters are really down to earth which to me makes them much more relatable.
Especially Logan who is not above letting his darling daughter paint his nails.
Tell me what kind of character Logan was to create, did he do what you wanted him to, or was he more of a run amuck type of guy?
Logan developed in a fun sort of way. At the very start of the book, he’s late to pick up Poppy from her skating practice, which causes a big issue for Coco. I wanted to show the reader what kind of person Logan was away from his persona as a star NHL player – and you really see who he is as a person revealed through how he treats his daughter Poppy, and later as he tries to make amends for the accident with Coco.  I wanted Logan to be the kind of man who takes responsibility for his actions, even if he sometimes acts in a way that is misguided. (Like we all do from time to time.) One thing I love about Logan is that he’s a giver of these incredibly thoughtful gifts – he really pays attention to people, and I find that so compelling.  I really love how much he respects Coco as an elite athlete and a person.

When I initially started writing Logan, I got some great input from the Swoon Squad, which is the name for my fans and newsletter subscribers. As I wrote him, I started thinking about how Logan’s experiences and traumas lined up with Coco’s, and how they could compel each other to grow as people.

Logan is tough on the outside but pretty sweet on the inside, and that is one of my very favorite combinations.

  

You give a good hint about book two and knowing the characters involved that’s going to be one heck of a story too.
 I’m super excited about Cam & Lana’s story in Book 2, Cold Feet, which will be the first fake fiancee story I’ve ever written. It’s one of my all-time favorite romance tropes, and it’s been so much fun diving into it. Cam is one of Logan’s best friends from The Cutting Edge, and Lana is the team’s publicist. She comes from this hockey dynasty, and her brother is also a teammate of Cam and Logan’s. Cam needs to clean up his bad boy man tramp image to land a sneaker deal and enlists Lana to help him. It’s obvious to everyone that there are sparks there, but Lana has to balance her career against her feelings for Cam, and he’s pretty certain that Lana’s brother Zayne will kill him if he confesses he’s developed feelings for Lana, so it’s got all sorts of fun to play with in the story line. Plus Lana and Cam are so supportive of Logan and Coco’s budding romance in The Cutting Edge, so I really wanted to give them their own story.

Do you have a set number of books in this series or is that still not conclusive?
I do not have a set number of books planned yet, but there will be at least three. The next one, Cold Feet, is a fake fiancée story that pairs Lana, the team’s publicist and Cam “Hitman” Murphy, Logan’s teammate and best friend. I love the fake fiancée trope and it just sort of hit me last year that I had never written one before, so I’m incredibly excited about that. I love a good fake romance.  I knew going into it that Lana was going to be the heroine of book 2 in the series, but I hadn’t really planned out who she’d be dating on the team until I started writing Cam.

Let’s chat with Lisa the author for a moment.
a-Did you want to be a writer all your life or are you an accidental author?
All my life. When I was a kid, we had this fireplace with glass doors in front of the sofa. During the day, the light would reflect off the doors and if you were sitting on the couch it sort of looked like you were on television. I literally used to sit on the couch when I was a kid and pretend like I was on a talk show being interviewed about my latest book.

My grandmother made it very clear to anyone who would listen that she wanted an author in the family. To her, there was no greater profession. As a kid, I loved to write and started telling stories from a young age. As an adult (and a person who is constantly thinking about the backstories of both real and imaginary people) I wonder now if she had unfulfilled aspirations of becoming an author herself. She died when I was eight, but I feel an incredible sense of pride that I was able to fulfill that wish for her. That said, if my grandmother had thought that the greatest profession in the universe was pro golfer or game show host or ice skater, I still would have been an author. (Or maybe a game show host and an author.)

 

b-Who are the authors that inspired you?
So many authors have inspired me over the years. I think most rom-com writers would say Jane Austen. For me, the combination of wit, a super-smart-heroine, and toe curling romance was something I really identified with. Weirdly, the combination of Shakespeare and Dave Barry’s humor column in the newspaper taught me it was okay to break some rules and write the way I wanted to. Jackie Collins for writing unputdownable smut. Shonda Rhimes for her incredible storytelling, creativity, and hooks galore. Sophie Kinsella, Christina Lauren, and Helena Hunting for their quirky, lovable and imperfect heroines and creating the kinds of heroes you’d actually want to date in real life.

 

Let’s talk about those many hats you wear.
I’m an author, a book coach, a book publicist, and now a podcaster. (Before that I was a national TV love guru for about 15 years.)

That said, all of my various activities are centered around books and helping authors find an audience for their books.

a-Which one would you describe as your day job
Such a great question! I suppose, Publicist & Book Coach would be what I’d consider my “day job”, although when I think about how I work, I consider them all to be different facets of my author business, and they all overlap in many ways.

For example, my book coaching work with a number of well-known 6- and 7-figure authors has significantly influenced my own writing (my first ever series!) as well as how I approach the rapidly changing publishing business. I build my publicity clients’ campaigns on strategies I learned from my 7-figure authors who are selling like gangbusters.

I’m an extrovert, so I love the collaboration with my book coaching clients and my publicity clients, and the community of book media, bookstagrammers, BookTokkers, and reviewers I get to work with on behalf of my publicity clients.

b-Which is your dream job
Author. I’ve wanted to be an author all my life, and it’s the vocation I most closely identify with.

c-Which is your favorite job
Author! (But book coach and publicist are close!)

Publishing has changed so much just in the last decade from what I call the wild west of writing and publishing when self-publishing made it possible for anyone to write and publish a book.

As someone who works on both sides of this aisle do you think it’s easier or harder to be an author today?
It’s so much easier to get published. You can be your own publisher for a very small investment (if not free, if you have the skills or can trade skills like cover design or editing with others.) You can write and publish a book and have it appear right next to the latest bestseller from the big 5 publishing houses, which is incredible. There are so many authors making a living off books that would never have been published by a big house 10 or 20 years ago.

Not to mention – I think indie authors are taking some really big swings and innovating in ways that the big houses just can’t (with a few notable exceptions, such as Bookouture.)

The downside is that there are so many more books being published, audiences and media are so fragmented, and the publishers don’t or can’t give authors the time to develop an audience the way they did in the past. Which means it’s very much up to an author to find an audience and build a fanbase themselves. That’s a lot of pressure if marketing is not one of your skill sets and you just want to write books.

I think the blunt answer is that it’s easier to be an author today, but also harder to be a traditionally published author today and actually make a living at it.

 

Lisa thanks so much for taking the time out of your incredibly busy life letting me pick your brain.
Thank you so much for talking with me today!

Where can my readers find the author – the podcaster – the writing coach – the dating expert just in case they are in need of any of those experts.

You can find me at www.LisaDailyBooks.com

My writing advice YouTube channel at www.author.coach

And my contemporary romance podcast at www.WhileYouWereReading.com.

 

Good luck with the new book/series and I hope you’ll stop back by some time
Thank you so much and anytime!

 

About the author:

Lisa Daily writes beach read romantic comedies (The Cutting Edge, Single-Minded, Fifteen Minutes of Shame) and dating advice books (Stop Getting Dumped!). So basically, if she can't help you meet your dream guy, she can create one for you from scratch.

She's the love and relationships expert on DAYTIME, a nationally-syndicated morning TV show, and a popular media guest who has appeared everywhere from MTV Live to Entertainment Tonight, and been quoted everywhere from the New York Times, Washington Post and Chicago Tribune to Cosmopolitan, Glamour, Men's Health, Christian Science Monitor and US Weekly Magazine. She's is the bestselling, award-winning author of 12 books, including SINGLE-MINDED (A romantic comedy), STOP GETTING DUMPED!, FIFTEEN MINUTES OF SHAME (a romantic comedy), HOW TO DATE LIKE A GROWN-UP, SOUTHERN FRIED FARCE, BEAUTY, IS HE CHEATING, IS SHE CHEATING?, and POP MUSIC. Hang out with Lisa at LisaDailyBooks.com