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Watch You Had Me at Hockey with Rachel Reid, Ngozi Ukazu, Emily Rath, Bal Khabra, Stephanie Archer, & Kate Cochrane from Bookcon 2026!

Ice has never been hotter, as the authors of Heated Rivalry; Check, Please; Pucking Around; Collide; Behind the Net; and Wake Up, Nat and Darcy attested at BookCon, where Popverse was filming their panel

Grant DeArmitt
News by Grant DeArmitt, Staff Writer
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Here's something the casuals out there might not already know: fans who discovered Heated Rivalry on HBO are actually latecomers to the already blossoming hockey romance subgenre. Want proof? Then you need to look no further than BookCon 2026, where some of the biggest names in the literary game assembled for an incredible panel all about the field - You Had Me at Hockey.

Specifically, attendees were Heated Rivalry author Rachel Reid; Check, Please author Ngozi Ukazu; Pucking Around author Emily Rath; Collide author Bal Khabra; Behind the Net author Stephanie Archer; and Wake Up, Nat and Darcy author Kate Cochran. And oh yeah, Popverse was also there too - sitting up in the proverbial VIP box to watch (and film!) the excitement.

This is one of the many Bookcon 2026 panels Popverse filmed at New York City's Javits on the Hudson. Consult our Bookcon 2026 panel hub for a list of all of the panels we have available, and what's left to be released.

Watch You Had Me at Hockey: A Look at One of Sports Romance's Hottest Genres with Emily Rath, Rachel Reid, Ngozi Ukazu, Bal Khabra, Stephanie Archer, and Kate Cochrane now:

Having trouble viewing this video? Read our streaming/VOD FAQ to find the answers you need. Want more? Here's our expansive Popverse panel video hub with years of panels from New York Comic Con, C2E2, Emerald City Comic Con, and more.

If you've enjoyed this coverage, please give Popverse a shoutout by tagging us @popversesays on X/Twitter, Instagram, BlueSky, or Facebook.   

Here's a list of all the major upcoming prose novels in our favorite genres.

 

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Grant DeArmitt

Grant DeArmitt: Grant DeArmitt (he/him) likes horror, comics, and the unholy union of the two. In the past, and despite their better judgment, he has written for Nightmare on Film Street and Newsarama. He lives in Brooklyn with his partner, Kingsley, and corgi, Legs.

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