Heated Rivalry writer Rachel Reid says getting free desserts in eating places, particularly together with her children, is among the finest perks of fame.
“Dairy Queen has little ice cream cakes, and somebody brought over a tray of them for my whole family. And that was the first time my kids were like, this is great,” Reid advised The Hollywood Reporter’s Women in Entertainment Canada occasion in Toronto on Thursday.
Her sudden fame for penning the Heated Rivalry ebook sequence that has been tailored into the favored Crave and HBO Max romance drama about homosexual hockey gamers has additionally prolonged to when she leaves the home. “It’s crazy. Authors aren’t supposed to be recognized on the street. Actors, this is what they want. I’ve been getting definitely more attention than I thought I would. I like some of it,” Reid revealed.
Her fame might solely develop with the second season of the Heated Rivalry TV sequence, which Reid teased forward of the 2027 premiere. “I’m excited for Troy and Harris. Can I say that?” Reid blurted out as she pointed to hockey participant Troy Barrett and Harris Drover, his love curiosity, who could have raised profiles within the subsequent cycle of the queer TV romancer.
The Heated Rivalry TV sequence success, in addition to seeing Reid’s books translated into 35 languages worldwide, has additionally allowed the stigma round romance novels, particularly with homosexual storylines, to fall by the wayside. “I personally don’t have to defend what I write about anymore, which is a great feeling. Now I can say I wrote Heated Rivalry and people are very familiar with it. That’s really nice,” she mentioned.
One other revelation: the success of the book-to-screen adaptation on HBO Max and elsewhere internationally didn’t shock Reid. “I felt when visiting the set I was the only person who understood what was going to happen. Early on, I was, this is going to be huge. I expected Connor and Hudson’s lives to get very different, for the whole world to fall in love with them,” she added throughout a dialog on the WIE Canada occasion with Jacob Tierney, who created, wrote and directed the homosexual hockey TV drama.
Heated Rivalry is a part of the ebook writer’s Sport Changer sequence, which follows the steamy romance between Shane Hollander and Ilya Rozanov, performed within the Heated Rivalry drama by Hudson Williams and Connor Storrie, respectively. Fame for Reid does have its downsides, nonetheless.
“I have some social anxiety that I didn’t have before. It’s the worry of being video recorded. I’m always worried about being secretly filmed or recorded. I’m probably being paranoid for no reason,” she volunteered. Getting off social media has helped tame that anxiousness, Reid insisted, although Instagram stays her go-to platform.
“The solution is I’m not there anymore. It’s pretty easy to walk away from,” she defined. Reid added a brand new problem could also be writing books exterior of the game of hockey, and even the romance style, whether or not that’s a darkish comedy or a screenplay. “I’d like to show myself that I can,” she insisted.
However wherever her pen takes her, Reid mentioned characters and their feelings will stay the foundations of her work. “The most important thing is nailing the character,” she mentioned with a double entendre about her Heated Rivalry books, the place characters bounce out and in of beds.
Reid might be publishing her seventh ebook, Unmatched, within the Sport Changers sequence in June 2027.
