The best-selling author of the Game Changers novels that launched Heated Rivalry into the television sensation it is today shared an unfortunate update on the franchise's next chapter. Rachel Reid posted a video on her Instagram account announcing the delay of Unrivaled, the upcoming seventh and final book in the hockey romance series. However, it's for an understandable reason.
Originally scheduled for release in September 2026, Reid revealed Unrivaled will now hit bookshelves on June 1, 2027. The author, who previously opened up about her Parkinson's disease diagnosis, revealed that her symptoms have been challenging to navigate while writing the highly anticipated next book, along with a newly busy schedule that comes on the heels of Heated Rivalry's success. Both her publisher and fans are fully backing up her decision to push the release.
Reid explained in the video that on top of lacking quality time to write with a jam-packed schedule, her symptoms have also had a hand in slowing down the writing process: "I think when good things happen, sometimes the universe hands you some worse stuff to balance it out. For me, that’s been that my Parkinson’s symptoms have gotten a bit worse, and it’s made it difficult physically to write."
Heated Rivalry author teases surprise announcements for fans
While it's natural for Heated Rivalry fans to be disappointed about this delay for the franchise, since we were hoping to get a solid dose of Shane and Ilya before season 2 premieres (likely next spring), Reid's health is of course of the utmost importance. She promised fans that Unrivaled being delayed will make it a "much better book" since she will have a longer amount of time to work on it rather than rushing to meet a tough deadline for publishing later this year.
Apart from teasing that the book will be worth the wait (as if we didn't already know that!), Reid also offered some interesting teases that had fans wondering what could be in the works to hold us over. Toward the end of her announcement video, Reid said that to "maybe soften the blow a little, later this week, there's going to be some announcements made about some things that I think that people have been hoping for." Hmmm... Things that we have been hoping for, you say?
Heated Rivalry fans have been admittedly hoping for a lot of things since the series blew up at the end of last year, but none more so than more episodes. While season 2 is confirmed and in the works, there are some fans hoping that a bonus episode based on Reid's story My Dinner with Hayden will be filmed and released ahead of the official season 2 release. However, it seems unlikely that that's what she would be teasing in this video, but you never know.
In the book realm of it all, fans have been hoping for media tie-in covers of the Heated Rivalry and The Long Game books with Hudson Williams and Connor Storrie in character. We could definitely be getting the announcement of a new Heated Rivalry book edition, but The Long Game would probably be reserved for closer to season 2's release. The publisher could also be releasing a new edition of Game Changer featuring François Arnaud and Robbie G.K. on the cover.
But the wish list isn't over yet! Diehard fans have also been keeping their fingers crossed for the audiobooks to be re-recorded with Williams and Storrie reading Shane and Ilya's dialogue and perspectives. Could that be in the cards given the increasingly busy schedules of the breakout actors? We'll have to wait and see what these announcements end up giving to fans in the absence of Unrivaled's release later this year. Keep your fingers crossed for some exciting news!