Icebreaker by Hannah Grace | Audiobook Review • Ana's Attic Book Blog

Icebreaker: A Novel by Hannah Grace

Narrated by Elizabeth Louise and Tim Paige

1st in a series of standalones. New Adult Romance.

I grew up figure skating. I wanted to go to the Olympics and even went to a figure skating sleepaway camp where the boys were hockey players. I have smelled those guys, and believe me, it’s not sexy. So honestly, hockey romances aren’t my favorite. But a figure skater? Yesssss, I can read that. I’ve been seeing Icebreaker by Hannah Grace everywhere for well over a year and saw it has over 70,000 ratings averaging 4.4. So I decided it was time to check it out.

My verdict? I am WAY too old for this, and it was WAY too long.

The actual bones of the story are good: Olympic hopeful pair figure skater Anastasia hates hockey players. But she is forced to share a rink with them when a prank shuts down one of the rinks. Nate is the captain of the hockey team who loves to get under her skin. She has an emotionally abusive skating partner who she thinks is her friend. When he is injured, Nate steps in and they go from frenemies to lovers. (Reminds me of the 1992 movie The Cutting Edge).

It took 13 and a half hours to tell that story. Instead of a little more plot, we have them drinking and fucking every other page. I get it’s for Gen Z, but I just expected so much more for how popular it is. It feels like an indie book from 2012 by an author who didn’t have the resources we have today.

There were moments I loved, especially the soft moments of everyday affection between the couple and I loved the figure skating but I felt like one-third of the book was devoted to side characters, one-third to sex, and the rest to the story.

“You have no idea, do you? The lengths I’d go to if you’d let me. What I’d do to make you happy.”

Likes:

The figure skating.
The small moments of affection.
The banter.
I loved the guys’ group texts.
Diversity and representation.
Adopted Rep.
Therapy and mental health were handled well.
Nate was so sweet yet so hot when needed.
Great friend group.

Dislikes:

Waaay too long for the story.
Immature writing and characters.
Too many side characters.
I didn’t love the heroine.
There was a lot of sex, that’s not normally a dislike for me, but it got boring. The sex was vanilla and was every other scene.

The Narration:

Elizabeth Louise and Tim Paige did a great job of bringing the characters to life. It was well-cast and I think it added to my enjoyment of the story.

The Down & Dirty (TLDR):

Icebreaker by Hannah Grace just wasn’t for me, nor am I its target demographic. I can see why young women, especially those just getting into romance loved it, but for me, it was very immature, waaaay too long and there just wasn’t enough plot to fill this 13.5 hour audiobook. But I think if you are young and really enjoy the New Adult genre, you’ll enjoy this way more than I did.