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Verdict: A well-liked rivals-to-lovers curling romance with real craft in its sports detail and a satisfying redemption arc, undercut in its first quarter by a lead whose hostility tests reader patience before she earns her turn.
Best for: Readers who want a rivals-to-lovers sports romance built on a niche sport rendered with real specificity, a slow-to-earn character arc, and a mystery about the heroine’s past that pays off rather than a fast, frictionless burn.
Heat level: ★★★★☆ (4/5 — described as “crisp, detailed, and ardent” by one detailed reviewer, though no romance.io listing was found to confirm a band)
Rating: ★★★★☆ (3.8/5 — a 3.97 Goodreads average across 892 ratings, tempered by a B grade from a major trade review site that flags a rough opening act)
Tropes: Rivals-to-lovers, sports romance, curling romance, grumpy-sunshine, workplace/professional-access proximity, redemption arc, standalone, hidden-past mystery.
Fire & Ice by Rachel Spangler is a standalone contemporary sports romance from Bywater Books that pairs a disgraced sports reporter demoted to covering curling with the skip of America’s second-ranked curling team who refuses to let her stay dismissive of the sport — or of herself.
The book holds a 3.97 average across 892 Goodreads ratings and 119 written reviews, and a B grade from Smart Bitches, Trashy Books, one of the genre’s most-read trade review sites. That’s a well-liked book by any measure, and the reviews explain the shape of the enthusiasm: near-unanimous praise for the sports detail and the eventual chemistry, against a real, specifically-named complaint about how hostile the lead is before she turns. Both halves are worth understanding before you start.
What Is Fire & Ice About?
Fire & Ice sits in sports romance territory, but it runs its tension through a rivals-to-lovers engine rather than a locker-room proximity setup: Max Lauren is the reporter forced to cover a sport she holds in contempt, and Callie Mulligan is the athlete who has to win her over before she can get the media coverage her team needs. That arrangement puts professional obligation and personal pride on opposite sides of the same relationship from page one.
Max is introduced through what she’s lost: “a mistake that shattered her pride, her heart, and her career in one fell swoop,” left deliberately vague by reviewers who note the full explanation doesn’t arrive until deep into the book. Callie is introduced through what she refuses to do — join her teammates in freezing Max out, choosing instead to mentor a reporter who’s openly mocking her sport. The book is a genuine rivals-to-lovers arc built on one woman’s contempt thawing against another’s patience.
What Makes This Rivals-to-Lovers Sports Romance Work
- Curling rendered by someone who did the work: Multiple reviewers single out how the sport’s detail is folded into the story “without boring info dumps,” and one independent audiobook review calls difficult subject matter “executed well.”
- A genuinely earned rivals-to-lovers turn: One reviewer notes the chemistry doesn’t take long to escalate once it starts, and Callie’s patience in the face of Max’s hostility is repeatedly credited as the thing that makes the turn believable rather than sudden.
- A mystery that pays off: Max’s professional scandal is withheld until roughly the book’s midpoint, and reviewers treat the reveal as a genuine payoff rather than a stalling tactic.
- Buffalo as a real place, not scenery: An independent audiobook review specifically praises the authenticity of the Buffalo setting, calling out the “Buffa-love” as feeling genuine rather than stereotypical.
- A small, specific bonding scene reviewers remember: A team scene built around poutine is singled out by name as “freaking adorable” — the kind of detail that shows up when multiple reviewers are independently charmed by the same beat.
Book Synopsis
Max Lauren used to have a career worth bragging about. A single mistake — one she trusted the wrong person over — cost her that career, her pride, and the version of herself she used to recognize. What she has left is a beat nobody wants: covering curling, a sport she’s already decided is beneath her, for a newspaper that’s clearly punishing her by giving it to her.
Callie Mulligan doesn’t have the luxury of Max’s contempt. She’s the skip of America’s second-ranked curling team, working multiple jobs to fund an Olympic dream nobody outside the sport takes seriously, and Max’s coverage — dismissive, mocking, openly bored — is exactly the kind of attention that could sink her team’s chance at real recognition. She could freeze Max out along with the rest of her teammates. She chooses, instead, to try to make her understand.
What starts as professional obligation on both sides becomes something neither expects: Max’s disdain for the sport starts cracking under Callie’s patience, and Callie’s guarded optimism starts bending toward a reporter she has every reason not to trust. Neither woman is telling the other the whole truth about what she’s protecting, and the season only has so much time left before both of their careers — and whatever this has become — are decided.
My Review
The strongest thing Fire & Ice has going for it is specificity, and it shows up in two places reviewers keep returning to independently: the curling itself, and the city it’s set in. Multiple accounts praise how the sport’s rules and strategy are folded into the story “without boring info dumps,” and a separate audiobook review calls out the Buffalo setting by name as feeling authentic rather than decorative. That’s two different kinds of research paying off in the same book, which is a harder trick than it sounds.
The second real strength is Callie, who draws consistent, near-unanimous praise across every account located for this review — patient, hardworking, “emotionally mature” by one description, and the character reviewers credit with making Max’s turn believable rather than abrupt. The eventual chemistry between the two is described as escalating quickly once it starts, which reviewers treat as earned rather than rushed, because of the groundwork Callie does first.
Where the book runs into real trouble is Max, and this is the one complaint that shows up with genuine specificity rather than as a vague quibble. One detailed review calls early-book Max “a world-class asshole,” notes the book was “pretty easy to put down in the first quarter” as a direct result, and flags that the explanation for her behavior — the scandal that shattered her career — doesn’t arrive until deep into the story. A second, gentler version of the same complaint calls her early behavior merely “cringe-worthy” rather than a dealbreaker. Neither reviewer who raises it stops recommending the book; both frame it as a hurdle the book clears rather than one it trips on.
One expectation worth resetting: this isn’t a rivals-to-lovers book where the friction is playful from the start. Max’s hostility toward Callie and her sport reads as genuinely unpleasant for a real stretch of pages, by more than one account, before the book earns its turn. If you need your grumpy lead to be lovable from page one, budget for some patience here; if you’re willing to sit with real unlikability on the way to a real redemption arc, the payoff is the thing every reviewer located agrees on.
My honest note: A well-researched, well-liked rivals-to-lovers sports romance that earns its ending, and asks you to get through a genuinely hostile opening act to reach it. If Max’s early behavior would sour the whole book for you, that risk is real and named by more than one reviewer; if you can trust the redemption arc to land, the curling, the setting, and the payoff are worth the patience.
| Element | In Fire & Ice |
|---|---|
| Central relationship | Max Lauren & Callie Mulligan — disgraced sports reporter and elite curling skip, rivals-to-lovers |
| Core tropes | Rivals-to-lovers, sports romance, curling romance, grumpy-sunshine, professional-access proximity, redemption arc |
| Setting | Contemporary Buffalo, New York, centered on America’s second-ranked competitive curling team |
| Heat level | Described as “crisp, detailed, and ardent” by one detailed reviewer; no romance.io listing found to confirm a band |
| Series | Standalone — no reviewer flags a cliffhanger or unresolved arc |
| Content notes | A withheld professional scandal in Max’s backstory (one trade review tags it “Cheating,” though no reviewer describes infidelity between the leads), sustained hostility from Max toward Callie in the first act, explicit sexual content |
How Spicy Is Fire & Ice?
No romance.io listing turned up for this book during this research pass, so there’s no numeric band to cite — worth naming as a gap rather than papering over with a guess. What’s available instead is reviewer testimony: one detailed review describes the writing as “crisp, detailed, and ardent,” with particular praise for sex scenes that incorporate curling terminology, which at least two independent reviewers treat as a real strength rather than a footnote.
No reviewer flags anything beyond conventional open-door content — no kink specifics, no consent question, no fade-to-black stretch. A trade review does tag the book with a “Cheating” content note, but nothing in the reviews located describes infidelity between Max and Callie; the label most plausibly points at the withheld professional scandal in Max’s backstory rather than anything between the leads, and that ambiguity is worth flagging rather than resolving with a guess. If you want a similar heat level in a similar sapphic sports-romance package where the band is also undocumented on romance.io, The Long Shot is worth a look.
Who Should Read This Book?
You’ll likely love it if: you want a rivals-to-lovers arc with real teeth rather than manufactured friction, you enjoy a niche sport rendered with genuine research and specificity, you like a hidden-past mystery that pays off rather than stalls, and you’re willing to sit with a genuinely unlikable lead for a real stretch before her turn.
You may want to skip it if: a hostile, dismissive lead in the opening act is a dealbreaker for you regardless of the eventual payoff, you want the central mystery resolved earlier than the book’s midpoint, or you’re looking for a low-conflict, low-friction romance from the start.
In short: a well-liked rivals-to-lovers sports romance whose real strength is the redemption arc it earns, at the cost of a first act that tests your patience with its lead.
What Readers Are Actually Saying (September 2026)
This book has a real, if modest, discourse trail behind it — a rarer thing on this site than the volume of Goodreads ratings alone would suggest. Four independent review sources turned up in this research pass: Smart Bitches, Trashy Books (a major trade site), The Lesbian Review, The Lesbian 52, and an independent audiobook review blog. No dedicated Reddit thread or organized BookTok activity was located, worth naming as a finding rather than a gap papered over — but the trade and blog coverage here is denser than most books in this batch have carried, five years after the book’s October 2019 release.
Why readers love it (according to the discourse): Callie is the character every account praises without reservation — patient, hardworking, “emotionally mature,” and credited by name as the reason Max’s turn feels earned rather than sudden. The curling detail draws specific, independent praise across multiple reviews for avoiding “boring info dumps,” and a separate audiobook review singles out the Buffalo setting as authentic. A team bonding scene built around poutine is independently called “freaking adorable” by name — the kind of specific beat that shows up when reviewers are genuinely charmed rather than just being polite.
What readers argue about and complain about: Max’s early hostility is the dominant and most specific complaint, and it comes with real texture: one detailed review calls her “a world-class asshole” in the opening chapters and says the book was “pretty easy to put down in the first quarter” as a direct result. A second, gentler account calls the same behavior merely “cringe-worthy.” Both reviewers who raise it still recommend the book and credit its eventual payoff — this reads as a real hurdle rather than a fatal flaw, but it is genuinely the first thing multiple accounts mention.
Prefer audio? There’s an audiobook edition, narrated by Ann Etter, running 9 hours and 10 minutes — an independent audiobook review puts it at 4.5 of 5 with specific praise for how the production handles the Buffalo setting. A Libro.fm listing search turned up a possible match, but a robots-blocked fetch on the individual audiobook page meant the author couldn’t be independently confirmed on it, so no Libro.fm link is included here.
The standalone question worth asking first: No reviewer located describes a cliffhanger or an unresolved arc, and the redemption-arc structure — a mystery introduced early and resolved by the book’s back half — points toward a complete, closed story, though no source used the words “HEA” or “HFN” by name. The book is sold directly through Bywater Books’ own store as an ebook, which is incompatible with Kindle Unlimited’s requirement of exclusive Amazon distribution — a confident “no” on KU by the same logic used elsewhere in this batch.
Frequently Asked Questions
Does Fire & Ice end on a cliffhanger?
No reviewer found in this research describes a cliffhanger or an unresolved arc. It’s a standalone, and the central mystery around Max’s past resolves within the book.
How spicy is Fire & Ice?
No romance.io listing was found to confirm a numeric band. One detailed reviewer describes the writing as “crisp, detailed, and ardent,” with sex scenes that incorporate curling terminology — a strong account, though not an independently confirmed consensus.
Is Fire & Ice part of a series?
No. It’s a standalone from Bywater Books with no sequel or connected books located in this research.
Is Max’s behavior in the first act really that bad?
By more than one account, yes for a real stretch of pages — one reviewer calls her “a world-class asshole” early on and says the book was easy to put down in the first quarter. Both reviewers who raise this still recommend the book and describe her eventual arc as earning the turn.
Is there an audiobook of Fire & Ice?
Yes — narrated by Ann Etter, running 9 hours and 10 minutes, independently reviewed at 4.5 of 5 stars. A Libro.fm listing was located but could not be independently verified during this research pass.
Is Fire & Ice available on Kindle Unlimited?
No. It’s sold directly through the publisher’s own store as an ebook, which is incompatible with Kindle Unlimited’s exclusivity requirement.
If You Loved Fire & Ice, Read These Next
For another sapphic sports romance where the heat level is reader-described rather than romance.io-confirmed, The Long Shot runs a comparable dynamic through golf rather than curling. For another rivals-to-lovers engine doing the heavy lifting in a sports setting, Set Point pairs professional rivals under one roof. And for a redemption-arc lead whose past complicates the present, Stick Around is worth a look for its own off-limits professional-access setup.
For more in this register, browse our complete sapphic sports romance guide or the full Book Reviews collection.
The Bottom Line
Fire & Ice earns its 3.97 Goodreads average and its B grade from Smart Bitches, Trashy Books through real strengths: curling detail multiple reviewers praise for avoiding info-dumps, a Buffalo setting an independent audiobook review calls genuinely authentic, and a Callie Mulligan every single account locates as the book’s clear favorite. It also asks you to get through a first act where Max is, by more than one account, genuinely hard to like — “a world-class asshole” in one reviewer’s words — before the redemption arc pays off. Whether that trade works for you depends on how much patience you bring to a slow-to-earn lead, but as a researched, well-liked rivals-to-lovers sports romance, it delivers exactly what its fans say it does. Check Fire & Ice on Amazon →
The Eikna Overall Ranking
On the Eikna scale, Fire & Ice ranks as a well-researched, well-liked rivals-to-lovers curling romance — genuinely specific in its sports and setting detail, held back by a lead whose hostility tests patience before she earns her arc, and best approached for the redemption story and the curling world rather than for an easy-going first act.
The Evidence Scorecard
Overall ★★★★☆ 3.8/5
- ✓ 3.97 average across 892 Goodreads ratings and 119 written reviews
- ✓ B grade from Smart Bitches, Trashy Books, a major trade site
- ✓ Curling detail and the Buffalo setting carry consistent praise
- ✓ Max’s hostile first act is the recurring, named complaint
Romance ★★★★☆ 4/5
- ✓ Rivals-to-lovers turn described as escalating quickly once earned
- ✓ Callie’s patience credited as what makes the turn believable
- ✓ Genuine hostility in the early chapters, not manufactured friction
- ✓ At least one reviewer found the slow start nearly a dealbreaker
Characters ★★★★☆ 3.8/5
- ✓ Callie praised without reservation across every account located
- ✓ Max’s growth arc independently called earned by two reviewers
- ✓ Early Max described as “a world-class asshole” by one detailed review
- ✓ A second reviewer calls the same behavior merely “cringe-worthy”
Writing ★★★★☆ 4.1/5
- ✓ Curling strategy folded in “without boring info dumps”
- ✓ Buffalo setting independently called authentic, not decorative
- ✓ Prose described as “crisp, detailed, and ardent” by one reviewer
- ✓ No independent second opinion located on line-level craft specifically
Emotional Impact ★★★★☆ 3.9/5
- ✓ Withheld scandal reveal treated as a genuine payoff, not a stall
- ✓ Team bonding scene independently called “freaking adorable”
- ✓ Redemption arc for Max is the throughline reviewers return to
- ✓ Emotional payoff depends on tolerating a rough first act to reach it
Heat Level ★★★★☆ 4/5
- ✓ Described as “crisp, detailed, and ardent” by one detailed reviewer
- ✓ Sex scenes reported to incorporate curling terminology
- ✓ No romance.io listing found to independently confirm a band
- ✓ Only one detailed account located — treat as reported, not consensus
Ending ★★★★☆ 4/5
- ✓ No reviewer located describes a cliffhanger
- ✓ Central mystery around Max’s past resolves within the book
- ✓ Standalone with no sequel or series entanglement found
- ✓ No source uses the words “HEA” or “HFN” explicitly
Re-read Value ★★★★☆ 3.7/5
- ✓ Curling world and Buffalo setting give it real atmosphere
- ✓ Independently reviewed audiobook offers a strong second-pass format
- ✓ Redemption-arc structure rewards a second read for the reveal’s setup
- ✓ Max’s rough first act may discourage some readers from a re-read
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