If you're a fan of sports romance, then I highly recommend the book Collide. This hockey romance novel combines the grumpy/sunshine and enemies to lovers tropes seamlessly, creating a truly captivating read. The author, Bal Khabra, has crafted a realistic and organic storyline featuring well-developed characters that you can't help but cheer for from the start. Plus, the witty banter throughout the book only adds to its charm. What impressed me the most was the depth of the book, which was unexpected! I give Collide a 5-star rating and can't wait to see what Bal Khabra has in store for us in the future!

Summer Preston has her life planned out. Next steps involve completing her thesis in sports psychology. When her advisor issues an ultimatum, Summer is forced to work with hockey captain Aiden Crawford. Summer hates hockey! As these two get to know one another, attraction blooms; but can Summer work through her personal issues with hockey and find something real with Aiden?

An enemies-to-lovers romantic dramedy with hockey. Explicit content. Real characters with slightly unrealistic situations. First in a series - look forwarding to reading about Eli.

Summer Preston hates hockey, especially hockey players, and her professor has just made avoiding all of the above very difficult by assigning her to Dalton University’s ice hockey team for her assignment. In walks the captain, Aidan Crawford, and they become instant enemies. Thrust together, Aidan and Summer work through their angst and quickly move from enemies to lovers.

You know, I have read a lot of hockey romances, and this one may be my favorite so far. The prose is clear and the plot makes sense, which sounds silly to say, but sometimes I feel like these books are just thrown together to connect sex scenes. The two main characters are very well-drawn and both have lives that evolve and the characters grow. It is a diverse group of students involved and I can see the series being a hit with further stories. I honestly feel like this novel skips a lot of the cheesy tropes that seem to occur in these sorts of stories, so it was refreshing to read it. And goodness - this book is spicy - be prepared! I really enjoyed reading “Collide,” and will definitely read the next installment.

Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for this ARC.

DNF. Collide was so. SLOW. I felt like I read so much at a time only to realize that I had only read about ten pages and the plot had gone almost nowhere. And the book isn't that long, it's not dense on plot, it. just. DRAGS. And as hard as I tried not to, there were too many parallels to Icebreaker by Hannah Grace. I'm not saying that the books are the same, but a lot of beats were too familiar:

-- An out of control party leads to campus damage and the team captain takes the fall for it, which leads to...
-- The captain having to work closely with a female student (not an athlete this time) who wants nothing to do with him, leading to...
-- A snarky, enemies-to-friends-to-lovers situationship because they are both too busy for committed, steady relationships.
-- The FMC has a mean male frenemy who negs her to make her feel like she's not good enough. The MMC sees this while the FMC shrugs it off and insists that said friend just wants 'what's best for her.' The MMC tries to solve the issue himself, only for the male frenemy to make things worse for them. I was unsatisfied with how that resolved in Icebreaker, and finding out HOW it resolves in Collide might be the only thing that drives me to finish this book.

I loved this book, like a lot.
And I loved Aiden even more!! He just made my favorite book boyfriend list.

This book will make all your hockey romance dreams come true! 🏒

The banter between Summer and Aiden was amazing and so dang entertaining! Add in the teasing and joking around with all the other hockey players and I couldn’t stop laughing!
Aiden was one of the most thoughtful and caring MMC I’ve ever encountered and he literally had me swooning with every sweet thing he did. He literally tried to make her homemade chai and wanted to oil her hair 🥹 He had golden retriever energy with daddy bedroom vibes 🥵
I loved Summer’s tough exterior and how hard she tried to resist falling for him. She was strong and independent and *thought* she knew what she wanted in life so watching her walls crumble down for Aiden was that much more satisfying!

The chemistry between the two characters was amazing, which made for the spiciest of spice!

🏒 Hockey romance
❤️ He falls first
😂 Funny
🌶️🌶️
🤍 Forced proximity
☀️ Grumpy FMC/Sunshine MMC

I loved the author’s writing style. I ended up reading it in less than 24 hours because I could not get enough of the characters and storyline! I hope she ends up writing a book for every single supporting character (except Donny, we hate Donny 🙄) in this series cause I will happily read them all!

And can we talk about the quotes 🙌🏼😍
“I love you, like a lot.”
“I forgot how much you feel like home.”
“Summer is my sun, and I’m the simple planet revolving in her orbit.”

Big thank you to NetGalley and Bloomsbury for the ARC!

#Collide #NetGalley

if you’re looking for a romance with a strong and feisty female lead, a ‘in a world of boys he’s a gentleman’ coded mmc and found family and ride or die friendships that will keep you both entertained and tug at your heartstrings — then this is the book for you !!

the romance between summer and aiden was so sweet and hot to the point that i couldn’t decide whether i was sweating because of the spice or giggling at the banter.

i can’t wait to read the next books in this series and this will definitely be a favourite of the year for me!

4🌟
2.5/5🌶
I loved this it was so cute and fun!
➳Tropes
- Forced Proximity
- Guy falls first
- She hates him at first
- Kind of a friends with benefits (only for a little bit)
➳Plot
Summer has to do a journaling thing to get her PHD and she's assigned to do it on hockey. She doesn't want to do her project on hockey especially not with Aiden Crawford. It goes from there and they're forced to spend time together.
➳Characters
Summer- I loved her she's a stubborn queen who's very driven and knows what she wants.
Aidan- Gave hardcore Nate Hawkins from icebreaker. Pretty average hockey player in a sports romance.
➳Writing
The writing was so easy to fly through and it had some amazing quotes.

One word to describe this is adorable.

Summer Preston is a grumpy psych student who <i>loathes</i> hockey players. Enter golden retriever Aidan Crawford, the captain of their college hockey team. Forced to work together and spend time together, the two slowly start to realize they might be perfect for each other.

There's not too much plot here, so if you don't like books with pure romance this isn't the book for you. I thought Aidan and Sumer balanced each other out so well, they are very cute together. This book is just vibes and fluff at the end of the day. The supporting characters are also so sweet and funny and I hope we get books for all of them.

The found family trope is found here too and you know I'm a sucker for that trope. It's the #1 be all trope.

This book hooked me in from the first chapter. I loved the character development and how the story progressed.

This was an unexpected joy!! I originally DNF'd this because I just wasn't vibing with the characters but I'm so glad I picked it up again. I love a hockey romance and this male main character was an utter delight. If you want "he fell first" this is the book for you. It reminded me a lot of The Deal by Elle Kennedy which is one of my faves, though Collide is a little less heavy thematically. The sex scenes were hot and abundant. Highly recommend!

This one hit the mark… hard

The story dragged on and felt like it could’ve ended within 30% in. There were a LOT of similarities of icebreaker, wildfire, and the deal, that it felt like one giant blur of them mixed up and the results were not amazing.

The characters were insufferable and i genuinely could not stand reading them. Summer kept making my eye twitch every 30 seconds.

The “problems” in the story were not even problems. the daddy issues in this book were identical to wildfire that i wanted to bang my head. “my daddy doesn’t spend enough time with me but gives me money” boohoo

I just felt like there was no originality with the storyline and wish that it felt like the author didn’t take bits and pieces from every other hockey romance book.

also the timeline of this book was completely chaotic and i had no sense of time while reading this. the chapters just didn’t really flow well yk?

I wanted to read this just for the vibes but they were off and i just couldn’t get into. It took everything in me not to dnf the book even though the story was just dragging on and on.

4 stars, 7.00 on CAWPILE

Thank you to Berkley and NetGalley for an ebook in exchange for an honest review!

At first, I wasn't sure. Summer irritated me in the beginning and while I understood her daddy issues, I thought she was a bit too harsh, however after the first 25%, I warmed up to her much more.

The banter between her and Aiden was great. They had a great back and forth, even when Aiden was being cheesy af. I had to roll my eyes but I wasn't mad about rolling my eyes, if that makes any sense at all.

Speaking of Aiden, he was adorable. Perhaps a bit too perfect but I had a good time. His relationship with his team was fun and the other players seem like they would be interesting to get more books from their perspectives AHEM.

There wasn't really all that much of a plot plot. It was just vibes and a nice slice of romance. I did feel like the book was slightly too long and that the friendships and everything blossomed very quickly. Plus there were times where a scene would end off on a moment that I thought would be explored further only for a time jump to happen, which was jarring at times.

Over all fun and cute!

This was a fun book, the college hockey vibes were great. Aiden was the sweetest, caring, unproblematic mmc and deserves nothing but good things. I also liked Summer(fmc) for the most part at times, she was a little annoying but overall cool. The hockey part wasn't too much, which I liked, and I loved the focus on the characters and romance. The romance was really cute, I liked that Summer was the grumpy character while Aiden fell first and was really into her. Some parts of the book were very long and there was a lot of back and forth, but overall, I think this was good. If you like icebreaker or the deal you should read this one!

Read if you like:
- College hockey romance
- Found family
- Spicy scenes
- Found family
- He falls first
- Bipoc fm

This book was kinda like if the Goal by Elle Kennedy and icebreaker had a child.
It was a college hokey romance book with all the angst and drama that comes along with it. It was a fun read. Thought I didn’t LOVE our main female protagonist. However I LOVED the side characters and I can see this becoming a great series.
Also this cover is stunning.

literally you can throw any hockey romance my way and i will only devour it! i loved this one so much and could not put down! i enjoyed the writing and the connection between all the characters. i need an aiden in real life OMG. i’m so happy this was only the first in the series as i will def be reading the rest!

Summer is doing her thesis on burnout in athletes and is forced to use the men's hockey captain, Aiden, as her part of her project. Aiden is in hot water with his coach, so he has no choice but to do whatever Summer wants him to do. The two are total opposites, despite being hard workers in their own way: Summer is type A and has her life totally mapped out; Aiden is easygoing and is just focusing on the days as they come. The two slowly start to form an unlikely friendship which quickly morphs into feelings, despite Summer vehemently denying it.

Bal Khabra had the makings of some juicy plot lines, but didn't really follow through with them - for example, way more could have been done with the Professor/Student relationship plotline. I think the author chose to focus on spice to the detriment of the plot, but if you're looking for more spice and less plot, this is the one for you. I can't say it stands out in a big way as far as hockey OR romances go, but it was cute. Some of the side characters were annoying and/or hard to keep track of, but Summer and Aiden's romance was sweet (and spicy). I mean, that boy fell FAST, but I don't read romances because I want reality. Overall, a solid pick for people looking for books similar to Ice Breaker.

This book was super cute and so much fun to read. I managed to finish this book in one sitting which was super exciting because I didn't put it down and just powered right on through. It was a really quick and easy read, enjoyable but not too complex. I think I liked Summer more than Aiden in the book, but their friends with benefits was super cute! I struggled a little bit with how much denial the two of them were in for the majority of the book but it was still a lot of fun getting to see them grow as characters!

For fans of Icebreaker, this book is definitely one that you'll want to pick up!

4.5 stars
Two hard-working college kids burning themselves out with their life goals and being forced to work together on a project help each other take breaks while falling in love. THIS IS MY JAM!

This was very addictive.
I love the style of writing we had because I think it matched the flow of each character and their progression so well. It was just so easy to sit down and devour this book.
I am in my sports era because this is the second hockey romance series that has made me desperate for more (THANK YOU FOR THAT SNEAK PEAK TO BOOK 2).

Our characters, Summer & Nathan, are my favourite couple.
Seeing an honest progression of feelings develop and form, even as Summer tackled her insecurities of the relationship becoming 'a relationship' and Nathan's determination that this was what he wanted and his willingness to be patient and supportive was heartwarming. Summer, being the person who called Nathan out, held him accountable and really showed him perspective on his goals and what was important to him, which was another heartwarming moment.
Their history sharing, their normalisation of consent (because consent is always sexy), and the pro-mental health representation were A+

And I won't lie, those spicy scenes were top tier, and I very much was screaming internally MANY TIMES!
I highly recommend it, and I will be a staff pick sticker this bad boy!
Also, bonus, CANADIAN AUTHOR <3

Unfortunately, I just couldn't bring myself to enjoy this book. The plot was done about 30% into the book and it just felt so aimless and random that I ended up forgetting what the plot even was...

The characters didn't help, they were infuriating and cringe, which I wouldn't mind if they were likable and we spent time with them outside of the quick romance about 15% in, but alas. They read like cardboard and I had no interest in their lives or their romance. I love me some cringe, but I wish the romance took longer to build up, as the summary implied it would.

The book would definitely benefit from being heavily condensed, as it was way too long when the meat of the "plot" was done before even hitting the halfway mark of the book. To be honest, I don't even know what the plot was supposed to be besides what the summary said.

There is nothing I love more than a grumpy/sunshine story. It was so nice to see that it was a grumpy FMC and a sunshine MMC. I thought the story was well paced and they really flushed out most characters. There were some characters that I thought were not as developed and I thought it might be because it’s part of the next novel but still, there was one character that came off as a jerk because I could not understand his motivation. It would help to at least have one scene were it describes what’s going on because it was a character that we are meant to like. Other than that the story was so fun! Other than that the story was so fun! I was kicking my feet and giggling along. I highly recommend!