When routine driven box office assistant Samantha Smith meets the stars of ‘Skating on Broadway’ her life is turned upside down. Immediately attracted to the infamous lead skater Jimmy Lloyd, Samantha does her best to deny her feelings. But when all you can do is burst out laughing and hyperventilate every time you’re under pressure, keeping things under wraps is a hard task. When the future of her beloved Civic Hall is threatened Samantha must rise to the challenge to ensure its survival. Constantly scrutinised and criticised by her zany sister Cleo and her brogue wearing boyfriend Jeremy, can Samantha save her job, save the Civic Hall and stop her panic attacks just long enough to give her away her heart

Breaking the Ice is a book by award winning writer Mandy Baggot. I wasn’t sure about this book before I read it. I hadn’t heard of Mandy before (sorry Mandy) and I had noticed on twitter that someone had tweeted a link to the book as it was free on Kobo that day. I never find the special offers or free books on Kobo for the type of books I read so I went straight in and got it. Usually I do not read a book on a whim, someone I have similar tastes as will recommend it or I will have read about it on another blog but this was just a reflex to seeing the word FREE lol.

Anyway I settled down to read it, keeping an open mind. Well I have to admit, it put a smile on my face :D. Its a really lovely story. Sometimes you just need to sit down and read a romance. I said it recently when writing about something else, you often don’t realise you miss it until you are right back in the middle of it again.

We follow the story of Samantha Smith the shy and retiring box office clerk at the Civic centre, who lets be honest basically runs the place. She meets the star of the ice show ‘Skating on Broadway’, Jimmy Lloyd, who is instantly drawn to her. Only she doesn’t see it. She is chronically shy, has panic attics and absolutely no self esteem. When she learns her beloved civic centre is to close they work together to try and save it. While the pair work together and he breaks down her defenses we learn all is not rosy in jimmy’s life either – will Samantha be able to help him fight his own demons?

Mandy does a great job of making us feel everything that’s going on in Breaking the Ice. She brings us deep into the story and we laugh when they laugh, blush with embarrassment and feel the pain when things don’t go exactly right. I read this story in less than a day, you just don’t feel the time going. The only thing that disappointed me was that it had to end. The sign of a good book!

Mandy shows us that no matter who we are, what we do or whatever our problems are that having faith and believing in yourself really is half the battle!