Dirty On The Ice: An Age Gap MM Hockey Romance

by Ellis Rhodes

It was supposed to be one night. No names. No consequences.

Then Jett walked into the locker room and saw the stranger wearing the Captain’s 'C'.

Sam Sullivan is a ruin. Eighteen seasons have left him with a failing knee and a heart made of concrete. He has forty games to win the Cup before his body quits for good. He can’t afford distractions—especially not the rookie phenom who knows exactly what he sounds like when he comes apart.

Jett Wilder is a nervous wreck disguised as a star. The pressure is eating him alive, and Sully isn’t just his captain; he’s the only person who makes the noise in Jett's head stop.

Sully draws the Teammates. Nothing else.

But on the ice, their chemistry is lethal. Off it, the tension is a lit fuse. As the playoffs grind Sully’s body into dust, the professional distance collapses. Sully thinks he has to break Jett’s heart to save his career. He forgot that Jett isn’t looking for a savior. He’s looking for a home.

The rules say stay away. The body says otherwise.

Genres: Hockey

308 pages, Kindle Edition

First published March 6, 2026

Reviews

[Marion · Rating 1 out of 5]

No editing

This book does not appear to have been proofread by anyone. The team is at home against a rival playing away, but then they have to fly home? I like the main characters and their relationship, but I am 45% through this book and not sure I’m going to finish. There are so many continuity errors that is hard to follow. Also, it’s not very spicy; you could read it to a middle schooler and they probably would not be shocked.

[Josie]

it’s ai vomit

[Lydia · Rating 1 out of 5]

AI had to have been used to write it and the “author” must not have read what was written.

[Lara · Rating 1 out of 5]

I second the comments this book was not written by a human and no human proof read it.
The chapters are quite disconnected, significant, explained details are inconsistent (the car changing from a black Porsche to a red Ferrari)

The top in a sex scene changes in the span of a paragraph from one MC to the next! WTF?!? While putting on a condom?!?

I feel really disrespected as a reader.

I still loved the emotional concept, but I’m starting to think I will only read books stating they don’t use AI for writing and/or where they a lot of info about the others.

And this book was weirdly similar to Riley Bauer’s Fresh Ice (which had the same problems)
Ungh.

[R. Johnson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sam (Sully) Sullivan and Jett Wilder first encounter each other in a club in Cabo. Jett, a 21-year-old very gifted first round draft pick is walking through the club when he sees Sam alone and decides to sit with him, uninvited.

Sam is 36 and looking to win the Legacy Cup before he retires. He has a bad back and his right knee is shot. It's basically down to bone-on-bone. He's in so much pain, that it jumps right off the pages of this book. He and Jett are complete opposites in just about every way possible. Sam is what I would call emotionally closed off and Jett is more open. He seems like an "old soul" sometimes.

They have a one-night stand after meeting in the club and Jett leaves before Sam awakes. What neither realizes is that they are on the same hockey team, and Sam is the captain of that team.

I think that the author of this book is talented, and I enjoyed reading this story; however, the internal dialogues of Sam and Jett were more like "telling their story and not showing." I preferred it when they actually talked and interacted with each other. I would have preferred more of that.

[Elle S · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book had the potential to be good but had so many inconsistencies! For example: They kept saying how many words they said, but they never matched with the number of words actually said which was so weird because if you're going to put a number, make sure it's correct! Also, after that first game I think, Jett gets in his car to drive home, but then the same night Sully is at a hotel? Also Sully somehow managed to be 36 for over 12 months. And how did neither of them recognize each other at the bar in the beginning! Especially Jett! Like, this is the captain of your future team who has been in the league for 18 years, how do you not know what he looks like?? And how Jett waited at Sully's door for 25 minutes yet somehow only left his place 20 minutes prior? There were other inconsistencies I can't remember right now, but throughout this book I just kept wondering who the editor was and if the author even used one, since I saw all of these during my first read. If they were fixed the book would be a lot better. This makes me not want to read anything else by this author, to be honest.

[J · Rating 4 out of 5]

Something about this particular story really g0t to me and made me emotional. There's a million hockey romances out there, this one stood out to me because of Sully & Jett (btw the jersey numbers on the cover are incorrect). I liked that Sully's injury is known, it's as devastating as promised, there's no miracle recovery, but there is love and tender caring from Jett. They get their happy ending which is practical and feels well earned after Sully's struggles with it. The pace of the story, the writing style - everything works well, there's no theatrics, and I loved that Sully admits being wrong. I would have really enjoyed an epilogue of them a few years down the road, but overall this was an unexpectedly satisfying read.

[Mesha Sloss · Rating 2 out of 5]

AI Generated

Pretty sure this book was written by or heavily edited by AI. That alone made me want to stop reading on principle but I was determined to finish to sate my curiosity. Hate to admit the plot itself wasn’t half bad but the repetitive writing, sloppy mistakes, etc. gave it away big time. I mean they couldn’t even get the cover art to match the book descriptions (not even the jersey numbers are correct). I have trouble believing a human author would be ok with this. More human writing less AI please!

[Kiki · Rating 1 out of 5]

I think the concept was there, but there was a lot of repeated sentiments and honestly, there was even some repeated verbiage like verbatim, and there was a lot of inconsistency on some of the specific details and there was no description of the actual physical attributes of the characters like they never said the hair color of the two main characters for example so that was interesting and then the plot line fell a little short and moved at a very choppy pace so overall, I think the idea was there, but the execution was a little lacking

[Marissa Lopez · Rating 1 out of 5]

Very clearly AI slop. Didn’t even edit it. First time DNFing a book, I could only get 30% of the way through. Mega continuity errors, excessive use of em dashs, cover does not match description of characters, cover is ai and not even good ai, the colors and numbers do not match the characters. How are they flying to a home game? Why do they stay in a hotel after a home game? There was one description where on the ice there were two forwards and two defense, I mean, at least get the hockey right.

[Emmaali · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fino ad un certo punto avrei dato quasi quattro stelle ma poi sono iniziati gli errori grossi, prima erano passabili, il protagonista che diventa una lei, la storia dell’operazione che prima si sa e poi viene fatta passare come una novità ( se aveva visto le medicine aveva visto anche l’appuntamento in clinica!). Ad un certo punto il ginocchio di Sam collassa e quindi non può più giocare ma ecco che poi si rimette in pista e gioca di nuovo, incredibile!

[Finley · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sweet, Powerful, Poetry & Hockey

I’ve read dozens of gay hockey romance novels. Rhodes writes stories so eloquently they feel like poetry. Sometimes, I felt that certain phrases or ideas the characters had were repeated too much. However, I loved that the story didn’t get stuck on becoming a coming out story. Instead, it was about perspective and acceptance and going forward in life instead of back and learning that one can be wrong and learning to admit when they are. Bravo!

[Camille · Rating 1 out of 5]

It took me way longer than it should have to realize there’s likely a lot of AI at play here. Once I looked closely at the cover and saw the backwards 6 and the shoddily photoshopped Vegas logo I got pissed. I haven’t encountered a lot of AI (as far as I know) because I actively avoid it to the best of my ability, so I just wrote it off as the writing style of a new author at first. Pretty disappointing and kind of embarrassing to spend time reading a book that’s just slop.

[Elizabeth Hipwell · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very Moving Portrayal of love

This story really got to me. Cried more times than I can count. On the surface it's a story of two men, an age-gap, hockey players, but underneath it's two human beings who find one another, and leave the doirs unlocked. The repetitions throughout the story were like a meditation of the building blocks of 'real' love.

[Natalie · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.25/5 Idk what happened between this and the other books but somebody got a better editor. Much stronger plot cohesion and the strong parts of the writing stood out more. I quite liked it.

[Tanya · Rating 4 out of 5]

good storyline

have loved these series, this one was especially a favourite because of how the feelings of both MMCs were distinguishable in the writing. still wishing their was more dialogue and more of this lighthearted conversations that is alluded to in the book!

[Amanda Mason · Rating 5 out of 5]

what a great book

This is the first time I’ve read any of this authors books, and what a great story. I really enjoyed it.

[Anna · Rating 1 out of 5]

DNF 50 i przeczytane 2 ostanie rozdziały.

To mogło być dobre , ale nie było i gdzie były dialogi!!!

[Julia · Rating 3 out of 5]

Repetition

Wish there was more banter from the characters and less descriptions of things you’ve already read 10 times. Hint: blue mug is important

[Kobie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thoroughly enjoyed this. Also must mention that there are 3 egregious editing errors. Without spoilers, they are whiskey/tequila, condom placement, and a theirs when it should read ours. These seriously pulled me out of the story.