BookFronter
The Boy Next Door by Katie Van Ark

The Boy Next Door

Katie Van Ark

Square Fish · Paperback · December 2, 2025

Curl up on a cold winter morning with this figure skating spin on a classic romance where childhood friends dance the edge between love and tragedy.

Contemporary YA RomanceFriendship for TeensWinter Sportsfamily
More
dramarelationshipromancecontemporary
Buy on Amazon

We earn from qualifying purchases.

Who it’s for
Figure-skating ambition meets a friends-to-lovers romance wary of its own dramatic potential.
Genres
Contemporary YA Romance, Winter Sports, Friendship for Teens
Published
Square Fish, December 2, 2025

Nearest books

Matched by what the books are about, then ordered by what their readers also loved. Most of these share its genre: Contemporary YA Romance.

  1. Beauty and the BesharamLillie Vale62% match
  2. Tiny Pretty ThingsSona Charaipotra, Dhonielle Clayton59% match
  3. By Your SideKasie West60% match
  4. On the FenceKasie West64% matchAlso shares Friendship for Teens
  5. Love, Life, and the ListKasie West58% match
  6. The Fill-in BoyfriendKasie West58% match
  7. It's a Love/skate RelationshipCarli J. Corson71% match
  8. Every Reason We Shouldn'tSara Fujimura70% matchAlso shares Winter Sports

For younger readers: Breaking the Ice, The Comeback

For older readers: Unsteady

Start with three books, and this one can be the first.

Members get a new edition every morning: a route out from their books to essays, research and talks, with the reason for each.

Start with this book

About this book

Curl up on a cold winter morning with this figure skating spin on a classic romance where childhood friends dance the edge between love and tragedy. As six-year-old neighbors, Maddy and Gabe held mittened hands and stepped onto the ice for the first time. As high school seniors, they’re poised to become world class figure skaters, on the path to the Olympic podium.

Continue reading

Maddy has been in love from the start, watching from the sidelines as girl after girl falls for her gorgeous partner. When the coach picks Romeo & Juliet for their theme, it’s Maddy’s chance to be more than just friends. Gabe never dates a girl for more than two weeks, and he relies on Maddy too much to risk it. His friends would mock them, her dad would kill him, and long-term romance is a world of problems. Better to think of Maddy as a sister, when anything more can only end in tragedy. Lies and secrecy. Attraction and temptation. Family turmoil and shifting identities. In Katie Van Ark’s sizzling debut, heated determination faces cold resistance in a competition for more than gold. The Boy Next Door is perfect for readers who are fans of: • Good Girl x Bad Boy • Forced Proximity • Figure Skating • Friends-To-Lovers • Lynn Painter books • Hannah Grace books

Love on Ice

Figure-skating ambition meets a friends-to-lovers romance wary of its own dramatic potential.

Come here for

  • Childhood-friends romance with figure skating and Olympic ambition in the mix
  • The charged staging of Romeo & Juliet on and off the ice

Expect

  • Yearning, secrecy, and resistance between longtime partners
  • Family turmoil alongside the pull of competition

Where it sits

Winter Sports81%
Contemporary YA Romance73%
Friendship for Teens36%

Percentages are BookFrontier’s reading of the book.

Publisher categories

  • Contemporary YA Romance
  • Friendship for Teens
  • Winter Sports
Authors
Katie Van Ark
Publisher
Square Fish
Published
December 2, 2025
Format
Paperback
Reading lane
Contemporary YA Romance