"[5] Early readers described the novel as a cross between the work of Kafka and British television series The Avengers, which Kavan felt was an apt description.

The Madagascan Indris, an element which reoccurs throughout the story, came to Kavan after watching a David Attenborough nature documentary.

Initially he must negotiate the presence of the woman's husband and later he faces more serious opposition from the Warden who seeks to keep her under his control.

Christopher Priest, in his introduction to the novel, writes that the book is "virtually plotless" and "told in scenes of happenstance and coincidence.

[11] Attention has been paid to the recurring imagery of coldness and encroaching ice, which is commonly associated with Kavan's struggles with heroin addiction and mental illness.

In 1968, a week after Kavan's death, Doubleday published Ice in the United States on the advice of Aldiss.