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THE FAVORITES
Layne Fargo
Random House
January 14, 2025
448 pages
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Wow! What an intense, compelling story.
With this book, we enter the world of competitive ice skating. It is brutal, merciless, thrilling and scary. It’s hard to find adjectives that are dramatic enough. We follow along with Katharina (Kat) and Heath. They meet as children, they grow up as skating partners and become lovers and then enemies, alternately.
Others have said that the style of writing and the format reminds them of Daisy Jones and the Six. I concur…..the chapters are interspersed with interviews, descriptions of film clips, and reminiscences. The book also reminds me of The Still Point by Tammy Greenwood, which delves into the intensity of the world of ballet.
It shocks me how competitive and ruthless it is inside the skating world.
I can’t say that I was particularly fond of any of the characters. Usually, that fact makes me dislike a book. But, not in this case. The story is both plot-driven and character-driven. Kat is a very strong character, right from the outset when she was a young girl. Because the subject deals with competition, every character, naturally, will do what it takes to win. This creates pretty tense relationships.
This book is such a conundrum for me. I thought it was a tad long, but, I didn’t want it to end. Makes no sense. I guess I wanted to find out how it ended, but then I knew it would be over. Then, sadly, the ending sort of fizzled out. Considering all the drama that occurred throughout the book, the ending was a bit of a letdown. But, still a satisfying and entertaining read.
Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the Advance Readers Copy.
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