Kelli Lawrence

An interesting take, written by a fan for fans, on how television has been a significant driver of skating's development as a sport. Lawrence's account concludes with the 2009-2010 competition season. There are areas where I would have enjoyed more analysis (e.g. the 1994 reinstatement of some pros to the Olympic-eligible ranks), and understandably, she is a bit limited by which interviews she was able to get--but it's well done. The perspectives of seasoned TV producers make a great contribution to the narrative, and even lifelong fans will learn new things.… (lisätietoja)

I partly enjoyed this book and partly thought it was confusing and hard to follow. I had a hard time following all of the names of random ABC, CBS and NBC people. I liked learning about figure skating in the context of TV, but also found it kind of ironic and weird when the TV people gave self congratulatory quotes about how TV brought transparency to figure skating. Nothing about how they sensationalized it, how they build up skaters so much and lambast them when they can't live up to their extreme expectations.

I did totally agree with the section on the new skating rules, and how they pretty much took the artistry out of programs, the all more or less look like cookie cutter interpretations of one another.… (lisätietoja)