The Favorites: A Novel

by Layne Fargo Narrated by Christine Lakin, Louisa Zhu, Amy Landon, Elena Rey, Valerie Rose Lohman, Suzanne Toren, Graham Halstead, Julia Emelin, Layne Fargo, Eric Yang, Johnny Weir

Overview

To the world, they were a scandal. To each other, an obsession.

NATIONAL BESTSELLER ¿ An epic love story set in the sparkling, savage sphere of elite figure skating, starring a woman determined to carve her own path on and off the ice

“Part Wuthering Heights and part Daisy Jones & The Six, this novel is as brilliantly choreographed as a gold medal performance and will keep you guessing until its last page.”-Jodi Picoult, New York Times bestselling author of By Any Other Name

She might not have a famous name, funding, or her family's support, but Katarina Shaw has always known that she was destined to become an Olympic skater. When she meets Heath Rocha, a lonely kid stuck in the foster care system, their instant connection makes them a formidable duo on the ice. Clinging to skating-and each other-to escape their turbulent lives, Kat and Heath go from childhood sweethearts to champion ice dancers, captivating the world with their scorching chemistry, rebellious style, and roller-coaster relationship.

Until a shocking incident at the Olympic Games brings their partnership to a sudden end.

As the ten-year anniversary of their final skate approaches, an unauthorized documentary reignites the public obsession with Shaw and Rocha, claiming to uncover the “real story” through interviews with their closest friends and fiercest rivals. Kat wants nothing to do with the documentary, but she can't stand the thought of someone else defining her legacy. So, after a decade of silence, she's telling her story: from the childhood tragedies that created her all-consuming bond with Heath to the clash of desires that tore them apart. Sensational rumors have haunted their every step for years, but the truth may be even more shocking than the headlines.

Editorial Reviews

From the Publisher

Part Wuthering Heights and part Daisy Jones & The Six, this novel is as brilliantly choreographed as a gold medal performance and will keep you guessing until its last page.”—Jodi Picoult, New York Times bestselling author of By Any Other Name

“The Favorites is a dizzying left hook to the jaw that drops the reader behind the scenes of competitive pairs ice dancing. . . . [Fargo’s] characters are unabashedly extra.”—The Washington Post

“One of the most heart-wrenching, epic and passionate romances I’ve read in quite some time . . . I already wish I could read it again for the first time.”—Betty Cayouette, People

“The horny ice skating novel The Favorites could not have possibly arrived at a more perfect time. . . . Immersive, wildly addictive.”—Paste

“[The Favorites] has a simple premise, executed perfectly: Wuthering Heights, but make it Olympic figure skaters. . . . So effing good.”—CrimeReads

“Irresistibly pulpy . . . The Favorites shimmers and delights.”—Bookreporter

“An epic love story set in the dazzling but brutal world of elite ice dancing . . . Think The Cutting Edge meets Daisy Jones & The Six.”—KMUW

“A true literary triple axel: a smart and nuanced retelling of a classic, a tense sports drama, and a perfectly twisted romance.”—Rachel Hawkins, New York Times bestselling author of The Heiress and The Wife Upstairs

“A glittery compulsive whirl of a book, filled with spite and love and sequins and ambition.”—Holly Gramazio, New York Times bestselling author of The Husbands

“Breathtaking . . . The ferocious passion between Kat and Heath leaps off the page, and the captivating drama that unfolds on and off the ice is unrelenting.”—Margarita Montimore, USA Today bestselling author of Acts of Violet and Oona Out of Order

“The Favorites combines the emotion of a coming-of-age tale with the sensationalism of the most audacious news headlines, creating a thoroughly intriguing read.”—Chicago Review of Books

“Engrossing, thrilling, and just downright fun.”—Booklist, starred review

“Colleen Hoover–style romance heads to the Olympic rink. Buckle up.”—Kirkus Reviews

“A deliciously scathing, sexy novel . . . passionate, cutthroat, and irresistibly fun.”—Julia Fine, author of Maddalena and the Dark

“A tale of ambition and scorching passion that will keep readers on the edge of their seats.”—Jean Kwok, New York Times bestselling author of The Leftover Woman

“What an addictive read . . .”—Emma Brodie, author of Songs in Ursa Major

“A drama of epic proportions.”—Library Journal

author of Let the Games Begin Rufaro Faith Mazarura

The Favorites masterfully weaves ambition and obsession into an epic, page-turning love story. Layne Fargo combines compelling characters with dazzling prose to fully immerse readers into the glamorously cutthroat world of competitive skating. Once I started reading I couldn’t put it down.

author of Jaded Ela Lee

As romantic as it is thrilling, The Favorites is an urgent and addictive story of the demands of ambition and the drama of obsessive love. Layne Fargo writes with a passion and propulsion that that will have you captivated until the very last page.

New York Times bestselling author of The Husbands Holly Gramazio

A glittery compulsive whirl of a book, filled with spite and love and sequins and ambition.

New York Times bestselling author of Wish You Were Jodi Picoult

If you have ever watched Olympic ice dancing teams and wondered if the chemistry between them persists when they’re not competing . . . well, have I got a book for you. Part Wuthering Heights and part Daisy Jones & The Six, this novel is as brilliantly choreographed as a gold medal performance and will keep you guessing until its last page.

New York Times bestselling author of The Leftover Jean Kwok

The Favorites is a gripping tale of ambition, love and the fierce world of competitive figure skating. Fargo masterfully weaves a story filled with scorching passion, keeping readers on the edge of their seats as they follow Kat and Heath's tumultuous journey. A delicious must-read!

Kirkus Reviews

Violent passions, bloody on-ice accidents, bedroom betrayals, sabotage, paparazzi-driven scandals, and nonstop cliffhangers . . . Colleen Hoover–style romance heads to the Olympic rink. Buckle up.

author of Take Me Apart and Vantage Point Sara Sligar

The Favorites is Tell Me Lies meets The Cutting Edge . . . Fargo deftly . . . delivers a razor-sharp account of the thin line between performance and reality.

USA Today bestselling author of Acts of Violet and Margarita Montimore

Breathtaking . . . The ferocious passion between Kat and Heath leaps off the page, and the captivating drama that unfolds on and off the ice is unrelenting.

author of Take Me Apart Sara Sligar

The Favorites is Tell Me Lies meets The Cutting Edge—a juicy, addictive look at an ice dancing pair whose obsession with winning is matched only by their obsession with each other.

author of Maddalena and the Dark Julia Fine

A deliciously scathing, sexy novel . . . passionate, cutthroat, and irresistibly fun.

author of Songs in Ursa Major Emma Brodie

What an addictive read—Kat and Heath’s connection leaps off the page in this sexy, gut-wrenching clash of abilities, values, and wills. As these two soul-mates dance around each other on and off the ice, Layne Fargo weighs the costs of ambition and love, fame and trust, and drive and fate in a story as shimmering and lethal as ice-dancing itself.

New York Times bestselling author of The Heiress a Rachel Hawkins

The Favorites is a true literary triple axel—a smart and nuanced retelling of a classic, a tense sports drama, and a perfectly twisted romance. I loved it!

bestselling author of Mad Love and What Remains Wendy Walker

As a former competitive figure skater, I devoured this epic love story set in the passionate world of ice dancing. The Favorites is every bit as spellbinding as it is brilliant. . . . An absolute must read!

New York Times bestselling author of The Husb Holly Gramazio

A glittery compulsive whirl of a book, filled with spite and love and sequins and ambition. I couldn’t stop reading.

USA Today bestselling author of Acts of Violet Margarita Montimore

The Favorites is nothing short of breathtaking. The ferocious passion between Kat and Heath leaps off the page, and the captivating drama that unfolds on and off the ice is unrelenting. . . . A stunning read.

Kirkus Reviews

2024-09-28
Star-crossed figure skaters whiz through decades of melodrama on and off the ice.

Fargo’s latest feature pairs skaters entwined by destiny and irradiated by fan and media obsession, as she cleverly tells her tale by alternating between narrative sections and clips from the script of a fictional 2024 documentary calledThe Favorites: The Shaw & Rocha Story. Katarina Shaw and Heath Rocha are “small-town Midwestern trash,” both orphans, he of mysterious origins. Teen lovers, they enter the world of skating at the 2000 Nationals, where they meet their rivals, brother and sister skaters Garrett and Bella Lin, the privileged twin children of figure skating icon-turned-coach Sheila Lin (and an anonymous Sarajevo Olympic Village sperm donor). For the next 14 years, violent passions, bloody on-ice accidents, bedroom betrayals, sabotage, paparazzi-driven scandals, and nonstop cliffhangers—“Unfortunately, it was only the beginning”—lead up to an epic brouhaha at the 2014 Winter Olympics in Russia, by which time the reader’s capacity for outrage and surprise has gotten quite a workout. But don’t give up in the stretch: “NBC Sports commentator Kirk Lockwood reports live from the Sochi Olympics. ‘In all my years covering skating,’ he says, shaking his head solemnly, ‘I’ve never seen anything like this.’” Though the stereotype-driven characterizations of the skaters are a couple dimensions short of real or relatable—Heath in particular is a furious cipher—Fargo does a nice job with the narrators of her documentary. One of them, a former skater turned gossip blogger named Ellis Dean, can be relied on to spill the tea (“That program was the most passive-aggressive shit I’d ever seen—and I’m from the South, honey”), while an uptight U.S. Figure Skating official dryly tows the party line: “Ice dance can have a certain sensuality to it, yes. Many programs express the beauty of the love between a man and a woman. But what Ms. Shaw and Mr. Rocha were doing bordered on vulgarity.” After all the histrionics and hormones, the unlikely ending Fargo bestows on her characters is a hoot.

Colleen Hoover–style romance heads to the Olympic rink. Buckle up.

Product Details

BN ID:	2940192470794
Publisher:	Penguin Random House
Publication date:	01/14/2025
Edition description:	Unabridged

Read an Excerpt

Chapter 1

Once I was satisfied, I handed him the knife.

Heath stood up on his knees, and I stretched out in the warm spot he’d left on the bed, watching him: the way his black hair shone in the moonlight, the press of his teeth on his lower lip as he concentrated, making his first mark with the tip of the blade. He was more precise than I had been, drawing curved, graceful lines underneath my savage slashes.

Shaw & Rocha, the carving read when he finished. It was the way our names would be written on the scoreboard at our first U.S. Figure Skating Championships in a few days’ time. The way they’d be announced in medal ceremonies and reported in newspapers and entered in the record books. We’d cut the letters into the center of my antique rosewood headboard, deep enough that no amount of sanding could remove them.

We were sixteen, and so sure of everything.

Our bags were already packed for the National Championships, costumes and skates in a neat stack next to my bedroom door. As many years as we’d been waiting, working, preparing for this moment, those few final hours felt like torture. I wanted to leave right then.

I wished we never had to come back.

Heath left the knife on my bedside table and settled down beside me to admire our handiwork. “Are you nervous?” he whispered.

I looked past him, at the pictures collaged around the drafty leaded glass window—all images of my favorite figure skater, Sheila Lin. Two-time Olympic gold medalist in ice dance, living legend. Sheila never seemed nervous, no matter how much pressure she faced.

“No,” I told him.

Heath smiled and slid his hand up the back of the stretched-out Stars on Ice 1996 sweatshirt I always wore to bed. “Liar.”

Nosebleed seats to see that tour were the closest I’d ever come to Sheila Lin in real life. My father sprung for a signed commemorative photo of her too, which was tacked up on my wall with the rest of my shrine. She was the woman, and the athlete, I wanted to be—not when I grew up, but as soon as possible.

When Sheila and her partner, Kirk Lockwood, won their first U.S. title, she was still a teenager. Winning was a long shot for Heath and me, since we’d never been to Nationals before. We had qualified the previous season but didn’t have the means to travel to the competition venue in Salt Lake City. Luckily, the championships were in Cleveland this time, a comparably short and affordable Greyhound bus ride away. I was certain the competition would change everything for us.

I was right. Just not in the way I imagined.

Heath kissed my shoulder. “Well, I’m not nervous. I’m skating with Katarina Shaw.” He said my name slow, reverent, savoring the sound. “And there’s nothing she can’t do.”

We stared at each other in the shadows, so close we were sharing breath. Later, we’d become world famous for that: stretching out the moment before a kiss until it was almost unbearable, until every member of the audience felt the quickening of our pulses, the pure want reflected in our eyes.

But that was choreography. This was real.

Heath’s mouth finally met mine—soft, unhurried. We thought we had all night.

By the time we heard the footsteps, it was too late.

Nicole Bradford, a middle-aged blond woman wearing a sparkly cardigan and heavy makeup, sits at the center island in her white-on-white suburban dream kitchen.

NICOLE BRADFORD (Figure Skating Coach): There’s always a surge after the Winter Olympics. All these girls who think they’re destined to become stars. Though they usually aren’t quite as intense about it as Katarina Shaw.

Family photos show Katarina as a little girl in various skating costumes. In one, she’s in front of a wall covered in pictures of Sheila Lin, imitating Sheila’s pose in the central image.

NICOLE BRADFORD: At her first lesson, Katarina said she was going to be a famous ice dancer like Sheila Lin. The other girls hated her instantly.

Four-year-old Katarina skates alone with a serious expression, her hair in two messy pigtails.

NARRATOR: Though her name eventually became synonymous with ice dance, Katarina Shaw spent her early career as a singles skater, since no boys were available to partner with her.

Ellis Dean perches on a stool at a chic cocktail bar, holding a martini glass. He’s in his early forties, with an impish smile and carefully coiffed hair.

ELLIS DEAN (Former Ice Dancer): There are vanishingly few guys who want to do ice dance. At least pairs has jumps, plus hurling pretty girls into the air and catching them by the crotch. If you like that sort of thing.

NARRATOR: Ice dance is perhaps the least understood figure skating discipline.

Archival footage of skaters competing in the ice dance event at the 1976 Winter Games in Innsbruck, Austria—the first year ice dance was contested as an Olympic sport.

NARRATOR: Drawn from ballroom dancing, ice dance focuses on intricate footwork and close partnering between skaters, rather than the acrobatic lifts and athletic jumps seen in other events.

ELLIS DEAN: A lot of female ice dancers start out skating with their brothers, cause those are the only dudes they can manage to guilt into it. That was not an option for Kat Shaw.

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