Customer Reviews

Murder on Ice (Figure Skating Mystery)

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This is a great cozy mystery. It is the first mystery I've read that combines murder and figure skating and is very well written.

Rebecca "Bex" Levy is a figure-skating researcher for the 24/7 network. It is the World Figure Skating Championships in San Francisco -- the end of her first season. The Russian skater, Xenia Trubin, is awarded the Gold medal and the U. S. skater, Erin Simpson, is awarded the Silver medal. The 24/7 broadcasters, Diana and Francis Howarth, state on the air that they believe Erin skated better and should have been awarded the Gold. They go on to imply that the Italian judge was bribed to vote with the ex-Soviet bloc of judges. Bex is appalled.

Then Silvana Potenza, the Italian judge, is found dead. The police believe it was an accident. Bex finds a printout of an email sent to Silvana the morning before the ladies' long program. It lists the ladies' finish order as Xenia first and Erin second. The email was signed Sergei Alemazov, Xenia's coach.

Bex finds there are so many suspects and so little time -- she has promised her boss Gil that she'd figure out who killed Silvana before their big show in two days.

I am a fan of figure skating, so merging it and murder together truly interested me. I like Bex, she's a very likable character. Her job as a researcher helps her have access to and information about the people involved that most people couldn't find. Ms. Adams has done a great job in creating this character.

Bex' boss Gil is a bit over the top, but that's what makes him so great. The Howarth's are very believable and are utilized at the right times in this book. This was a great book in what I hope will be a long series. I can't wait to read the next one. I HIGHLY RECOMMEND this book.

Since starting her research job at Network 24/7, Bex Levy has had to learn everything there was to know about figure skating. That way when TV commentators Francis and Diana Howarth are commenting on a live show they have all the needed material at their fingertips. At the World Figure Skating Championship's in San Francisco, everyone expects cute Erin Simpson to take the gold.

When the final results are tabulated, the Russian girl Xenia Trubin wins the top prize. The fans, the TV commentators and Erin's mother all say that Erin was cheated out of the gold. The four Russian judges voted for Xenia and the four western judges voted for Erin. The tie breaker vote was cast by Italian Judge Silvana Potenza who later was found murdered in the refrigerator room of the ice skating rink. The director of 24/7 tells Bex that if she wants a job next year she has to figure out who the killer is, which leaves her skating on thin ice.

Alina Adams gives a glimpse into the rivalries, the animosities and the bickering that goes on in the world of amateur figure skating. However, as interesting as that is, the protagonist scores a 10 as one of better leads to come along in years. She is perky, has a delightful sense of humor and leaves no stone unturned in her quest to find a murderer though one must wonder why her employer forced Bex to play detective. MURDER ON ICE is a winning amateur sleuth tale starring a delightful self-deprecating heroine.

This is the first in the series of figure skating mysteries about TV researcher and sleuth Bex Levy. I'd already read the 3rd and 4th books.

It's the World Figure Skating Championship, and surprisingly, the Russian skater wins over the American favorite, with the Italian judge casting the deciding vote. Amid a huge controversy over bloc voting and accusations of bribery or coercion, the Italian judge is found dead. The police seem inclined to view it as an accident, but it seems too coincidental to ignore.

Bex has just gotten her job as figure skating researcher. Not only does she have to keep the on-air talent from screwing up (they're a former pairs skating team, who delight in goading each other), she's under the constant threat of losing her job (her boss's idea of motivation). So in desperation, Bex promises to deliver the real story in two days.

The Good:
The very realistic-feeling look inside the world of figure skating competitions, and our introduction to the slightly larger-than-life ongoing characters of Bex's boss Gil and the on-air commentators, the Howarths.

The Bad:
The slow accumulation of clues and following false leads was mildly frustrating, but it was also refreshingly realistic. I'd much rather read about a sleuth, particularly an amateur one, who makes mistakes than one who gets it all right from the beginning. And the reader's frustration evokes Bex's, which is good, too.

The Verdict:
Murder on Ice had been in my TBR pile for about a year. I'm hoping to unearth the 2nd book in the series before the 5th comes out.

I found the book by Alina Adams, "Murder on Ice," a welcome addition to the ice skating literature because the author has experience in the sport as a figure-skating researcher and feature producer for: ABC (Nationals, Europeans and Worlds); TNT (1998 Winter Olympics); NBC ( the StarSkates series); and ESPN (Jr. Worlds). I say this because today there are so few fictional books authored by people who actually have had an exposure to the sport they are writing about. In my opinion, this prevents them from having an adequate understanding of the technical, social and political characteristics of figure skating.

I personally have come across only one other fictional ice skating murder mystery series where the author writes accurately about the sport of ice skating within a murder mystery storyline. In this regard, Joan Bartlett has two high-quality books, namely, " Nice Shows" and "Judge Me Nottingham." Both of these malice domestic mysteries are set in an ice arena. Joan Bartlett is a former high-test figure and ice dancer, coach and amateur ice show producer. She also has done volunteer work with the local police department, including independent study in police procedures and forensic science, all of which adds credibility to discussions in these areas.

This book should please every fan of figure skating. Bex Levy, skating reasercher for TV broadcaster 24/7 uncovers a tricky murder mystery using her powers of conversational crime fighting and meeting everyone from skating mothers to perky teenagers to eccentric coaches and skating-struck middle aged men along the way. I definitely recommend this hilarious book.

I am a former figure skater and mystery lover, so when I discovered this series I was elated to bring my two interests together. I am very disappointed. To begin with this book is not well written. Books like this should be a fast, entertaining, easy read. I had to literally plow through the author's text. Then, the heroine - a TV researcher - found what she thought was a clue: a shorter than normal fax. Her conclusion was that it was European paper...when any good researcher, traveler or businessperson knows that A4 paper is longer than US paper, but slightly narrower. It is definitely not shorter. This was not a mention, which I could excuse, but for much of a book it was the only clue the character had. I lost faith. It is too bad the idea of the series is a great one with all the politics and drama that goes into skating, but this entry is definitely not a gold medal winner.

Murder on Ice by Alina Adams is a fabnlous book! It offers an accurate and humorous account of the figure skating world, with a storyline being a twist of the 2002 Olympics.
Bex Levy is a figure skating researcher. She works 20 hour days, and knows all the ins and outs of the figure skating world. When the Russian beats the American at the world championships, the blame is pinned on the Italian judge for not voting with the western block. When the Italian judge is found dead the next day, Bex is ordered by her boss the find the killer.
Murder on ice is a humerous, unique book that is recommended for figure skating fans of all ages, or for someone who just wants to read a great mystery.

If you enjoy curling up with a cozy little mystery with an interesting twist then I highly recommend "Murder on Ice".

Figure skating fans in particular should enjoy this charming tale but even those who aren't skating fans will enjoy the mischievious sense of fun that the protaganist, a researcher named Bex, displays as she races to solve the murder of the judge before the championships end.

What a funny, true picture of high stakes, international figure skating competitions. As a skater, coach and amateur ice show producer myself, as a volunteer at too many competitions to mention, I could feel the tension rise as the final scenes were played out. The descriptions of the various characters involved in the plot are wonderfully close to the real thing.

I am looking forward to the next book in the series, "Missing on Ice."

In the meantime, there are two other good murder mysteries about ice skating. These two, "Nice Shows" and "Judge Me Nottingham," portray the skaters and coaches during the initial hard work and planning before the skaters reach national and international competition levels. And by the way, I'm the author of these two books!

I have a question for Alina Adams - why in the world would you set a series of books in a world for which you so clearly have zero respect? Alina Adams doesn't know figure skating any better than her heroine does. Which would be not at all. She may have worked as a researcher, but she clearly didn't learn much. The book is a string of cliche's about the world of skating, looking for a reality check. Certainly the cliche's exist, but according to Ms. Adams, the world of figure skating is no more complex than every cliche you have ever heard - every male figure skater is gay, every skating marriage is a lie and every skater is shallow and self-absorbed and every skating parent is a nightmare. How about some depth?

The book is not well written, nor does it seem to know who it's audience actually is. It is trite to the point that only a 12 year old could find it enjoyable, yet uses several vocabularly words that most adults wouldn't know. Bex isn't charming, she's annoying - and slow-witted, at best. And Ms. Adams for all her supposed knowledge about the world of skating - a world filled to the brim with Russians, makes a big point of explaining patronymics and then proceeds to get it wrong. The patronymic for Peter (or Pyotr) is Petrovich or Petrovna, NOT Petrov or Petrova (which happen to be surnames of two well known pairs skaters - Denis Petrov and Maria Petrova). If you are going to make a point of showing off how much you know, at least get it right.

As for the story - it's rather obvious, but I've read worse and more obvious plots, which is why it gets two stars, not one. Unless you are the kind of skating fan who thinks the entire sport is the cliche (and I have yet to meet a skating fan who does), don't bother. And unless you are a mystery fan who finds Nancy Drew much too complex and challenging, don't bother from that angle, either.

It's too bad, because skating fans are eager for well written books about their sport. Kudos to the publisher for taking a chance on a "skating novel" - it's too bad this one was so poorly executed.