Crossing the Ice by Jennifer Comeaux

Crossing the IceNarrated by Emily Stokes

Crossing the Ice is the story of Courtney and Josh, figure skaters who dream of representing the U.S. at the Olympic Games. Will their budding attraction get in the way of their dreams?

Mark and Courtney have been skating partners for the past nine years. Four years ago, they tried and failed to make the Olympic team. Now, they’re beginning their final year of training, determined to see it end with them claiming one of the two spots on the team. Both are dismayed to learn that Stephanie and Josh, their biggest rivals, are moving to Cape Cod to train with them.

Courtney has had a crush on Josh for the past eight years. She’s done all she can to talk herself out of those feelings, and she’s been successful for the most part. After all, with her on Cape Cod and Josh in L.A., it would be nearly impossible for anything to come of it. Now though, with Josh so close, will Courtney be able to keep her mind and heart focused on the ice?

As time passes, a friendship grows between them. Josh is not only a talented skater, but a gifted pianist as well. They bond over music and a shared sense of humor. Soon, their feelings become impossible to deny, but is their love really a good idea? Should they keep it a secret, or come out in the open, despite the bad feelings of Mark and Josh’s sister and skating partner Stephanie?

Crossing the Ice is a story with a lot of potential. I love a taste of the forbidden, but Ms. Comeaux was unable to deliver. I wanted to be in favor of Courtney and Josh’s relationship. Instead, I found myself hoping Courtney wouldn’t sacrifice all she held dear for a weak-willed idiot. I wanted to see Josh tell off his snooty sister and pretentious parents. I wanted him to defy everyone and everything in order to claim the woman of his dreams. He was unable to do this, and Courtney’s reaction, which should have inspired my sympathy, made me think of a sulky teenager instead of someone in her early twenties.

I admired their dedication to their sport. Ms. Comeaux did a wonderful job with the skating-related scenes. If more of the book had taken place on the ice, I might have enjoyed it more. Courtney spends hours daydreaming about skating with Josh. She knows they would have amazing chemistry. Couldn’t the author have found a way to work that chemistry into the story? I saw it as something Courtney imagined instead of the reality it needed to be.

Josh is an extremely sensitive and thoughtful young man. Normally, I would admire that in a hero. However, these traits caused a lot of problems for him. He wasn’t able to stand up for himself. He reminded me of a puppet on a string, and his sister was usually holding the strings.

All of this might have been manageable if a skilled narrator had performed it. Unfortunately, Emily Stokes’s performance was filled with flaws that served to further annoy me. Her character voices were inconsistent, and she tried way too hard to imbue the performance with emotion. It came off as corny rather than believable.

Certain characters were performed well. One of the coaches is given a wonderful Russian accent. Ms. Stokes gives Stephanie an appropriately valley-girl sound. An elderly woman who befriends Courtney and Josh speaks with a thick Boston accent that allows her to stand out from the rest of the characters. These things were not enough to save the performance. Ms. Stokes was not able to portray either of the lead characters in a believable manner. This is particularly problematic in Courtney’s case since the story is told in first person, from Courtney’s point of view.

There were also a number of production problems. I’m not sure if these were the fault of Ms. Stokes or of a producer, but placing blame isn’t really important. The fact is the recording is full of clicks, hums, and hisses. Some of the clicks sounded like equipment being paused and restarted. The hums could be attributed to microphone noise, but those aren’t things the listener should be exposed to. They’re things I expect to hear in amateur recordings, not books that have been commercially produced.

The recording also showed several of Ms. Stokes’ vocal errors. I’m sure all narrators make mistakes, but I usually don’t have to hear countless false starts – they are edited out so that the finished project sounds clear and seamless. This did not happen here. I was pulled out of the story numerous times by the stumbling nature of the narration.

All in all, Crossing the Ice could have been a whole lot better than it turned out to be. If you decide you absolutely must read it, pick up a print copy.

Shannon


Narration:  D

Production:  F

Book Content:  C-

Steam Factor:  You can play it out loud

Violence:  Minimal

Genre:  General Fiction

Publisher:  Jennifer Comeaux

 

Crossing the Ice was provided to AudioGals for review.