With thanks to Netgalley and the author for allowing me to review this book.

The Favourites is very much like Daisy Jones and the Six but with figure skating with a hint of Flowers in the Attic thrown in.

It was a good summer read.

I was first intrigued by the suggestion that this was a reimagining, or at least had callbacks to Wuthering Heights, which is one of my favourite classics; I do think, however, that this was a slight overestimation of the character dynamics and led me to expect a touch more from this book than it delivered. While the plot was pacy, I found it didn’t catch and hook my interests as I was hoping, and which other readers had found. The constant melodrama ultimately felt a little one-note for me; I would have preferred a touch more character development and arc! I’m sure that, and it’s proven to be, a great read for something shiny and enjoyable, but for me personally it lacked the substance I tend to look for. A palette cleanser, perhaps, for readers looking for something to spin around the block but not look too closely at

Wow! What an epic read; it was absolutely stunning from cover to cover. I was engrossed in this world of figure skating and the characters' stories.

I was sad when it ended, but what a wild ride.

The glam, glitz, and DRAMA!

This book was so addictive, I just couldn't put it down!! There was a roller coaster of emotions throughout this one! I loved the writing style on this one!

The Favourites tells the story of Kat and Heath, childhood friends turned sweethearts who are determined to make it in the world of competitive ice dance, but at what cost?

This book was just what I needed after some pretty heavy going reads, Covenant of Water I’m looking at you! 😆

It definitely lived up to the hype for me and it was only the last section of the book which let it down slightly as couldn’t really understand the new dynamics of the characters, and the seemingly toxic relationship between Kat and Heath.

This is a hugely entertaining read which I was able to completely lose myself in, I can very much understand the comparisons with TJR and hope the author takes that as the compliment it’s intended to be!

I actually had no idea when I started that this is a retelling of Wuthering Heights so keen to read that now to see how it all fits in.

Shameth upon me because yes, I did beg on my hands and knees to read this early, and then I did, and now it’s June. Blasted idiot I am. But I do need to yell about how obsessed I am with this book, so let’s not dwell on the negatives,,,

⛸️

Maybe I’ve also not written this review for so long because I’m still speechless and don’t know how to comprehend my thoughts. We’ll give it a shot and start with the writing, which was breathtaking and floored me on multiple occasions. This book is quite literally the most terrifying and exhilarating rollercoaster of emotions and gave me whiplash about once a chapter, but I loved every second. And I hate rollercoasters, so that should tell you something.

Like you cannot put this book down. It’s literally I-M-P-O-S-S-I-B-L-E!!! She sucks you right onto the ice and you cannot leave. You’re… frozen. Ha like my joke? You should, it was genius.

Don’t even get me started on the multimedia, which I realise I don’t read enough of, seeing as I love it so much. Mental note to pick up more books with multimedia. This book is compared to Daisy Jones & The Six, and they couldn’t be more spot on, except the romance is dialled wayyyyy up and my DJ6 heart is NOT mad about that.

I’m also not Katarina by any means, but Miss Fargo got me relating real hard to an ambitious cutthroat figure skater. Though I do have a need to do my best at all times, so maybe it’s time for a career change? There just HAS to be a reason I love this sport so much, right? I’m taking this as my official sign!

Moment of silence for the side characters who know how to knock us off our rockets. Like howwwwww are they all that interesting? The interview format was only the surface, and I was absolutely living for all of their tea-spilling drama, and at the same time, wanted to duct tape their mouths for sprouting nonsense

Okay fine, I’ll try to be serious. Be warned that I will most likely fail because this book has driven me insane. Mostly because of THE FREAKING ROMANCE. God, I love some good angst, and I think this is the best angst I’ve ever seen. You know what I also love? Second chance angst where the next time they meet the rizz levels are through the roof, and the chef added a sign of yearning. Punch me in the gut, why don’t you?

Whilst my one critique with this book is that the ending was rushed and some things with the romance were not alllll in for me, I almost didn’t care because the rest of the book was too delicious. Heath is a,,, a smol baby boi who I want to hug. I want to simultaneously run away but also stroke Katarina’s hair. They love each other, but they’re so stupid and obsessive and gahhhhhhh!!!!!! One thing about Layne Fargo is she KNOWS how to write messy characters, and I’m so here for it.

If you’re looking for a gut-wrenching, cut-throat figure-skating sports romance to induce the biggest adrenaline rush maybe ever, then you’ve 1 million percent come to the right place. You’ll probably faint from being obsessed so I recommend preparing yourself. K thanks for coming to my Ted-Talk xoxox

What a romp! So much fun to read - this book really has it all. Romance, rivalry, rags to riches. Hugely enjoyable.

The Favourites is a compelling and well-crafted story that kept me hooked from start to finish. The characters are richly developed, and the plot unfolds with just the right amount of intrigue and emotional depth. While a few pacing moments felt a bit slow, overall, it’s a satisfying read that explores themes of friendship and ambition in a nuanced way. Perfect for fans of Taylor Jenkins Reid, who appreciate character-driven narratives with a mix of drama and heartfelt moments. Definitely worth picking up!

🎧 Audiobook Review 🎧

#adprproduct

I want to thank NetGalley for approving me for an ARC of this book. I have seen lots of buzz about this one and was intrigued to see if it lived up to the hype.

The audiobook narration is fantastic. The multiple voices were very effective during the interview segments and I can see why people are referencing Daisy Jones and the Six for a comparison.

Set in the world of ice skating, this coming of age story also gave me Carrie Soto vibes and I really liked getting a better glimpse of the ice skating world and what these athletes endure for olympic success.

Katarina was a character you didn't always like but you could also understand some of her actions. The determination and bold attitude create a lot of stirs but I wanted to see her succeed. The on and off relationship between her and Heath kept me intrigued. There was a lot of tension and once again I found myself hoping they'd find their way.

Whilst I did find this entertaining there were parts that felt overly long and my attention sometimes waivered. I was also expecting a bit more from the ending, and felt slightly disappointed. Nevertheless it was an entertaining listen and I look forward to reading more from Layne Fargo.

🌟🌟🌟✨

I was looking forward to reading this after seeing all the hype on social media. Unfortunately, this was one that did not live up to the hype for me. I found it pretty boring. Not much happened, and what did happen, could have been dealt with in 200 pages.

I absolutely adored this book. It was everything I wanted! Figure skaters and Olympics and drama and relationships and the darkness of families and love in all its forms. Absolutely wonderful and I will read what ever comes next!!!

The Favourites by Layne Fargo – ★★★☆☆
All the drama, not quite enough depth.

Figure skating is the perfect setting for rivalries, ambition, and glittering tension, and this book had all the drama but I kept waiting for that extra something to truly hook me. The characters had potential, but I never felt fully connected, and while the story had twists, it didn’t quite land with the impact I was hoping for.

That said, I totally think this would shine as a TV series slow-mo rivalry stares and all! But Daisy Jones & The Six it is not. A solid three stars from me, enjoyable, dramatic, and fast-paced, but not quite a gold-medal performance.

#BookReview #TheFavourites #LayneFargo #Bookstagram #SportsDrama #FigureSkatingFiction

This story goes behind the scenes of ice dancing and shows it is not a sport for the faint hearted. Katarina and Heath have only their love for each other and their passion to win going for them. Lacking money and support they struggle to make their way into the top tier, until getting picked up by the top training school. It is no easy ride though, every time they look like achieving their dreams there seems to be a catastrophe in waiting to take it away from them. Full of ups and downs, this story has interesting characters, lots of plot twists, and describes the ice dancing so well that you can nearly see and hear it

Thank you to Vintage Books for the NetGalley ARC of this brilliant book by Layne Fargo, out in January.

When I say this is about to become your new obsession, I mean it. This novel is sprinkled with that magical thing that keeps you turning the pages, no matter how late it is!

This is a modern take on Wuthering Heights, set in the glitz and glamour of the world of professional ice dancing. Think I, Tonya mixed with Daisy Jones, and a sprinkling of Disney films like The Ice Princess, but turn up the heat.

I couldn’t put this book down - Fargo has deftly weaved elements of the original Brontë novel into the modern day, with some great meta inclusions of Kate Bush music. It has wit and is as sharp as a blade, the characters really coming to life on the page. I loved the alternate ways of telling the story, between interviews and Kat’s own words.

Like I said, it will be your new obsession.

finally, a [mostly] accurate figure skating novel

After reading *They Never Learn*, I was impatient for Layne Fargo to write another book. When that book was about ice dance, I lost my mind. I am a staunch fan of figure skating and have been for years. The underrated discipline of ice dance has always been my favorite (ha), and I was so happy to finally see it represented in fiction. I was especially grateful to see figure skating represented in fiction by someone who actually knows what they’re talking about – listen, I liked *Icebreaker* plenty, but the rants I subjected my coworkers to about the inaccuracies of skating basics had them fantasizing about my murder.

Fargo crafts unlikeable characters expertly. Every single character is unlikeable but has just enough redeeming characteristics for the reader to still care about their fate. They are also all complicated and unlikeable in unique ways, making their interactions compelling.

Despite their huge flaws, I was very invested in hoping for a positive outcome for all the characters, even Ellis. I was very stressed for them the whole time. Kat and Heath are obviously toxic, but I hoped they’d be able to grow and settle into a good relationship.

My small criticisms of this book: it should have been shorter, and some of the dramatic incidents should have been cut. Figure skating is indeed a very dramatic sport, but several of the incidents in this book felt like `__` overkill to me. I can see hints of the Tonya Harding story, Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir’s chemistry (and they’re rivalry and close training relationship with Meryl Davis and Charlie White), creepy commentaries about Maia and Alex Shibutani, and the judging scandal at the 2002 Olympics regarding the scores of pairs skating teams Jamie Salé and David Pelletier and Elena Berezhnaya and Anton Sikharulidze. I appreciate the nods to these titans of figure skating drama, but they did not all need to be included. Finally, Fargo obviously knows so much about the sport – enough to mention the now-defunct compulsory figures and compulsory dance aspects of figure skating competition – but fails in the category of music rules. It was perhaps a choice of pure artistic license, but it took me out of the story. This story takes place in the 2000s, culminating in 2014, and the characters frequently skate to music with vocals and lyrics – vocals were expressly forbidden in program music until *after* the 2014 Olympics. I was losing my mind. My coworkers are once again contemplating violence.

I saw a lot of people comparing this to Daisy Jones and The Six, which I can see in the sense of the format and the drama, but that’s where it ends.

When I first finished the book I was left thinking “is that it?” The ending felt unsatisfactory to me, but a few weeks on from reading it I think it was perfect. Katarina and Heath were made for each other and I spent the entire book screaming at them 😂

The Favourites by Layne Fargo
Elite figure skating, a complicated, coming of age love story, friendships, obsession and multi media storytelling? What's not to love? I thoroughly enjoyed Fargo’s storytelling as we followed our MC’s from their early days through to competing at the Olympics and beyond. I was very invested in all parts of this story and couldn’t put it down. Highly recommend
Thank you to Random House UK, Vintage | Chatto & Windus and Netgalley for access to an early copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

This book was an emotional rollercoaster—if the rollercoaster was the kind that’s been banned because it has killed multiple people.

The story follows Katarina Shaw, a former Olympic figure skater whose partnership—and entanglement—with fellow skater Heath Rocha captured the world’s attention both on and off the ice. I’ve always been a bit fascinated by figure skating, in the same way I'm interested in people who climb Everest. I know I'm never going to do it but want to scratch beneath the surface of what makes the people who do these things tick. This book certainly delivered on giving an insight into the glamour, the precision and the theatre of it all so getting to see that world up close, with all its beauty and brutality, completely hooked me. Kat and Heath’s skating partnership is the heart of the story, but their relationship is messy, obsessive, toxic in ways that feels completely believable.

The novel alternates between Kat’s perspective as she finally tells her side of the story ten years after a shocking Olympic incident, and transcripts from a documentary about their rise and fall. I enjoyed this narrative choice, it gave the book a really dynamic, almost voyeuristic feel, like you’re piecing together a scandal in real time from interviews and soundbites. It added layers to the characters because you’re seeing how others perceive them versus how they see themselves. I kept thinking that it would make such a brilliant film or TV series. The format, the skating sequences, the high-stakes drama—it’s made for the screen.

The pacing was a bit uneven at the start, and I found it dragged a bit. I also wanted the estrangement between Kat and Heath to simmer a little longer, to dig even deeper into the angst before things started unravelling again. But once it took off, it was wild from start to finish, and I couldn’t put it down. The ending was the perfect bittersweet blend of catharsis and ambiguity, staying true to the complicated, tangled relationship at the book’s core. About half an hour or so from finishing the book I was sure I'd hate the ending but it worked for me in the end.

If you like messy characters, morally grey dynamics, and a backstage pass to the dark side of competitive sports, this one’s worth the ride. And seriously—someone needs to adapt this. I’d watch it in a heartbeat.

Oh it's also a riff on Wuthering Heights if that wasn't clear enough from the name but there's no digging up of corpses this time (unfortunately)

An utterly captivating contemporary romance set against the glittering, high-stakes world of figure skating. The Favourites is as sharp as a triple axel and just as breathtaking—delivering a story rich with emotional nuance, simmering chemistry, and characters you can’t help but root for (even when they’re at odds). Fargo perfectly balances ambition and vulnerability, crafting a slow-burn romance that feels both authentic and electrifying. The competitive skating backdrop adds intensity without overshadowing the tender, complicated love story at its heart.

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for the opportunity to read an advance copy.

Never did I think that a Wuthering Heights retelling would fit so seamlessly into the world of figure skating! The stakes were real, the drama was on point and the suspense was insane.