/UCWE/ - Figure skating expert Alina Adams understands the timing and value of a well-executed move. In 2002, months before an American teen came out of nowhere to win the Olympic Gold medal, Adams published the biography SARAH HUGHES: SKATING TO THE STARS. Being the only volume available on the young skater, the book became a best-seller and catapulted Adams into the spotlight as a sought-after new voice in the discussion of a much beloved sport.
With her new novel, AXEL OF EVIL, Adams anticipates that the timing is right once again for the world to rediscover heroine Bex Levy and her world of blade-bearing, score-fixing protagonists. At the center of this mystery, set in Moscow, is Igor Marchenko. A former skating Champion and world-renowned coach who first made news twenty-five years earlier for his defection to America during the height of the US-USSR Cold War, Igor lay dead in a Moscow skating rink Now Bex Levy, researcher for the 24/7 sports network, has been ordered by her boss to help solve the crime on live television. AXEL OF EVIL is scheduled for release January 3, 2006.
”The lucky thing about this series is that I get to use the world of figure skating to discuss a wide range of issues that resonate outside of the ice rink.,” Adams explains. “The first book, MURDER ON ICE, was about the media’s manipulation of reality. The second, ON THIN ICE, dealt with child and spousal abuse. The current title, AXEL OF EVIL, goes beyond the stories we see during the Olympics for a look at what life was really like for Soviet-era athletes during the Cold War…and afterwards. It is also the first book where we really get to see the heroine, Box Levy’s, life away from work, and the development of a potential romance --- something readers have been asking me for since the series began!”
Adams has drawn from her own extensive knowledge of figure skating to create the third in what critics have called a “must-read” series. A former producer and skating researcher for ABC, CBS, TNT and ESPN, Adams has incorporated her real-life experiences with the larger-than-life personalities in the field into a fun and fast-paced read. Publisher Berkley Prime Crime has recently ordered two more volumes of the Figure Skating Mysteries, to be released in 2007 and 2008.
Born in the Soviet Union and raised in San Francisco, Adams sold her first novel when she was just 23 years old. Since then she has proven both versatile and prolific, writing across a variety of genres with a unique voice and trademark wit.
Check out Adams’ daily blog:
www.figureskatingmystery.com , for more insight into the world of figure skating.
