Little Girls in Pretty Boxes, Joan Ryan
Little Girls in Pretty Boxes, Joan Ryan
List: $19.99 | Sale: $13.99
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Little Girls in Pretty Boxes
The Making and Breaking of Elite Gymnasts and Figure Skaters

Author: Joan Ryan

Narrator: Jennifer Jill Araya

Unabridged: 8 hr 34 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Tantor Media

Published: 02/09/2021


Synopsis

Welcome to the world of women's gymnastics and figure skating—the real world that happens away from the cameras, at the training camps and in the private lives of these talented teenage competitors. From starvation diets and debilitating injuries to the brutal tactics of tyrannical gymnastics guru Béla Károlyi, Little Girls in Pretty Boxes portrays the horrors endured by girls at the hands of their coaches and sometimes their own families—and is now updated with a new introduction and foreword that address the sexual abuse scandal perpetrated by USA Gymnastics national team doctor, Larry Nassar. This groundbreaking book shows how a longstanding culture of abuse made young gymnasts perfect targets for a sexual predator, and continues to plead for sanity, safety, and an end to our national obsession: winning at any cost.

About Joan Ryan

Joan Ryan is an award-winning journalist and the author of four books. Her groundbreaking book Little Girls in Pretty Boxes was named one of the Top 100 Sports Books of All Time by Sports Illustrated and one of the Top 50 Sports Books of All Time by the Guardian. Throughout her career, Ryan has been awarded thirteen Associated Press Sports Editors awards, the National Headliner Award, the Women's Sports Foundation's Journalism Award and the Fabulous Feminist Award from the San Francisco chapter of NOW. She is a founding trustee of Coaching Corps in Oakland, CA, and the Association of Women in Sports Media. Since 2008, she has been a media consultant with the San Francisco Giants.


Reviews

Twenty years before most of us heard the name Larry Nassar, the Gymnastics who molested over 150 gymnasts and other athletes, journalist Joan Ryan wrote LITTLE GIRLS IN PRETTY BOXES about the often dark secrets behind competitive gymnastics and figure skating. I still gave my copy from 1995 which I......more

Goodreads review by Meave

Not nearly as tawdry as promised. In the prologue it was all sexual abuse and this and that all over the place, but the book was mostly eating disorders and injuries. Eating disorders, eh, the ways losing 10 pounds in a week affect your gymnastics skills, no surprise there. Maybe it was more shockin......more