One Fall

Professional wrestling is a form of entertainment as fascinating as it is misunderstood. Baum understands it, though - it interests people as much for what goes on outside the ring as inside, and for the stories being told as for the action and athleticism. It's a timeless, unique form of drama, and at its best its damned entertaining.

One Fall takes place during one of the most interesting times in pro wrestling - the “Monday Night Wars” of the early 2000s, with the Global Wrestling Alliance and Revolution Wrestling taking the place of WCW and the WWF. It's not a straight analogue, though - Baum is a better storyteller than that, so he takes the elements of reality that make for a great story, twists them together, and adds fiction where appropriate. The result is a story that's a must-read for fans of pro wrestling, although I'm not sure how appealing it would be to others.

this is a fantasy version of the monday nights falls set in slightly more contemporary times and with fantasy versions of the wwf and wcw with a very smarky bent. If none of that made sense to you this book probably isnt for you. The book makes a decent effort to explain terms and concepts and I cant tell how much itd help a complete stranger to wrestling but even if - it is so stock full of allusions to real world wrestling stuff and things you just wont get if you werent at some point at least a little bit invested in the world of pro wrestling. If you are – read on

this was very readable and hard to put down. I constantly was wondering what happened next. I think this book captured what makes pro wrestling so exciting to follow both in kayfabe and out perfectly. The onstage performances to the backstage politics to the fans. Sadly it also captures the worst of wrestling and not in a good way. Yeah sure it portrays the shit female wrestlers had/have to face and I have no problems with it its accurate after all. However at times it seems the book falls into the same pitfalls.
There is a lengthy tirade near the end of a book about the omther of some minor character who is apparently an evil activist feminist who decides his son will grow up to be evil because he has a penis (not an exact quote but very close to it). This isnt relavant to anythign the character in question is very minor and the backstory doesnt come up again. It sticks out like a sore thumb and just made me weary of the book.
Another example is a minor character who is a writer and she is seemingly just be there to be humiliated about how bad her writing ideas are in her own pov scenes. In other scenes she barely shows up except at some point when the main character notes that she probably sucks at writing based on the fact that she has great legs. This felt so out of place considering he at that point is dating an internation sex symbol who he admits is also a great wrestler.
Those two are ultimately small examples in a big novel but the undercurrent of it is always there and leaves a bad taste in the mouth. It didn't keep me from my enjoyment overall. Funnily enough it reminded me of actually watching wrestling. Wrestling fans especially those of us that arent male or straight or whatever are experts at compertimentalizing shit after all. And this wasn't nearly as bad as the sort of stuff I generally have to put up with in wrestling.

My other big criticism is the amount of simply uneccessary scenes. One character, lucifer it seemed at first was being set up as important. We got his backstory (including his aforementioned mother) how he got into the business etc.... And then nothing until the very end. Did I miss a few scenes? If this was a series id understand maybe it's setting up for something in the next book but I dont get the impression this was ever meant to be one.

I focused more on the negative because as a wrestling fan thats what comes easier to me (just kidding..or am I). but this was extremely enjoyable despite anything else. I think wrestling in fiction has a lot of untapped potential and I hope I see more of it in the future.