A year in wrestling with Blakwidow
By GREG OLIVER -- SLAM! Wrestling
Blakwidow: My First Year as a Professional Wrestler
By Amanda Storm
ECW Press
$19.95 Cdn, $17.95 US
ISBN 1-55022-431-X
One of the regular emails that comes in to SLAM! Wrestling is the 'How
do I become a wrestler?' question. There's a standard reply that is sent
out telling people to finish high school, work on their body, and have
something to fall back on should their dream not succeed.
And now there's a book to recommend to them as well. Blakwidow: My First
Year as a Professional Wrestler, by independent wrestler Amanda Storm,
spells out much of the trials and tribulations that face any wannabe
wrestler.
Storm gave up life in California to train to be a wrestler, travelling
across the U.S. to train with the legendary
Wladek 'Killer' Kowalski at his
Massachussets school -- one of the few that would train a woman.
The fact that she trained with Kowalski is an important one, because he
also trained the hottest woman wrestler on the planet in Chyna.
Apparently, Storm gets a lot of comparisons to Chyna, despite the fact
that she is not a bodybuilder, a Playmate or a superstar in the WWF.
"I don't think that I'm all that similar to Chyna, despite having gone
to the same wrestling school and both being women," Storm writes. "But
when I'm a heel I sometimes play up the similarities by doing a lot more
of HHH's moves than usual and working in a low blow or two. Then when
the fans yell that I'm a 'Chyna wanna-be' I get mad and scream, 'I'm not
a Chyna wanna-be! I'm Amanda God-damn Storm and I'd destroy her or any
other man, woman, or child who is stupid enough to step into the ring
with me!'"
Storm is actually Alexandra Whitney, but that's about all the real facts
you'll learn about her. You don't learn when she was born, where she
grew up, what her childhood was like -- except for the fact that she
watched a lot of wrestling with her grandfather. She sticks to the
wrestling, even when it may have helped the reader better understand her
motivations to go into further detail.
For example, at different points she mentions being in a motorcycle
gang, being in the army, and having cancer, but nothing more than
mentioning it. This may not be a big deal to the teen reading this book to
learn a little about what it's like to break into pro wrestling, but to
the book reviewer it's a fairly serious flaw.
What is pretty good about the book is the writing. An English major in
college, Storm turns a good phrase and seems to have really given some
thought to what makes her, and others, want to be wrestlers.
My personal favourite is when she's describing a promotion in
Sacramento, which sums up far too many of the characters I've met during
my fifteen plus years covering pro wrestling. "The SVWA was basically
run by a man who conned whoever he could into fronting money for his
next show, which he would promptly lose by booking too many stars,
apparently so he could have his picture taken with them."
In another instance, she writes about what is behind an indy wrestler's
dream. "We small-time wrestlers get our fame in Warholian doses, one
weekend at a time. We are stars of the moment, from the instant we step
into that ring until we leave the building and drive off in our Yugos.
In a way we are like shooting stars that burn brightly with the
timekeeper's bell and wink out with the referee's 1-2-3. Then we go back
to our lives as housewives, girlfriends, deli clerks, and software
manual writers."
From a Canadian perspective, Storm's story takes into account her
appearances at
Jacques Rougeau Jr.'s Lutte International 2000 shows (but for
some reason her opponent
Precious Lucy declined to be mentioned by name
in the book), and her six-week tour with the Can-Am Wrestling promotion
in the Prairies.
In the end, Blakwidow: My First Year as a Professional Wrestler is a
decent read, but more importantly, it offers a much more realistic
portrayal of what awaits the wannabe. It's all fine and good that
The
Rock or Mick Foley can write bestsellers, but only a tiny percentage of
those who train to be wrestlers will ever attain their heights. Amanda
Storm's book is a tribute to all those who will never get there.
