Review: "Chellsie's Challenges" by Chellsie Memmel

Chellsie's Challenges by Chellsie Memmel
Published March 2023
★★

Heartfelt but underdeveloped. Memmel is a top gymnast—she has more than a few gold medals to her name, plus an Olympic silver—and this slim book takes the reader through some of her competitions. Unfortunately, while the writing is fine, the structure and plotting leave something to be desired. The first half of the book is a runthrough of early life and competitions up until she retired; there's a brief break where she talks about doing other things, like getting married and having kids and trying out American Ninja Warrior, and then most of the second half is about returning to gymnastics. (I do appreciate that when Memmel started gymnastics, her gymnast parents put her in a gym other than their own for the sake of boundaries and maintaining a healthy relationship—I've read too many memoirs talking about parent-coach relationships being difficult!) But it's short: the Kindle edition clocks in at 68 pages, leaving precious little time for things like character development or what it felt like to be in the gym, or on the competition floor, or even things like how she met her husband.

Obviously I don't know whether Memmel looked for an established publisher (and, if so, what conversations were had) or whether she always intended to self-publish, but I wish she'd gone the established-publisher route and worked with a ghostwriter to really flesh out her story. It seems to be that this is one perk of being on a global stage—if you want to tell your story, there are absolutely publishers out there who will want to help you shape that story and amplify your voice. There's potential here, but it's not fully tapped.