André
It's wonderful to have an oral history of Drag Race but this book has several glaring issues.
The biggest of them is that, being produced by WOW, you get a sanitized corporate history here. Various issues are glanced over or not mentioned at all, and critical voices and people who are not in WOW's good graces, such as former contestants Willam, Carmen Carrera, or Courtney Act, or former staff members such as Mathu Andersen, are mentioned but never get to tell their story. I doubt they were even asked to take part. Scandals and moments in the history of the show where it faced pushback from within the queer community are entirely absent, which feels cowardly.
It's also just not very informative beyond the opening chapter, and could have done with much more aggressive editing. Once they recount season after season of the show, it's largely fluff, and information any fan would have been aware of already - you expect more new information in such a long book. There are often stretches where multiple people are quoted saying essentially the same thing, or making fluffy statements with no real content about how amazing the show or the contestants or RuPaul are, and a better oral history would have cut down on all those repetitive, zero calorie statements and removed those that don't add anything valuable.
All that then comes at the expense of the All Stars seasons just being briefly recounted all in one chapter together, as if they weren't just as important as the regular seasons, rushed through, and the international franchises and the expanded Drag Race franchise (conventions, tours, spin-off shows...) getting barely a mention.
It's messy and not at all the definitive history it presents itself as.
It's wonderful to have an oral history of Drag Race but this book has several glaring issues.
The biggest of them is that, being produced by WOW, you get a sanitized corporate history here. Various issues are glanced over or not mentioned at all, and critical voices and people who are not in WOW's good graces, such as former contestants Willam, Carmen Carrera, or Courtney Act, or former staff members such as Mathu Andersen, are mentioned but never get to tell their story. I doubt they were even asked to take part. Scandals and moments in the history of the show where it faced pushback from within the queer community are entirely absent, which feels cowardly.
It's also just not very informative beyond the opening chapter, and could have done with much more aggressive editing. Once they recount season after season of the show, it's largely fluff, and information any fan would have been aware of already - you expect more new information in such a long book. There are often stretches where multiple people are quoted saying essentially the same thing, or making fluffy statements with no real content about how amazing the show or the contestants or RuPaul are, and a better oral history would have cut down on all those repetitive, zero calorie statements and removed those that don't add anything valuable.
All that then comes at the expense of the All Stars seasons just being briefly recounted all in one chapter together, as if they weren't just as important as the regular seasons, rushed through, and the international franchises and the expanded Drag Race franchise (conventions, tours, spin-off shows...) getting barely a mention.
It's messy and not at all the definitive history it presents itself as.