Read Off Balance: A Memoir Online
Authors: Dominique Moceanu
Off Balance: A Memoir
“When you have traveled the world, won Olympic gold, and gone through a very public court battle against your parents all by the age of seventeen, surprises don’t come easy. Discovering my sister Jennifer, though—that was a surprise.”
More than a decade after winning gold at the U.S. Olympics, in the middle of college final exams, and nine months pregnant with her first child, Dominique Moceanu got a letter out of the blue that turned everything she thought she knew about her family upside down. The writer was her biological sister, given up for adoption by their parents when Moceanu was just six years old.
This unimaginable scenario caused her to question everything she believed about her family and her life … and reopened some old wounds about her unrelenting years of training and the often-dark underbelly of Olympic gymnastics. Ultimately, Moceanu finds a way to embrace her new family—and accept her past—in order to reclaim her life and the sport she loves.
AT FOURTEEN YEARS OLD
, Dominique Moceanu was the youngest member of the 1996 U.S. Women’s Olympic Gymnastics team, the first and only American women’s team to take gold at the Olympics. Her pixyish appearance and ferocious competitive drive quickly earned her the status of media darling. But behind the fame, the flawless floor routines, and the million-dollar smile, her life was a series of challenges and hardships.
Off Balance
vividly delineates each of the dominating characters who contributed to Moceanu’s rise to the top, from her stubborn father and long-suffering mother to her mercurial coach, Bela Karolyi. Here, Moceanu finally shares the haunting stories of competition, her years of hiding injuries and pain out of fear of retribution from her coaches, and how she hit rock bottom after a public battle with her parents.
But medals, murder plots, drugs, and daring escapes aside (all of which figure into Moceanu’s incredible journey), the most unique aspect of her life is the family secret that Moceanu discovers, opening a new and unexpected chapter in her adult life. A mysterious letter from a stranger reveals that she has a second sister—born with a physical disability and given away at birth—who has nonetheless followed in Moceanu’s footsteps in an astonishing way.
A multilayered memoir that transcends the world of sports,
Off Balance
will touch anyone who has ever dared to dream of a better life.
DOMINIQUE MOCEANU
is the youngest American gymnast to win an Olympic gold medal, and the youngest to win a Senior National All-Around title. She lives with her husband and two children near Cleveland, Ohio.
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JACKET DESIGN BY MARLYN DANTES
JACKET PHOTOGRAPH BY ANNIE LEIBOVITZ
BACK JACKET PHOTOGRAPH COURTESY OF THE AUTHOR
AUTHOR PHOTOGRAPH © ROBERT CHAPMAN
COPYRIGHT © 2012 SIMON & SCHUSTER
