The bad*ss story of a crew of female, queer, bi, and nonbinary skaters who charted a path to the Olympics and changed the face of an entire sport.
Who gets to tell the story of skateboarding? For most of its history, skateboarding has been dominated by men. It’s time to set the record straight.
Drop In is the first book to tell a different tale about skateboarding by recognizing and historicizing the female, queer, bi, and nonbinary humans responsible for today’s more equitable skate culture.
It wasn’t easy getting here.
In the 70s, skate personified the punk rock, lock-up-your-daughters, middle-finger-to-the-man ethos. In the 80s, it was Miami Vice soundtracks and parachute pants, neon graphics and fingerless gloves. In the 90s it was New York—graffiti, hip-hop, street. In all those decades, skateboarding was patriarchal, just like the rest of the world. Rarely did you see a woman’s name in a skate video—either on a deck or behind the lens.
The four skateboarders at the heart of Deb Stoll’s dynamic narrative defy expectations. Alana as the first openly nonbinary athlete in Olympic history; Vanessa as the first trailblazing gold medalist at the X Games; Marbie as a boundary pushing trans skater; and Victoria as a rookie turned social media sensation. Drop In vividly recounts their journeys to prominence, from rebellious outsiders to the historic stage of the 2021 Tokyo Olympics, where skateboarding made its monumental debut. Their experiences offer a new collective story about skateboarding, amplifying the voices that have long been overlooked.
