Sports Books That Everyone Will Love
Even if you don't love sports: WSIR #19
Why sports-related books, you ask? Well, partially in honor of March Madness. And partially because after last week’s series of heartbreaking books, not to mention the general Time In Which We Live, I’m confident most of us can use a dose of the “hope springs eternal” messages that sports themes offer - even if you’re not a fan of sports themselves.
Total sidebar, but what do we think March Madness for books would be? Personally, I don't want to pit books against each other in a bracket-style showdown; every book is a winner to someone. So I imagine it much like a political day of action I attended once, where amidst the trading-floor cacophony of phone banking and candidate stumping, there was a quiet table in the center where all of us introvert-activists were happily writing “Get Out The Vote” postcards in convivial, creative silence, punctuated only by the occasional request for more paper. My Book March Madness dream: productively reading side by side at a great, uninterrupted velocity!
But back to this week’s list: I *do* happen to be a sports fan, for many of the same reasons that I’m a fan of books that ably use sports as the backdrop — because sports are such a microcosm for life itself and some of its most important lessons of dedication, hard work, fairness, team play, and resilience. And because we can collectively share in the happy endings or heartbreak of our favorite player’s wins and losses while also remembering that with every new season or game, the slate is washed clean and as a team, as a group, as a family or even as one individual, we usually get another shot to do it right.
But even if sports are decidedly not your jam, these are all great reads and I promise you don’t need to know a thing about sports to enjoy them! So I hope you find something here to love.
The Art of Fielding is a novel about a gifted shortstop who, toward the end of his meteoric college baseball career, throws an off-course ball that changes everything and renders him essentially incapable of playing. It’s a really moving and well-crafted story about potential, and failure, and how to live a different life than the one you first imagined. Like baseball itself - warm and timeless.
OK, this murder mystery set against Olympic-level gymnastics is the opposite of warm and timeless but it IS a Total Thriller. My friend Jill, who is the most discriminating fiction reader I know, turned me on to Megan Abbott by saying “she’s so dark but so great” and man, does that describe You Will Know Me, an electric, visceral, suspenseful book that perfectly depicts teenage girls, the desire for apex success, and the price of obsessively pursing a dream.
I first read (and re-read) Friday Night Lights 25 years ago when it came out and I can still quote snippets of it. It’s narrative non-fiction about a year in the life of a Texas high school football team, and it’s such an unsparing but also deeply empathetic, very human look at a town through the lens of race, and class, and opportunity, and passionate fandom, and the sheer joy and short-sightedness and dispensability of teenagers in this football system. It’s not new, but it’s SO good. (No, I didn’t see the movie nor the TV show starring Connie Britton’s hair, but I understand they are good as well. Should I watch them?)
I also liked The Blind Side for many of the same reasons: it’s readable, Malcolm Gladwell-y analytical nonfiction that looks at the evolution of the modern NFL game at a macro level (the economics and intricacies of the left tackle position and the eye-popping corruption of college recruiting) and at a micro, human level via the story of teenage Michael Oher, who finds football success, stability and opportunity through an adopted family. It’s also a fascinating look at racial and class inequality with less white-washed Disney stardust than the movie starring Sandra Bullock’s perfectly tailored dresses. I’ll acknowledge that you *do* probably need to be at least a little interested in, or at least tolerant of, football to read this book.
Lastly, if you just want a good best-selling story, for heaven’s sake, go on ahead and read The Art of Racing in the Rain, about a Formula One racer and his family, told from the perspective of his dog, Enzo. Yes, it’s a little corny and no, it won’t win a Pulitzer for literature, but it is big-hearted. You’ll laugh, you will definitely cry (I mean, it’s an animal story. Need I say more?) And, the author was a semi-pro driver so it has those necessarily specific details about the sport that make all the difference in grounding these kinds of books.
Want more escapism? Find it here or just watch Ted Lasso, which is as good as everyone tells you it is.
A Year of Shakespeare: Currently in Fair Verona
This week, I chose to start Romeo and Juliet, in part because I’m dreading all the histories. I’m also genuinely curious to see how it plays as a reader who’s not a teenager identifying with our star-cross’d lovers but an adult possibly understanding the villainous older family members (like when you suddenly start thinking that Benny from Rent has some reasonable positions.)
And lastly: as an experiment, I’ve linked all of these books to my affiliate page on Bookshop.org, which supports independent bookstores. Any money received from these links will be donated to my favorite charity, Defy Ventures, which works with currently and formerly incarcerated men and women to transform their futures via holistic life and entrepreneurial skills. You can find all past recos on my Bookshop.org page here.
But however you find your books, please consider supporting independent bookstores and libraries! And thank you, as always, for being here. I’m truly grateful for every comment and subscriber.