Let's Book Club!: The Art of a Beautiful Game by Chris Ballard

Chris Ballard's The Art of a Beautiful Game is subtitled The Thinking Fan's Tour of the NBA, which in my estimation, is a slightly misleading title. At once the book seeks to detail the nuance of a variety of different parts of the game: Kobe's killer instinct, Steve Nash's passing, shooting with Steve Kerr. However, the book only touches on these subjects in broad, general terms. In essence, it's a "thinking fans" guide to the NBA... if the fan only has a grammar school education.

The chapters, each of which tackles a different aspect of the game, tend to follow this formula: introduction to the subject, a reader's digest background on the subject, a bunch of quotes from other people about the person and subject, summary of chapter/thoughts on the future of the aspect of the game.

My biggest gripe with the book is that it appears the book was written based solely off interviews and personal anecdotes. Now, there's certainly nothing wrong with that, and that's the way that the majority of sports journalism is done, and that works well the two column articles that show up in the local sports pages. But, to qualify as something for a "thinking fan" there has to be some degree of, a) background knowledge of the literature in that area; and b) original research. Even for a mass market book I'd settle for a summary of new original research (see Gladwell, Malcolm), but, unfortunately, Ballard manages to cite exactly one book through the entire 200 pages.

So, my recommendation would be that if you are familiar with things like PER, true shooting percentage, a pinch post, then this might be a book to pass on... you're not going to get anything new. On the other hand, it is a well written book with some fun anecdotes, so if you're not planning on attending the Sloan Conference at MIT (or have no idea what I'm talking about), then it may be a fun little read.

Grade: C

Up next: After how easy I found this one, I think I'm going to head back to A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius.

2011 Book Club Results

1. Into the Wild | John Krakauer (207 pages) | B-

2. Dance Dance Dance| Haruki Murakami (393 pages)| A-

3. The Undisputed Guide to Pro Basketball History| Free Darko (not applicable)|A

4. The Art of a Beautiful Game| Chris Ballard (228 pages)| C

Let's Book Club!: Free Darko Presents The Undisputed Guide to Pro Basketball History

In his book What is History E.H. Carr distinguishes between "facts of the past" and "historical fact" arguing that, if I remember correctly, "facts of the past" are forgotten and "historical facts" are what historians have collectively deemed important. Therefore, the thesis from Carr is that history is constructed by those that write it, meaning the stories of the marginalized are often under represented or not represented at all. In Carr's view, history isn't an accumulation of facts, history is about how stories are framed into a coherent narrative.

In the The Undisputed Guide to Pro Basketball History, the Free Darko collective have taken the grand narratives of basketball history and have deconstructed NBA history beyond just dates and facts. For those not familiar with the Free Darko, their writing is highly literate often drawing on references from the classics to current, and often obscure, pop-culture references. If basketball is an art form, as its oft described, then the latest collection of short essays from Free Darko is art-history. The magic of all this is that they do this without sounding arrogant or pretentious, and they do it in a way that captures the characters in basketball.

While having the appearance of a coffee table book akin to Jon Stewart's America: The Book, the writing is much more than reader's digest clips of the past. Stylistically, the book is stunning, with some graphics that will knock your socks off, but the prose in the The Undisputed Guide is what makes the guys at Free Darko some of the most interesting writing in basketball today.

At the beginning, the pre-history of basketball from Naismith to the beginning of the ABA does read a little like a history text, but without any real source material there really wasn't any room to do what Free Darko does. And what they do, is pick the untold swag out of the history of professional basketball -- they tell the stories that are untold in the popular myths about professional basketball, and they cast a new light on the stories that we do know -- the similarities between Wilt/Russell and the fun of the Duncan/Popovich San Antonio Spurs, for example. While wins and losses are significant, to Free Darko, they are only as significant as the way they make us feel about the dynamics, style, and players on the team.

Most interestingly, the authors examine how the giants of the game Russell and Jordan, impact how we look at mere mortals like Elgin Baylor, Jerry West, Oscar Robertson; and Barkley and Malone. They look at the eclectic early 70s New York Knicks (future Senator Bill Bradley, Phil Jackson, Walt Frazier, Willis Reed, etc.), the similarities between Kareem and Bill Walton, how the 1984 draft (Olajuwon, Jordan, Barkley) transformed the draft from business transaction into spectacle, and the beauty of AI's individual approach to playing a team game. In each section of the book the writers of Free Darko are able to find the art/style/meaning in their subjects (yes, even the Duncan/Popovich San Antonio Spurs).

The real morale from The Undisputed Guide is that, there's meaning to the game beyond championships and popular myths of heroism, that often, the narratives that go untold are equally meaningful.

Grade: A

Upnext: I'm reading Dave Eggers A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, which I'm Foster Wallacianly dense, so I'll probably mix that in with Chris Ballard's Art of a Beautiful Game. I'm expecting the Eggers book to take a little so expect thoughts on the Ballard book next...

2011 Book Club Results

1. Into the Wild | John Krakauer (207 pages) | B-

2. Dance Dance Dance| Haruki Murakami (393 pages)| A-

3. The Undisputed Guide to Pro Basketball History| Free Darko (not applicable)|A

Let's Book Club!: Dance, Dance, Dance by Haruki Murakami

I'm not sure whether I have anything really earth shattering to say about Haruki Murakami's Dance Dance Dance. The book is another solid addition in Murakami's rather impressive collection. It doesn't move the reader (me) on the same scale that Kafka on the Shore or Norwegian Wood did, and it's not an epic story like The Wind-Up Bird Cronicle (which may well be one of my favourite works of fiction of all time), but it's good.

After looking at Murakami's bookography, Dance Dance Dance falls right after Norwegian Wood a novel which garnered him much unwanted fame in his native Japan. NW was a more prototypical novel, without the strange surreal elements that often makes Murakami's work so different, and DDD seems to be a return to the strange.

The more I think about it, the more I think I actually really enjoyed Dance Dance Dance. I did, after all, read the entire book in 4 days. But, it's probably not the book I'd recommend first to people who haven't read anything by the Japanese super-star author... I'd check out the other ones I mentioned above first.

Grade: A-

Up next: Probably Chris Ballard's The Art of a Beautiful Game... I ordered approximately 100 basketball books from Amazon, so, it's going to be a lot of that in the next while. That said, I'm pretty keen on reading Murakami's memoirs What I Talk About When I Talk About Running.

2011 Book Club Results

1. Into the Wild | John Krakauer (207 pages) | B-

2. Dance Dance Dance| Haruki Murakami (393 pages)| A-

Let's Book Club!: Race in Play by Carl James

I suspect that this book is probably not going to be for everyone. It's a very academic look at race, and the student-athlete, or, in many cases athlete-student. So, rather than me getting into my thoughts on students' construction of their athletic identity and so forth, I'm going to very highly recommend that you read The Last Shot by Darcy Frey (cited a number of times in this book), which is like a literary version of Hoop Dreams, but shorter and better.

Up next: I'm just about to order "Miracle at St. Anthony's" (about Bob Hurley and his high school basketball dynasty in Jersey City) -- see the movie trailer (excellent) here -- though, after reading Race in Play I'm much more critical of Hurley's reputation; a couple of books on sport philosophy/sociology; "Season on the Brink" about Bobby Knight and the '85/'86 Indiana Basketball team; and the "Jordan Rules" about MJ. We'll see which one of these emerges out of the pack... or, if I can finish any of them before the end of the year...

1. The Inner Game of Tennis | Timothy Gallwey (134 pages) | A
2. The Last Shot | Darcy Frey (240 pages) | A+
3. The Road | Cormac McCarthy (287 pages) | A+
4. Outliers | Malcolm Gladwell (299 pages) | C+
5. The Last Season | Phil Jackson (304 pages) | B-
6. The Sunset Limited | Cormac McCarthy (160 pages)| B-
7. The Education of a Coach | David Halberstam (288 pages)| B+
8. Downtown Owl | Chuck Klosterman | (288 pages)| B
9. Can I Keep My Jersey?| Paul Shirley| (336 pages)|C-
10. Then We Came to The End| Joshua Ferris| (416 pages)|B+
11. Friday Night Lights| H.G. Bissinger|(400 pages)|A++
12. Strokes of Genius| L. Jon Wertheim|(208 pages)|B
13. Who's Your City| Richard Florida|( 345 pages)|C
14. Brief Interviews with Hideous Men| (336 pages)|A
15. The Book of Basketball| Bill Simmons|(736 pages)|C-
16. A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again|David Foster Wallace| (368 pages)|A-
17. Race in Play| Carl James|(258) pages|n/a

Let's Book Club!: A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again (prt. 2) by David Foster Wallace

Part 1, the first three essays.

David Lynch Keeps His Head
Not really sure what to say, since, you know, I've never seen anything that David Lynch -- a filmmaker -- has ever produced/directed/acted in/been involved with, I think. Having said that, DFW's descriptions of everything outside of detailed comparisons of his (Lynch's) different films is insanely entertaining.

Tennis Player Michael Joyce's Professional... (cont'd)
If you don't have any idea of what goes on behind the scenes at a professional tennis tournament, or don't know what tennis' minor leagues are like (but you care), this is a really interesting read. The essay, for me at least, is significantly more interesting because it's set in MTL during the (now named) Roger's Cup (somewhere I've been!).

The part of the essay that leads me to believe that DFW may have been the modern incarnation of Nostradamus: he describes Agassi's groundstrokes as "like Borg if he were on both steroids and methamphetamines".

A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again
... is the best essay of the bunch, but is also the most tragic (though the writing itself is hilarious), which, as I mentioned when discussing "Suicide as a Sort of Present" in Brief Interviews, is how down on life he sounds (in ASFTINDA), or how a vividly he talks about wanting to die (SAASOP). Sad.

Sad, yes, but at least he's given us something to smile about -- I mean, his whole interpretation of what a Cruise is, a Cruiseline's attempt to aggressively ensure that you relax and pamper yourself. The way he describes people moving in/on/around the Cruise Ship, "bovine", his interaction with his tablemates and his intense dislike for one of the women at his table as well as his feud with the ship's captain is indescribably funny.

Mostly, the essay works so well because going on a Cruise is generally something that people think they want to do; it is, supposedly, fun -- much like, say, going to a concert or sometype of sporting event. But DFW, as is his way, finds and uncovers all that is truly strange, when you really think about it, or, when you spend 50-60 pages analyzing it.

1. The Inner Game of Tennis | Timothy Gallwey (134 pages) | A
2. The Last Shot | Darcy Frey (240 pages) | A+
3. The Road | Cormac McCarthy (287 pages) | A+
4. Outliers | Malcolm Gladwell (299 pages) | C+
5. The Last Season | Phil Jackson (304 pages) | B-
6. The Sunset Limited | Cormac McCarthy (160 pages)| B-
7. The Education of a Coach | David Halberstam (288 pages)| B+
8. Downtown Owl | Chuck Klosterman | (288 pages)| B
9. Can I Keep My Jersey?| Paul Shirley| (336 pages)|C-
10. Then We Came to The End| Joshua Ferris| (416 pages)|B+
11. Friday Night Lights| H.G. Bissinger|(400 pages)|A++
12. Strokes of Genius| L. Jon Wertheim|(208 pages)|B
13. Who's Your City| Richard Florida|( 345 pages)|C
14. Brief Interviews with Hideous Men| (336 pages)|A
15. The Book of Basketball| Bill Simmons|(736 pages)|C-
16. A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again|(368 pages)|A-

Let's Book Club!: The Book of Basketball by Bill Simmons

I'm not sure I want to spend any sort of time writing a "review" of The Book of Basketball mostly because this Deadspin review says just about everything that needs to be said about Simmons and TBOB (thanks, Wasko).

But, a few random sort of thoughts on the book:

• A better title for the book probably would've been Everything I've Ever Thought About Basketball.
• There has been a lot of manufactured discussion by Simmons/ESPN/whoever about the length of the book and my thoughts are this: length isn't an issue if you have 700 pages worth of stuff to say. Simmons, in my opinion, did not have 700 pages worth of stuff to say. This becomes VERY apparent if you read the book all at once. It is highly, highly, repetitive.
  
• An extension of the second note: don't read the book all at once, keep it in the bathroom.

Grade: D (probably a B- if I hadn't read it all at once)

Next Up: Probably going to get back and try and finish The Dumbest Generation and/or the last three essays in DFW's A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again.

1. The Inner Game of Tennis | Timothy Gallwey (134 pages) | A
2. The Last Shot | Darcy Frey (240 pages) | A+
3. The Road | Cormac McCarthy (287 pages) | A+
4. Outliers | Malcolm Gladwell (299 pages) | C+
5. The Last Season | Phil Jackson (304 pages) | B-
6. The Sunset Limited | Cormac McCarthy (160 pages)| B-
7. The Education of a Coach | David Halberstam (288 pages)| B+
8. Downtown Owl | Chuck Klosterman | (288 pages)| B
9. Can I Keep My Jersey?| Paul Shirley| (336 pages)|C-
10. Then We Came to The End| Joshua Ferris| (416 pages)|B+
11. Friday Night Lights| H.G. Bissinger|(400 pages)|A++
12. Strokes of Genius| L. Jon Wertheim|(208 pages)|B
13. Who's Your City| Richard Florida|( 345 pages)|C
14. Brief Interviews with Hideous Men| (336 pages)|A
15. The Book of Basketball| Bill Simmons|(736 pages)|C-

Let's Book Club!: Open by Andre Agassi

For the record, I haven't read Open (yet, I'm planning on it), but there's been so much interesting commentary around the book that, being a tennis guy, I feel compelled to say something about my childhood idol.

By now you've heard (or you're hearing now) about his father chaining him to the court in the early mornings, the weave, the tanking, etc., etc., and oh... the crystal meth. I don't do a ton of reading on tennis stuff, but enough to hear that the likes of Safin, Martina Navratilova, and Nadal have come out and questioned why Agassi would make his crystal meth use public after all these years. Basically, their suggestion has been that: 1/that this hurts the game by damaging the public perception that the game is clean; and 2/ that this is a rather thinly veiled attempt to sell some books; which has led to the 40+ tennis playing community to think, why would he admit to this?

To me, while Safin's criticism comes off as a little bit of sour grapes, and I find it hard to hear Martina's from her high horse (she complains about everything), Nadal's concerns seem very reasonable. The thrust of Nadal's complaints against Agassi all seem to stem from his ability to taint the public's thinking about tennis as a 'clean' sport. His reasoning goes, if Agassi circumvented drug testing, why wouldn't other star players (potentially ones with bulging Popeye-esque biceps) be using drugs also? So, while Nadal's critique seems a little self-serving at first, at the heart of what Nadal is advocating for is honesty (Uncle Toni has raised him well), from Agassi and from the ATP.

That said, it doesn't seem to me that what Nadal is advocating for and Agassi's book is doing (coming clean) are really at odds. My impression is that honesty really is what is at the heart of this Agassi autobiography. He certainly doesn't need the money, particularly after having married Steffi Graf (and her accountant! BA-zing!), it seems like he just wants to tell the truth and get on with the rest of his life. Frankly, I'd be surprised if anyone watched him on 60 minutes and thought he was being anything other than completely honest...

And this is where Navratilova's Roger Clemens comparison is pretty out to lunch -- the reprehensible part about Clemens' behaviour was that, not only did he break the rules, but he lied about it afterward. Now Agassi, to his credit, is coming clean and we're upset about it?

I mean, I get what people are irked about -- particularly when people get into the he's so brave coming forward bullshit (should we be praising every athlete who doesn't do drugs and doesn't break the rules?), but that's not it either. I think the point being that everyone has their own challenges, and we ought to applaud people who are trying to improve themselves. He's trying to make up for past wrongs, and so good for him.

To sum up:

• Good for Agassi for coming clean, and kudos to him for all the do-gooding he's done post-crystal meth use.
  
• For someone without a G.E.D. he is very articulate and well spoken.
• To me the issue is not the type of drug use (recreational vs. performance enhancing) or even the drug use itself, it's that he was dishonest (a bad thing) and now he's being honest (a good thing).
  
• His honesty now (still a good thing), doesn't make up for his past dishonesty, but it certainly makes it better, and it also makes him... human...
  

... if you thought I had a lot to say about Open now, wait until I actually read the book...

Let's Book Club!: Brief Interviews with Hideous Men by David Foster Wallace

So, yeah, I finished another book. Finally. I think I'm feeling a little back to school guilt i.e. I'm not in school now, but it's September, okay, October -- but it's the fall -- which is a time when you ought be thinking/learning/growing, or, alternatively, pretending to think/learn/grow.

After attempting (and failing) to read The Infinite Jest at least a couple of times, but knowing that Foster Wallace is an incredibly interesting/challenging writer, I thought that his book of short stories, Brief Interviews with Hideous Men, would be a good warm-up (or, at the very least, I was curious to read the book before seeing the movie). Well, after reading through the bulk - say, the last third - of the book in the last two days or so I daresay that getting through The Infinite Jest seems pretty unlikely in the near future. It's certainly not that DFW is not a great writer, because there is no question that he is, but he may be too good, or, just too experimental at different points to get through 1,000 plus pages of tIJ (w/ footnotes).

The experimentation, at certain points during certain stories, works well -- e.g. the whole concept of omitting the interviewer's questions in the "Brief Interviews". Where I have the most trouble with DFW is when he gets into the overly technical/scientific/futuristic language/plots/sub-plots/footnotes which just requires so, so, so, much energy to concentrate and follow along.

The flip side to the technical/experimental nature of his writing is that often the technical/experimental nature leads to some really stunning sort of depth/complexity/nuance that he can find in the most basic human interactions. That, and again, with the B.I.s, the way DFW draws up these incredibly strange, neurotic, sick, bizarre, men with these strange, neurotic, sick, bizarre sexual experiences. Some of the B.I.s left me laughing out loud, some of them left me looking around, sort of incredulous, in a - did anyone else see/read that b/c I can't believe that someone put something that shockingly, hilariously, strange on paper, and at other points I was just left speechless.

For me, the saddest point of the book was the foreshadowing of the third last story "Suicide as a Sort of Present" (this will make more sense if you know that DFW committed suicide late last year). Who knows, maybe there's nothing there, but the way I read it, and how clearly he elucidates the anxiety and pain and the unmet expectations of the woman in the story makes you feel the struggle he must've been going through himself toward the end of/throughout his life. At any rate, despite how tough spots of this book are to get through, it's well worth reading for its unequivocal moments of brilliance.

Grade: A

Up next: More DFW, A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do AgainA

Movie Trailer dir. by John Krasinski



1. The Inner Game of Tennis | Timothy Gallwey (134 pages) | A
2. The Last Shot | Darcy Frey (240 pages) | A+
3. The Road | Cormac McCarthy (287 pages) | A+
4. Outliers | Malcolm Gladwell (299 pages) | C+
5. The Last Season | Phil Jackson (304 pages) | B-
6. The Sunset Limited | Cormac McCarthy (160 pages)| B-
7. The Education of a Coach | David Halberstam (288 pages)| B+
8. Downtown Owl | Chuck Klosterman | (288 pages)| B
9. Can I Keep My Jersey?| Paul Shirley| (336 pages)|C-
10. Then We Came to The End| Joshua Ferris| (416 pages)|B+
11. Friday Night Lights| H.G. Bissinger|(400 pages)|A++
12. Strokes of Genius| L. Jon Wertheim|(208 pages)|B
13. Who's Your City| Richard Florida|( 345 pages)|C
14. Brief Interviews with Hideous Men| (336 pages)|A

Let's Book Club: Who's Your City by Richard Florida

Kind of ironic that I've taken the time to read Who's Your City, a self-described "self-help" book about choosing the place where you live, both after I've moved to Toronto (last year) and after I've moved in Toronto (last week). But, I suppose if nothing else, its made me feel pretty good about the place Liz and I have moved to (downtown), presuming we can afford it.

Who's Your City, for those not familiar with Richard Florida and his ideas surrounding the creative class, explains that creative people drive the economy (duh), but that creative people are drawn to cool places with arts scenes, bars, amenities, pretty places, etc. (i.e. creative spaces draw creative people which drives economic growth), I think. Who's Your City doesn't so much build on these ideas, but repackages them in a way to make explicit that: 1/ you should know what kind lifestyle you want before moving somewhere -- don't move into the city if you like piece and quiet; 2/ if you want to find work, regions are specializing, so go to the region where your field is -- if you're interested in business and finance, come to Toronto!; 3/ the more money and education you have, the more choices you're going to have -- if you don't have money, you're screwed! Hello growing divide between the rich and poor!That last point is probably the most striking one that the book makes, since, if you're relatively self-aware, many of Florida's suggestions seem self-evident.

So, basically the nuts of all this is that if you have some money and are mobile there are a whole lot of opportunities in an increasingly complex, globalized world; if not, then prepare to get hosed. You can't live in the city, because its expensive (or really unsafe in the areas you can afford), nor can you afford to live out of the city (there is no public transportation, or work for people without skills), so, you're damned if you do and you're damned if you don't.

What all this means to me is that there is probably some good things that cities, or provinces (cities are "creatures of the province" - they don't actually exist anywhere in our constitution) or federal governments for that matter, can be doing to create nice places to live for everyone. I think Florida misses out on this point, that what is good/important for certain demographics, is probably good for everyone. If there are good schools, walkable streets, a vibrant nightlife, a viable arts scene, reliable transit, etc. that's good for everyone.

The Executive Summary: As you may be able to tell, its got me thinking, so bonus points for that. But, on the whole, I kind of wish I had read Rise of the Creative Class since it probably would've been less listy (this neighborhood in Toronto, Vancouver, San Franciso, New York are all like this...) and more of the academic ideas (stuff on why/how regions are specializing, etc.).

Grade: C

1. The Inner Game of Tennis | Timothy Gallwey (134 pages) | A
2. The Last Shot | Darcy Frey (240 pages) | A+
3. The Road | Cormac McCarthy (287 pages) | A+
4. Outliers | Malcolm Gladwell (299 pages) | C+
5. The Last Season | Phil Jackson (304 pages) | B-
6. The Sunset Limited | Cormac McCarthy (160 pages)| B-
7. The Education of a Coach | David Halberstam (288 pages)| B+
8. Downtown Owl | Chuck Klosterman | (288 pages)| B
9. Can I Keep My Jersey?| Paul Shirley| (336 pages)|C-
10. Then We Came to The End| Joshua Ferris| (416 pages)|B+
11. Friday Night Lights| H.G. Bissinger|(400 pages)|A++
12. Strokes of Genius| L. Jon Wertheim|(208 pages)|B
13. Who's Your City| Richard Florida|( 345 pages)|C

Let's Book Club! The Macrophenomenal Pro Basketball Almanac

The guys at Free Darko, which features some of the most poetic basketball writing around, have this book The Macrophenomenal Pro Basketball Almanac, which is essentially a coffee table book about some of the more interesting personalities in pro basketball. On the face of it this is exactly the kind of book that I should probably dislike. Basically, I like winners... guys who are do the little things, are good teammates, work hard, are humble, etc.; and the book's authors value entertainment over substance, personality over performance, and so forth.

But, I think what made the book a great read for me, given that I don't see the world of sports the same way they do, is that they are able to find redeeming value in the un-redeemable (see: Carter, Vince; McGrady, Tracy). They are able to look at characters like Ron Artest, Kobe Bryant, and Amare Stoudemire, examine their flaws without dwelling on them, and explore what makes each of the players that they discuss compelling to watch. Normally, watching someone like, say, Gilbert Arenas ("The Court is a Carnival" exerpt here) would make me want to tear my hair out. He's a hilarious guy, sure, but I definitely wouldn't be banking on an NBA title parade down Yonge St. if he landed in TO, and, I've always thought that that's the way you play sports: to win.

That said, I think that the Free Darko collective make me think that its possible to look at sports more like music (which, I suppose is appropriate given that this is a music blog, mostly)... it can be fun to watch Ron-Ron jack off balanced 3s, Kobe pretend to like his teammates, and Amare do his best imitation of a pylon on defence... but it doesn't mean that I want them on my team...

And it doesn't hurt that the pictures in the book are super-cool...

Let's Book Club: Strokes of Genius by L. Jon Wertheim

I'm not entirely sure what to say about Strokes of Genius by Jon Wertheim. He's easily my favourite tennis writer, I don't think there is anything better than his weekly(ish) Tennis Mailbag, but there's definitely something missing from making this a top-shelf sports book.

Certainly, part of what's missing has to do with the degree of difficulty of trying to describe the greatest tennis match ever played... there was a reason that the commentators (rightfully) said very little in the latter half of the match. For me, the best parts of the book were the backstories of R-Fed, Nadal, and the creation of the rivalry, which made me think why isn't the book about the rivalry? There are some obvious reasons why that didn't happen, lack of access - for one, and the fact that Federer and Nadal have many more (I'd say 3 years worth, barring injuries) matches in them.

For tennis fans, its a book definitely worth picking up, particularly if you are a parent of a tennis player looking at how to raise a tennis player. R-Fed and Rafa are two prime examples of not just how to play tennis, but how to live.

Grade: B

Up next: I'm about 30 pages into the 600 page Wind-Up Bird Chronicle by Haruki Murakami, which I'm thinking may be a warm-up for The Infinite Jest...

1. The Inner Game of Tennis | Timothy Gallwey (134 pages) | A
2. The Last Shot | Darcy Frey (240 pages) | A+
3. The Road | Cormac McCarthy (287 pages) | A+
4. Outliers | Malcolm Gladwell (299 pages) | C+
5. The Last Season | Phil Jackson (304 pages) | B-
6. The Sunset Limited | Cormac McCarthy (160 pages)| B-
7. The Education of a Coach | David Halberstam (288 pages)| B+
8. Downtown Owl | Chuck Klosterman | (288 pages)| B
9. Can I Keep My Jersey?| Paul Shirley| (336 pages)|C-
10. Then We Came to The End| Joshua Ferris| (416 pages)|B+
11. Friday Night Lights| H.G. Bissinger|(400 pages)|A++
12. Strokes of Genius| L. Jon Wertheim|(208 pages)|B

Let's Book Club!: Friday Night Lights by H.G. Bissinger

There's FNL the movie (staring CBC favourite Billy Bob Thornton as Coach Gary Gaines), the excellent TV show, which is probably the best sports show this side of Hang Time, but FNL the book by H.G. Bissinger about the 1988 Permian Panthers is certainly the best of the bunch.

The Permian Panthers, who reside in the football-mad West Texas town of Odessa, are determined to "go to State in '88", and are a group who's lives (and the lives of everyone else in the town) revolve around high school football. While the book revolves around the '88 season, it is as much a book on the history of West Texas, a sociology book on race relations, a psychology book on high school athletes, as it is a book on a high school football team.

Like The Last Shot, FNL captures the dysfunction of high school athletics, but shows affection towards the personalities of the team. Bissinger doesn't hide his discomfort with the backwards gender relations or the educational priorities in Odessa, but finds something likable about the community and the togetherness that the Panthers bring to Odessa.

My synopsis: Its basically a longer, more detailed, better written version of The Last Shot, which, is a huge compliment since tLS was the most compelling/heart wrenching story I've read in... maybe ever...

Thanks to Kyle for letting me borrow his copy of the book...

Excuses: Yeah, I haven't been reading so much lately. I tried to get through Grown Up Digital (on how the NetGen and technology have developed different expectations of work and different work habits -- the Introductory Chapter, at least, is a must read for anyone in business/management), but, alas, after a week the library wanted it back. And, really, I've been watching a lot of TV - Breaking Bad, Party Down, the Bachelorette! - and driving to work (boo! driving) which has precluded me from reading for safety reasons.

Grade: A++

Up next: I went to visit my Mom and she bought me a copy of Strokes of Genius by Jon Wertheim on the epic Nadal v. Federer 2008 Wimbledon final, so, I'm going to try and give that a spin (no pun intended).

1. The Inner Game of Tennis | Timothy Gallwey (134 pages) | A
2. The Last Shot | Darcy Frey (240 pages) | A+
3. The Road | Cormac McCarthy (287 pages) | A+
4. Outliers | Malcolm Gladwell (299 pages) | C+
5. The Last Season | Phil Jackson (304 pages) | B-
6. The Sunset Limited | Cormac McCarthy (160 pages)| B-
7. The Education of a Coach | David Halberstam (288 pages)| B+
8. Downtown Owl | Chuck Klosterman | (288 pages)| B
9. Can I Keep My Jersey?| Paul Shirley| (336 pages)|C-
10. Then We Came to The End| Joshua Ferris| (416 pages)|B+
11. Friday Night Lights| H.G. Bissinger|(400 pages)|A++

Let's Book Club: Then We Came To The End: A Novel by Joshua Ferris

So, wherever I read this book was like The Office was completely wrong. I mean, its set in an office, so that's kind of the same. But the comparison would be like saying Titanic and, say, Master and Commander were the same (hint: they both have boats).

The book is about the group of people who work in a failing Chicago advertising firm (its also like MadMen!), the rumour mill within the office, and the slow and steady collapse of the aforementioned ad firm. It took me roughly 200 pgs, which is a lot I realize, but once I got familiar with the ensemble cast I really began to enjoy the book. In fact, I think I read the last half of the book about twice as fast as I read the first half.

Grade: B+

Upnext: Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut, which was inspired by me missing a trivia question in last weekend's Toronto Star...

1. The Inner Game of Tennis | Timothy Gallwey (134 pages) | A
2. The Last Shot | Darcy Frey (240 pages) | A+
3. The Road | Cormac McCarthy (287 pages) | A+
4. Outliers | Malcolm Gladwell (299 pages) | C+
5. The Last Season | Phil Jackson (304 pages) | B-
6. The Sunset Limited | Cormac McCarthy (160 pages)| B-
7. The Education of a Coach | David Halberstam (288 pages)| B+
8. Downtown Owl | Chuck Klosterman | (288 pages)| B
9. Can I Keep My Jersey?| Paul Shirley| (336 pages)|C-
10. Then We Came to The End| Joshua Ferris| (416 pages)|B+

Let's Book Club!: Can I Keep My Jersey? by Paul Shirley

Remember how I said I was going to read The Brief and Wonderous Life of Oscar Wao? You didn't. Good. I got 150 pages in and quit b/c all the Spanish was a little too much to take after dealing with grade 4s all day.

Instead, I got through Can I Keep My Jersey, which is basically 336 pages of Paul Shirley complaining about playing professional basketball. I can appreciate that he doesn't like a lot of things that many basketball players are: rich, greedy, selfish, detached from reality, etc., etc.; and, while he's pretty self aware - her recognizes he's a whiner -he doesn't have anything positive to say about anything, which is kind of depressing. An interesting reminder that not all professional athletes are: rich, greedy, selfish, detached; but maybe a reminder that most professional athletes are not people you'd sit down and have a beer with.

Grade: C-

Up next: I'm starting to feel the need to get away from sports/basketball books... I googled 'best fiction' this morning and came up with a book, Then We Came to the End by Joshua Ferris, which was described as a literary version of The Office, so, we'll see how that goes. Otherwise, I've got this Murakami book, The Wind-Up Bird Chronicles, that's been sitting on my shelf for a while...

1. The Inner Game of Tennis | Timothy Gallwey (134 pages) | A
2. The Last Shot | Darcy Frey (240 pages) | A+
3. The Road | Cormac McCarthy (287 pages) | A+
4. Outliers | Malcolm Gladwell (299 pages) | C+
5. The Last Season | Phil Jackson (304 pages) | B-
6. The Sunset Limited | Cormac McCarthy (160 pages)| B-
7. The Education of a Coach | David Halberstam (288 pages)| B+
8. Downtown Owl | Chuck Klosterman | (288 pages)| B
9. Can I Keep My Jersey?| Paul Shirley| (336 pages)|C-

Let's Book Club!: Downtown Owl by Chuck Klosterman

Downtown Owl, Chuck Klosterman's first (I'm pretty sure) work of fiction, reads remarkably like his other (non-fiction, obviously) work, which, is probably a strange statement. Sure, he tells a story, the story has characters, but its the way that Klosterman goes about telling the story in this choppy, mulit-dimensional kind of way, and the use of a bunch of different literary devices(?) - I'm not a lit major - which just makes it feel (to me) a lot like Sex, Drugs and Coa-Coa Puffs. Although, this might be the most obvious statement in the world since I'm esentially saying that 'this thing CK has written is like the other stuff CK has written', so, duh... right.

On the whole, Klosterman creates some interesting characters and sets them in wholly uninteresting place (a small town, Owl, ND), and the book comes across more as a showcase for what CK can do as a writer rather than a compelling story, or, alternately, a story that tells us something about human nature, or the world, or something more profound. But, maybe that tells us something about Klosterman, who, while an interesting guy to listen to (I think he's been really interesting on the BS Report), he strikes me as an introverted dude that people must've kept their distance from in high school.

Grade: Compared to the other fiction I've read since the beginning of the year (The Road) its definitely not as good, but the characters were interesting and Klosterman is def. a creative dude. B

Up next: The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, which came up on my google search for 'best books 2008' and Kyle gave it an 'A', so away we go....

1. The Inner Game of Tennis | Timothy Gallwey (134 pages) | A
2. The Last Shot | Darcy Frey (240 pages) | A+
3. The Road | Cormac McCarthy (287 pages) | A+
4. Outliers | Malcolm Gladwell (299 pages) | C+
5. The Last Season | Phil Jackson (304 pages) | B-
6. The Sunset Limited | Cormac McCarthy (160 pages)| B-
7. The Education of a Coach | David Halberstam (288 pages)| B+
8. Downtown Owl | Chuck Klosterman | (288 pages)| B

Let's Book Club!: Education of a Coach by David Halberstam

I promise I'm not making this up... I've actually read all these books... I haven't had my computer, and I've been sitting on the couch reading for the last 4 days or so.

David Halberstam's take on Belichick is basically this: he is successful because he works/worked really, really, really, hard. The book was actually a lot more of a narrative of Belichick's life than I thought it would be (despite the fact that the title is Education of a Coach - go figure), covering a great deal of the Belichick family history, their move to America from Croatia, and Bill's upbringing on the east coast as the son of a football coach.

Aside from that, it should be noted that, and this should be news to no one, that Halberstam is an awesome writer (also, he invented the comma). And, I think I actually might have enjoyed this a little more than his masterpiece Breaks of the Game (about the 19--? Portland Trailblazers) if only because the only people I knew on that team were Kermit Washington (famous for the Rudy Tomjonavich punch) and Bill Walton (not actually on the team, left the year before).

All told, the book would've been somewhere near 100 times more interesting if it had been written after the Patriots cheating scandal, but, with Halberstam being dead (R.I.P.) and all that may not have worked out so well.

Grade: B+

Up next: Downtown Owl by Chuck Klosterman... to the best of my knowledge he hasn't written fiction before (at least that I've read) so, it'll be interesting to see how this goes...

Apologies for any spelling mistakes, but I've had a couple of glasses of wine and I'm no mood for editing.

Let's Book Club!: The Sunset Limited by Cormac McCarthy

The Sunset Limited is "A Novel in Dramatic Form", which is to say that's its a play, a conversation, between White, a Professor, and Black, a recovering addict. The setting, the writing, and the mood all kind of fit with McCarthy's other stuff (ie. The Road and No Country for Old Men - I realize there are others but I haven't read any of them), but its definitely not as violent - in as far as its just a conversation set in Black's apartment.

For what it is, its an interesting conversation, but, I feel like it would be a much more interesting in actual play form, rather than just words on a page.

Grade: B-

Up next: Since its Spring Break (woooo!) I might give The Infinite Jest a shot, but I'm thinking I might try and leave that until the summer. Otherwise The Education of a Coach or a book that Liz really liked Cockeyed (the story of a teenager who goes blind - Non-fiction).

1. The Inner Game of Tennis | Timothy Gallwey (134 pages) | A
2. The Last Shot | Darcy Frey (240 pages) | A+
3. The Road | Cormac McCarthy (287 pages) | A+
4. Outliers | Malcolm Gladwell (299 pages) | C+
5. The Last Season | Phil Jackson (304 pages) | B-

Let's Book Club!: The Last Season by Phil Jackson

My computer is still being repaired and its looking like I'm going to get it next week, so, for those of you who are sitting on the edge of your seats you'll probably have to hold tight for another week or so.

The book... is basically a series of diary entries (or more likely adapted, edited, and re-written diary entries) from the 2003-04 Lakers season (this was two seasons after they won their last of three consecutive championships).  It's not exactly a literary masterpiece, but hearing the 'behind the scenes' stories gives some really interesting insight into Jackson's success as a coach, Kobe's melt-downs in the playoffs, and probably a little why Shaq hasn't had won more than he has.  More than anything else, it really drove home how important a team concept is in basketball, and how significant having a system and defining the roles of your players within that system is.  And, I think if you look at the last, say dozen teams that won titles (Celtics, Spurs, Pistons, Lakers - the Heat maybe being the exception) all of them have played good team basketball.

Grade: B- 

Next up: I'm actually already about half finished a 'Novel in Dramatic Form' The Sunset Limited by Cormac McCarthy, because I wanted something a little different.  After that, I've got David Halberstam's book about Bill Belichick The Education of a Coach.  

Let's Book Club!: Slam by Nick Hornby

... was a nice story, but wasn't anything special. If you have a sister who shops at big box stores, I'd buy it a used book store and give it to her. Or, alternately, if you want to scare someone you know out of an unwanted pregnancy.

Grade: B-

Up next: I'm excited to say that I got a Toronto Library card over the weekend, so, (up next) is a couple of lieberry books: Curb Your Enthusiasm: The Book and The Last Season by Phil Jackson.

Let's Book Club! Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell

Outliers, I think, is best viewed as a series of New Yorker/New York Times articles rather than a serious attempt to understand success, since, as a whole, the book doesn't really make a coherent point from start to finish. I mean, the book's thesis is essentially that our conceptions about living in a meritocracy are false, that we don't live in one, and he doesn't attempt to connect each chapter of the book through his idea. So, in that sense the book is a failure. If, on the other hand, you're willing to look past that and view the book as a bunch of typically snappy magazine articles then I think you're going to enjoy the book a heck of a lot more...

Grade: C+ (and yes, this is the first book to not receive an 'A'...)


Also: I recently finished reading Bifocal for school. If you've got a son/daughter, niece/nephew, etc. who's roughly in the Grade 8 age range it's worth picking up for them.

Next up: Slam by Nick Hornby... somebody really needs to loan me a book...