An inspirational portrait of trailblazing sports excellence.
A Black transgender woman athlete chronicles her journey battling obstacles throughout her career.
Born in Jamaica, Telfer, the first openly transgender woman to win an NCAA title, shares anecdotes of her upbringing raised by her mother and volatile stepfather who, while her mother worked in Canada, sent her to live with her aunt. Despite being assigned male at birth, the author always believed she was female. She writes about how she was ridiculed by townsfolk and initially scorned by her mother, so she resolved to “hide my feminine side forever.” Running, which was “a way of life” in Jamaica, became an obsession and a way to quell her feelings of gender dysphoria and the dissatisfaction of living a tortured double life. Ultimately, for fear of being killed in Jamaica, Telfer fled to New England to fulfill her dreams of living a free life and having the college experience, part of which was finding immense success as a track athlete. Her outstanding athleticism brought her name to prominence in sporting circles, and once she changed her name and confirmed her transgender status with coaches, she resigned to stop training with the male track team. Though many once-affirmative conversations about her potential turned derisive because of her trans status, Telfer dominated the competition to win an NCAA title in 2019. In this intimate glimpse into her life and career, the author candidly shares her story of perseverance to overcome the hateful backlash from her path toward the Olympics, where eligibility rules prevented her from competing in the women’s 400-meter hurdles. The memoir concludes with Telfer emboldened to achieve a future Olympic victory. “Sports narratives inspire, ignite, evoke emotions, and most importantly, transcend cultural boundaries and unite people from across the globe under a common passion,” she writes. “They should be about bringing people together, not tearing them apart.”
An inspirational portrait of trailblazing sports excellence.Pub Date: June 18, 2024
ISBN: 9781538756249
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Review Posted Online: May 17, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2024
Basketball fans will enjoy Pippen’s bird’s-eye view of some of the sport’s greatest contests.
The Chicago Bulls stalwart tells all—and then some.
Hall of Famer Pippen opens with a long complaint: Yes, he’s a legend, but he got short shrift in the ESPN documentary about Michael Jordan and the Bulls, The Last Dance. Given that Jordan emerges as someone not quite friend enough to qualify as a frenemy, even though teammates for many years, the maltreatment is understandable. This book, Pippen allows, is his retort to a man who “was determined to prove to the current generation of fans that he was larger-than-life during his day—and still larger than LeBron James, the player many consider his equal, if not superior.” Coming from a hardscrabble little town in Arkansas and playing for a small college, Pippen enjoyed an unlikely rise to NBA stardom. He played alongside and against some of the greats, of whom he writes appreciatively (even Jordan). Readers will gain insight into the lives of characters such as Dennis Rodman, who “possessed an unbelievable basketball IQ,” and into the behind-the-scenes work that led to the Bulls dynasty, which ended only because, Pippen charges, the team’s management was so inept. Looking back on his early years, Pippen advocates paying college athletes. “Don’t give me any of that holier-than-thou student-athlete nonsense,” he writes. “These young men—and women—are athletes first, not students, and make up the labor that generates fortunes for their schools. They are, for lack of a better term, slaves.” The author also writes evenhandedly of the world outside basketball: “No matter how many championships I have won, and millions I have earned, I never forget the color of my skin and that some people in this world hate me just because of that.” Overall, the memoir is closely observed and uncommonly modest, given Pippen’s many successes, and it moves as swiftly as a playoff game.
Basketball fans will enjoy Pippen’s bird’s-eye view of some of the sport’s greatest contests.Pub Date: Nov. 9, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-982165-19-2
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Atria
Review Posted Online: Sept. 14, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2021
SEEN & HEARD
Smart, engaging sportswriting—good reading for organization builders as well as Pats fans.
Prolific writer Benedict has long blended two interests—sports and business—and the Patriots are emblematic of both. Founded in 1959 as the Boston Patriots, the team built a strategic home field between that city and Providence. When original owner Billy Sullivan sold the flailing team in 1988, it was $126 million in the hole, a condition so dire that “Sullivan had to beg the NFL to release emergency funds so he could pay his players.” Victor Kiam, the razor magnate, bought the long since renamed New England Patriots, but rival Robert Kraft bought first the parking lots and then the stadium—and “it rankled Kiam that he bore all the risk as the owner of the team but virtually all of the revenue that the team generated went to Kraft.” Check and mate. Kraft finally took over the team in 1994. Kraft inherited coach Bill Parcells, who in turn brought in star quarterback Drew Bledsoe, “the Patriots’ most prized player.” However, as the book’s nimbly constructed opening recounts, in 2001, Bledsoe got smeared in a hit “so violent that players along the Patriots sideline compared the sound of the collision to a car crash.” After that, it was backup Tom Brady’s team. Gridiron nerds will debate whether Brady is the greatest QB and Bill Belichick the greatest coach the game has ever known, but certainly they’ve had their share of controversy. The infamous “Deflategate” incident of 2015 takes up plenty of space in the late pages of the narrative, and depending on how you read between the lines, Brady was either an accomplice or an unwitting beneficiary. Still, as the author writes, by that point Brady “had started in 223 straight regular-season games,” an enviable record on a team that itself has racked up impressive stats.
Smart, engaging sportswriting—good reading for organization builders as well as Pats fans.Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-982134-10-5
Page Count: 592
Publisher: Avid Reader Press
Review Posted Online: Aug. 25, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2020
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