Bursting across Couch’s impressionistic Harlem street scenes in a blaze of color, the rangy, grinning young Gibson—the first African-American tennis player, male or female, to win at Wimbledon—seems ready to jump right off the pages of this high-energy profile. Along with paying specific homage to some of the people who helped Gibson along the way, Stauffacher ascribes her passage from wild child to international celebrity to the acquisition of social as well as technical skills: “Althea realized she could dress up in white and act like a lady, and still beat the liver and lights out of the ball.” For assignments, Karen Dean’s Playing To Win: The Story of Althea Gibson (September 2007) is preferable, as aside from a timeline on the rear endpapers (placed so that it will be partly hidden by the jacket flap), there is no coverage here of Gibson’s post-Wimbledon career. However, the author does add leads to further information at the end, and plenty of readers, athletes or otherwise, will find this tribute to her fiery spirit inspirational. (Picture book/biography. 6-9)
