by Ed Caesar ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 27, 2015
Caesar’s winning prose will keep even armchair readers turning pages, perhaps tuning in to watch the next marathon.
A wide-ranging and compelling account of marathons and the very fastest men who run them.
Caesar, a British journalist with many American credits (New York Times Magazine, Outside, the Atlantic, etc.), explores the world of high-speed long-distance running. The dream of running the 26.2-mile race in less than two hours has not yet been achieved, and the author shows us the pursuit of that dream. Besides giving a capsule history of the race, from its mythical beginnings in Greece through its 20th-century ups and downs in popularity to its present dominance by East Africans, Caesar reveals its personalities and delves into its economics, science, and psychology. While the author depicts a host of runners, both well-known and otherwise, at the center of the story is Geoffrey Kiprono Mutai, a Kenyan runner whose personal best is 2:03:02. Caesar spent time with Mutai, observing the lives of Kenyan runners and how and why they run. Their mastery of marathon running has been variously attributed to geography (altitude, terrain), lifestyle (diet, arduous training), biology (genetic makeup, physique), and to an overwhelming desire to escape a difficult life. Caesar, whose admiration for his subjects is palpable, examines all of these, including the question of possible drug use. He also looks into the role of the runners' managers, the efforts of shoe companies to create the perfect running shoe, the varying design of marathon courses in different cities, and the outside factors affecting speed, such as wind and temperature. Readers should not skip the endnotes: this usually dry addendum is unexpectedly entertaining and informative. “Whatever science or common sense one uses to rebut the possibility of a two-hour marathon,” writes the author, “we still cannot resist its lure.”
Caesar’s winning prose will keep even armchair readers turning pages, perhaps tuning in to watch the next marathon.Pub Date: Oct. 27, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-4516-8584-8
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: June 16, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2015
Share your opinion of this book
More by Ed Caesar
BOOK REVIEW
by Ed Caesar
More About This Book
PROFILES
by Lulu Miller illustrated by Kate Samworth ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 14, 2020
A quirky wonder of a book.
A Peabody Award–winning NPR science reporter chronicles the life of a turn-of-the-century scientist and how her quest led to significant revelations about the meaning of order, chaos, and her own existence.
Miller began doing research on David Starr Jordan (1851-1931) to understand how he had managed to carry on after the 1906 San Francisco earthquake destroyed his work. A taxonomist who is credited with discovering “a full fifth of fish known to man in his day,” Jordan had amassed an unparalleled collection of ichthyological specimens. Gathering up all the fish he could save, Jordan sewed the nameplates that had been on the destroyed jars directly onto the fish. His perseverance intrigued the author, who also discusses the struggles she underwent after her affair with a woman ended a heterosexual relationship. Born into an upstate New York farm family, Jordan attended Cornell and then became an itinerant scholar and field researcher until he landed at Indiana University, where his first ichthyological collection was destroyed by lightning. In between this catastrophe and others involving family members’ deaths, he reconstructed his collection. Later, he was appointed as the founding president of Stanford, where he evolved into a Machiavellian figure who trampled on colleagues and sang the praises of eugenics. Miller concludes that Jordan displayed the characteristics of someone who relied on “positive illusions” to rebound from disaster and that his stand on eugenics came from a belief in “a divine hierarchy from bacteria to humans that point[ed]…toward better.” Considering recent research that negates biological hierarchies, the author then suggests that Jordan’s beloved taxonomic category—fish—does not exist. Part biography, part science report, and part meditation on how the chaos that caused Miller’s existential misery could also bring self-acceptance and a loving wife, this unique book is an ingenious celebration of diversity and the mysterious order that underlies all existence.
A quirky wonder of a book.Pub Date: April 14, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-5011-6027-1
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Jan. 1, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2020
Share your opinion of this book
by Jeanne Marie Laskas ‧ RELEASE DATE: Nov. 24, 2015
Effectively sobering. Suffice it to say that Pop Warner parents will want to armor their kids from head to toe upon reading...
A maddening, well-constructed tale of medical discovery and corporate coverup, set in morgues, laboratories, courtrooms, and football fields.
Nigeria-born Bennet Omalu is perhaps an unlikely hero, a medical doctor board-certified in four areas of pathology, “anatomic, clinical, forensic, and neuropathology,” and a well-rounded specialist in death. When his boss, celebrity examiner Cyril Wecht (“in the autopsy business, Wecht was a rock star”), got into trouble for various specimens of publicity-hound overreach, Omalu was there to offer patient, stoical support. The student did not surpass the teacher in flashiness, but Omalu was a rock star all his own in studying the brain to determine a cause of death. Laskas’ (Creative Writing/Univ. of Pittsburgh; Hidden America, 2012, etc.) main topic is the horrific injuries wrought to the brains and bodies of football players on the field. Omalu’s study of the unfortunate brain of Pittsburgh Steeler Mike Webster, who died in 2002 at 50 of a supposed heart attack, brought new attention to the trauma of concussion. Laskas trades in sportwriter-ese, all staccato delivery full of tough guy–isms and sports clichés: “He had played for fifteen seasons, a warrior’s warrior; he played in more games—two hundred twenty—than any other player in Steelers history. Undersized, tough, a big, burly white guy—a Pittsburgh kind of guy—the heart of the best team in history.” A little of that goes a long way, but Laskas, a Pittsburgher who first wrote of Omalu and his studies in a story in GQ, does sturdy work in keeping up with a grim story that the NFL most definitely did not want to see aired—not in Omalu’s professional publications in medical journals, nor, reportedly, on the big screen in the Will Smith vehicle based on this book.
Effectively sobering. Suffice it to say that Pop Warner parents will want to armor their kids from head to toe upon reading it.Pub Date: Nov. 24, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-8129-8757-7
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: Sept. 14, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2015
Share your opinion of this book
More by Jeanne Marie Laskas
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
© Copyright 2024 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Hey there, book lover.
We’re glad you found a book that interests you!
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Don’t fret. We’ll find you.