A wide-ranging, personal book that addresses may different aspects of high school sports.
Debut author Roth, a former high school coach and sports administrator with decades of experience, offers amusing and enlightening remembrances, a brief history of high school athletics in the United States, and tips for coaches, parents, officials, and players.
Over the course of this work, the author, who coached a few different sports in Westchester, New York, comes across as tough but caring. He preaches discipline for athletes throughout, for example, but he also shows a clear distaste for coaches who curse out their players and embarrass them in public. Roth writes that he believes that players should be well-rounded individuals; for instance, he tells of how he once instituted a mandatory study hall for his players before practices, both to allow a girls’ team early access to the gym and to make sure his athletes were on track academically. He also effectively addresses broader issues in a clear, impartial manner. Not all schools have academic requirements for their athletes, but Roth places a high value on education, often stating that coaches should be teachers first and take interest in their students’ everyday lives. On the other hand, he points out that sometimes players don’t excel in academics, and playing a sport provides their main means of socialization. At one point, he asks parents to resist the temptation to send coaches abusive emails when they don’t think their kid is getting enough playing time; at another, he reminds players they owe their coach a commitment to the rules. Another general rule of Roth’s is that winning is important, especially at the varsity level, but it’s not the only important goal. Overall, the author is mostly successful at combining memoir, history, and self-help, finding an effective balance while often speaking of his own personal experiences. That said, however, readers with only a casual interest in high school sports may find themselves drifting in parts. Also, some of the stories here are more instructive than entertaining, such as one about a coach getting ejected from a game for swearing at an official.
A wide-ranging, personal book that addresses may different aspects of high school sports.Pub Date: Feb. 21, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-5320-4083-2
Page Count: 248
Publisher: iUniverse
Review Posted Online: June 22, 2018
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular...
A neurosurgeon with a passion for literature tragically finds his perfect subject after his diagnosis of terminal lung cancer.
Writing isn’t brain surgery, but it’s rare when someone adept at the latter is also so accomplished at the former. Searching for meaning and purpose in his life, Kalanithi pursued a doctorate in literature and had felt certain that he wouldn’t enter the field of medicine, in which his father and other members of his family excelled. “But I couldn’t let go of the question,” he writes, after realizing that his goals “didn’t quite fit in an English department.” “Where did biology, morality, literature and philosophy intersect?” So he decided to set aside his doctoral dissertation and belatedly prepare for medical school, which “would allow me a chance to find answers that are not in books, to find a different sort of sublime, to forge relationships with the suffering, and to keep following the question of what makes human life meaningful, even in the face of death and decay.” The author’s empathy undoubtedly made him an exceptional doctor, and the precision of his prose—as well as the moral purpose underscoring it—suggests that he could have written a good book on any subject he chose. Part of what makes this book so essential is the fact that it was written under a death sentence following the diagnosis that upended his life, just as he was preparing to end his residency and attract offers at the top of his profession. Kalanithi learned he might have 10 years to live or perhaps five. Should he return to neurosurgery (he could and did), or should he write (he also did)? Should he and his wife have a baby? They did, eight months before he died, which was less than two years after the original diagnosis. “The fact of death is unsettling,” he understates. “Yet there is no other way to live.”
A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular clarity.Pub Date: Jan. 19, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-8129-8840-6
Page Count: 248
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: Sept. 29, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2015
PERSPECTIVES
Well-told and admonitory.
Young-rags-to-mature-riches memoir by broker and motivational speaker Gardner.
Born and raised in the Milwaukee ghetto, the author pulled himself up from considerable disadvantage. He was fatherless, and his adored mother wasn’t always around; once, as a child, he spied her at a family funeral accompanied by a prison guard. When beautiful, evanescent Moms was there, Chris also had to deal with Freddie “I ain’t your goddamn daddy!” Triplett, one of the meanest stepfathers in recent literature. Chris did “the dozens” with the homies, boosted a bit and in the course of youthful adventure was raped. His heroes were Miles Davis, James Brown and Muhammad Ali. Meanwhile, at the behest of Moms, he developed a fondness for reading. He joined the Navy and became a medic (preparing badass Marines for proctology), and a proficient lab technician. Moving up in San Francisco, married and then divorced, he sold medical supplies. He was recruited as a trainee at Dean Witter just around the time he became a homeless single father. All his belongings in a shopping cart, Gardner sometimes slept with his young son at the office (apparently undiscovered by the night cleaning crew). The two also frequently bedded down in a public restroom. After Gardner’s talents were finally appreciated by the firm of Bear Stearns, his American Dream became real. He got the cool duds, hot car and fine ladies so coveted from afar back in the day. He even had a meeting with Nelson Mandela. Through it all, he remained a prideful parent. His own no-daddy blues are gone now.
Well-told and admonitory.Pub Date: June 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-06-074486-3
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Amistad/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2006
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
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.
