The Geek Feminist Revolution


Kameron Hurley - 2016
    The Geek Feminist Revolution also features several entirely new essays written specifically for this volume.Unapologetically outspoken, Hurley has contributed essays to The Atlantic, Locus, Tor.com, and elsewhere on the rise of women in genre, her passion for science fiction and fantasy, and the diversification of publishing.

The Game of Their Lives: The Untold Story of the World Cup's Biggest Upset


Geoffrey Douglas - 1996
    The Americans were outsiders to the sport, the underdogs of the event, a 500-to-1 long shot. But they were also proud and loyal men -- to one another, to their communities, and certainly to their country. Facing almost no time to prepare, opponents with superior training, and skepticism from the rest of the world, this ragtag group of unknowns was inspired to a stunning victory over England and one of the most thrilling upsets in the history of sports.Written by critically acclaimed author Geoffrey Douglas, and now a film directed by David Anspaugh (Hoosiers), The Game of Their Lives takes us back to a time before million-dollar contracts and commercial endorsements, and introduces us to the athletes -- the Americans -- who showed the world just how far a long shot could really go.

The Best American Sports Writing 2018


Glenn Stout - 2018
    Each year, the series editor and guest editor curate a truly exceptional collection. The only shared traits among all these diverse styles, voices, and stories are the extraordinarily high caliber of writing, and the pure passion they tap into that can only come from sports.

America (The Book): A Citizen's Guide to Democracy Inaction


Jon StewartScott Jacobson - 2004
    But what is American democracy? In America (The Book), Jon Stewart and The Daily Show writing staff offer their insights into our unique system of government, dissecting its institutions, explaining its history and processes, and exploring the reasons why concepts like one man, one vote, government by the people, and every vote counts have become such popular urban myths. Topics include: Ancient Rome: The First Republicans; The Founding Fathers: Young, Gifted, and White; The Media: Can it Be Stopped?; and more!

A Wink from the Universe


Martin Flanagan - 2018
    They were the rank underdogs and they swept to victory on an unprecedented tide of goodwill that washed over the nation. Only Martin Flanagan could bring to life this particular miracle. The club's two guiding spirits - captain Bob Murphy and coach Luke Beveridge - welcomed him in, Beveridge making available his match diaries, pre-match notes and video highlights. Flanagan interviewed every player, watched every match, talked with the trainers, the women in the football department, the fans who never miss a training session, the cheer squad.What Flanagan shows is that the Bulldogs found a new way to play partly because they found a new way to be a team - a new way to support each other, even a new way to be. A Wink from the Universe takes us into the heart of the community Luke Beveridge and Bob Murphy dreamt into being with the support of the Bulldog people around them. This is a classic of sportswriting - a book for fans of the club, and of the game, but also a book for anyone who wants to know how a group of people can will a miracle to happen.

Burn It Down: Women Writing about Anger


Lilly DancygerMelissa Febos - 2019
    But all rage isn't created equal. Who gets to be angry? (If there's now space for cis white women's anger, what about black women? Trans women?) How do women express their anger? And what will they do with it-individually and collectively? In Burn It Down, a diverse group of women authors explore their rage-from the personal to the systemic, the unacknowledged to the public. One woman describes her rage at her own body when she becomes ill with no explanation. Another writes of the anger she inherits from her father. One Pakistani American writes, "To openly express my anger would be too American," and explains why. Broad-ranging and cathartic, Burn It Down is essential reading for any woman who has burned with rage but questioned if she is entitled to express it.

The Unabridged Devil's Dictionary


Ambrose Bierce - 1911
    There, a bore is "a person who talks when you wish him to listen," and happiness is "an agreeable sensation arising from contemplating the misery of another." This is the most comprehensive, authoritative edition ever of Ambrose Bierce’s satiric masterpiece. It renders obsolete all other versions that have appeared in the book’s ninety-year history.A virtual onslaught of acerbic, confrontational wordplay, The Unabridged Devil’s Dictionary offers some 1,600 wickedly clever definitions to the vocabulary of everyday life. Little is sacred and few are safe, for Bierce targets just about any pursuit, from matrimony to immortality, that allows our willful failings and excesses to shine forth.This new edition is based on David E. Schultz and S. T. Joshi’s exhaustive investigation into the book’s writing and publishing history. All of Bierce’s known satiric definitions are here, including previously uncollected, unpublished, and alternative entries. Definitions dropped from previous editions have been restored while nearly two hundred wrongly attributed to Bierce have been excised. For dedicated Bierce readers, an introduction and notes are also included.Ambrose Bierce’s Devil’s Dictionary is a classic that stands alongside the best work of satirists such as Twain, Mencken, and Thurber. This unabridged edition will be celebrated by humor fans and word lovers everywhere.

Arnie and Jack: Palmer, Nicklaus, and Golf's Greatest Rivalry


Ian O'Connor - 2008
    Arnie and Jack. Palmer and Nicklaus. Their fifty-year duel, in both the clubhouse and the boardroom, propelled each to the status of American icon and pushed modern golf to the heights and popularity it enjoys today. Yet for all the ink that has been spilled on these two essential golf figures individually, no one has ever examined their relationship in this way. Arnie was the cowboy, with rugged good looks, Popeye-like forearms, a flailing swing, and charm enough to win fans worldwide. Jack was scientific, precise, conservative, aloof, even fat and awkward. Ultimately, Nicklaus got the better of Palmer on the course, beating him in major victories, 18-7. But Palmer bested Nicklaus almost everywhere else, especially in the hearts of the public and in endorsement dollars -- Palmer was the top-grossing athlete for thirty years, until Michael Jordan surpassed him.With dogged reporting and crisp, colorful storytelling, the award-winning sports columnist Ian O’Connor explores this heated professional and personal battle in fascinating, intimate, and revelatory detail. Drawing on unique and exclusive access to Palmer and Nicklaus, and informed by some two hundred new interviews, O’Connor illuminates the two men’s extreme differences and sprawling influence through mini-dramas, such as their little-known first meeting on the course at the topsy-turvy U.S. Open in 1962, their early involvement with marketing and a small agency called IMG, and their intense competition for golf-course designs in their later years.By the end of this page-turning narrative, which spans five remarkable decades, we see that each man wanted what the other had: Arnold had the adoring fans but wanted the trophies. Jack had the trophies but wanted the love.

Left for Dead: My Journey Home from Everest


Beck Weathers - 2000
    Then a storm exploded on the mountain, ripping the team to shreds, forcing brave men to scratch and crawl for their lives. Rescuers who reached Weathers saw that he was dying, and left him. Twelve hours later, the inexplicable occurred. Weathers appeared, blinded, gloveless, and caked with ice—walking down the mountain. In this powerful memoir, now featuring a new Preface, Weathers describes not only his escape from hypothermia and the murderous storm that killed eight climbers, but the journey of his life. This is the story of a man’s route to a dangerous sport and a fateful expedition, as well as the road of recovery he has traveled since; of survival in the face of certain death, the reclaiming of a family and a life; and of the most extraordinary adventure of all: finding the courage to say yes when life offers us a second chance.  Praise for Left for Dead  “Riveting . . . [a] remarkable survival story . . . Left for Dead takes a long, critical look at climbing: Weathers is particularly candid about how the demanding sport altered and strained his relationships.”—USA Today   “Ultimately, this engrossing tale depicts the difficulty of a man’s struggle to reform his life.”—Publishers Weekly

Summer of '98


Mike Lupica - 1999
    The best book yet by America's finest sportswriter. - Pete Hamill. Here is what makes Mike Lupica so good - he is a gifted writer with the skills of a first-rate reporter and the honest sentiment of a lifelong fan. Here is what makes this book so good - baseball's summer of '98 provided authentic moments of poetry and passion, the kind of stuff that shines through all the crassness and nonsense, to remind us all why we can still care. I'd say the storyteller is a damn good match for the story. - Bob Costas, NBC Sports. This isn't just one of the best books you'll ever read about baseball. It's one of the best books you'll ever read about fathers and sons. And one more thing: in this one, I said everything Mike said I said. - Yoggi Berra. No one writes about baseball's glorious sporting scene better than Mike Lupica, and this was one of the greatest glory years of all. - Tom Brokaw, NBC News. From one of sportswriting's best-known commentators comes a funny, moving, and unconventional exploration of a glorious baseball season. Maris hit another, Mantle went two-for-four, the Yanks won. That was Lupica's best summer ever. He thought he'd never have another like it - until the summer of '98, when he found himself leaving notes for his own sons: Sosa hit another, McGwire hit one back. And the Yanks won. With humor and feeling, Lupica recaptures the season that made everyone stand up and cheer, but not in any ordinary way. His is also a story of fathers and sons - about the golden thread that stretches through baseball and, for Lupica, from his father to himself to his sons. I cannot tell you why baseball is passed on the way it is, more than the other sports. I just know it came first with me. It was something I shared with my father, and still share today. It was a special language we had, at the ballpark, in the front seat of a '56 Dodge, watching on television. Talking on the telephone the night McGwire hit No. 62, all that time after we had watched Maris hit No. 61. A love that fits inside a bigger love, like a ball in a mitt.

Miss American Pie: A Diary of Love, Secrets, and Growing Up in the 1970s


Margaret Sartor - 2006
    Crafted from diaries, notebooks, and letters, this deeply personal yet universally appealing story moves with ease between the seemingly trivial concerns of hairstyles and boys to the more profound questions of faith and identity. By turns funny and poignant, heartbreaking and profound, Miss American Pie tackles all of the decade's issues--desegregation, drugs, the sexual revolution, the rise of feminism, and the spread of charismatic evangelical Christianity--with humor, frankness, and unexpected insight.

The Greatest Game Ever Pitched: Juan Marichal, Warren Spahn, and the Pitching Duel of the Century


Jim Kaplan - 2011
    Even before their epic pitching duel, Marichal and Spahn already had a lot in common. Future Hall of Famers with high-kicking deliveries, they were shaped into winners by character-building experiences in the military. Spahn had been baseball's most winning pitcher in the 1950s, and Marichal would be equally dominant in the 1960s. The Braves' Spahn and the Giants' Marichal began their duel in San Francisco's cold and windy Candlestick Park. Four hours later, the two pitching legends were deadlocked in a scoreless tie when Willie Mays hit a walk-off home run to end the greatest game ever pitched. In between, Marichal and Spahn each threw more than 200 pitches and went 16 innings without relief. Considering today's culture of pitch counts and coddled arms, it was proved to be a legendary night that won't be repeated ever again.

A Stash of One's Own: Knitters on Loving, Living with, and Letting go of Yarn


Clara Parkes - 2017
      This addictive-to-read anthology celebrates yarn—specifically, the knitter’s reputation for acquiring it in large quantities and storing it away in what’s lovingly referred to as a “stash.” Consider contributions from knitting and teaching luminaries, including:    BUST co-founder Debbie Stoller    Meg Swansen, daughter of master knitter Elizabeth Zimmermann    Knitting blogger and author Susan B. Anderson alongside offerings from knitting greats Amy Herzog, Stephanie Pearl-McPhee, and Franklin Habit—plus, stories from a romance novelist, an illustrator, a PhD-wielding feminist publisher, a globetrotting textile artist, a licensed clinical social worker, and the people behind the world’s largest collective online stash, Ravelry.com. The pieces range from comical to earnest, lighthearted to deeply philosophical as each seeks to answer the question of how the stash a knitter has accumulated over the years reflects his or her place in universe.   The stories in A Stash of One’s Own represent and provide validation for knitters’ wildly varying perspectives on yarn, from holding zero stash, to stash-busting, to stockpiling masses of it—and even including it in estate plans. These tales are for all fiber artists, spinners, dyers, crafters, crocheters, sheep farmers, shop owners, beginning knitters to yarn experts, and everyone who has ever loved a skein too hard to let it go.

Can We All Be Feminists?: New Writing from Brit Bennett, Nicole Dennis-Benn, and 15 Others on Intersectionality, Identity, and the Way Forward for Feminism


June Eric-UdorieAfua Hirsch - 2018
    A groundbreaking book that elevates underrepresented voices, Can We All Be Feminists? offers the tools and perspective we need to create a 21st century feminism that is truly for all.Including essays by: Soofiya Andry, Gabrielle Bellot, Caitlin Cruz, Nicole Dennis-Benn, Brit Bennett, Evette Dionne, Aisha Gani, Afua Hirsch, Juliet Jacques, Wei Ming Kam, Mariya Karimjee, Eishar Kaur, Emer O’Toole, Frances Ryan, Zoé Samudzi, Charlotte Shane, and Selina Thompson

J.R.: My Life as the Most Outspoken, Fearless, and Hard-Hitting Man in Hockey


Jeremy Roenick - 2012
    After making his debut as an 18-year-old with the Chicago Blackhawks, Roenick thrilled fans with his flashy style, take-no-prisoners approach, and jaw-dropping skills. A native of Boston, Roenick went on to play for four more franchises—including the Philadelphia Flyers and Los Angeles Kings—during his incredible 18-season career. By the time he was through, Roenick had racked up 513 goals—the second most of any American-born player—and 703 assists. Now a tells-it-like-it-is commentator for NBC and the NHL, Roenick takes readers on a behind-the-scenes, warts-and-all tour through his illustrious career, both on and off the ice.