Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

They’re Playing Basketball?

Blood in the Garden: The Flagrant History of the 1990s New York Knicks by Chris Herring

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This book has been years in the making. And it did not disappoint. I wasn’t a big NBA fan in the 1990s. College was more my thing (Let’s goooooo Murr-Land!/clapclap). To the extent that I followed the league in that time, I was aware of two things: 1. Michael Jordan’s Bulls won everything, 2. Patrick Ewing’s Knicks were the toughest ticket in Manhattan. As I got older and read more about the league, I began to be fascinated with the Knicks of that time: their […]

Vacation Reading

Stonewall: The Definitive Story of the LGBT Rights Uprising that Changed America by Martin Doberman

The Pursuit of Pearls by Clara Vine

Lust, Caution by Eileen Chang

While Justice Sleeps by Stacey Abrams

The Rocksburg Railroad Murders by K.C. Constantine

March Violets by Philip Kerr

Can't Knock the Hustle: Inside Brooklyn's Season of Hope: How Basketball Helped Us Survive Power, Politics, and a Global Pandemic by Matt Sullivan

The Lime Pit by Jonathan Valin

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I was on vacation last week and, as you can tell from the stack in the header, I read a LOT… Stonewall: The Definitive Story of the LGBT Rights Uprising that Changed America **** I wish this had focused more on the Uprising itself, as opposed to being a semi auto-biography on those who were involved in it. But it’s still a fascinating story at the nascent days of the LGBTQIA+ Movement, the challenges and complexities, and what emerged from it. A good gateway into learning […]

Sho-Be

Three-Ring Circus: Kobe, Shaq, Phil, and the Crazy Years of the Lakers Dynasty by Jeff Pearlman

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(TW: this book mentions Kobe Bryant’s rape case and so does this review. The book goes into graphic detail; the review does not.) I always enjoy Jeff Pearlman’s sports books and this one was no exception. Just as he did for the Showtime Lakers, so he does for the Shaq-Kobe Lakers. Personally speaking, I hated those teams. I thought they were arrogant and selfish. I rooted hard against them in the Finals every year. But that was also in the time when I didn’t care […]

The Last Last Dance

When Nothing Else Matters: Michael Jordan's Last Comeback by Michael Leahy

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Last month, like a large portion of the country, I greedily devoured ESPN’s documentary The Last Dance, which covered the basketball career of Michael Jordan through the lens of his final season with the Chicago Bulls. I enjoyed it for what it was: a fun, somewhat interesting nostalgia trip replete with many delightful basketball highlights. Before I became a diehard NBA fan in the aughts, my knowledge of the league revolved around Jordan. So much of it was a trip down memory lane. Unsurprisingly, the documentary […]

Trust the Process

Tanking to the Top: The Philadelphia 76ers and the Most Audacious Process in the History of Professional Sports by Yaron Weitzman

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As I said a few weeks ago in my review of Ethan Sherwood Strauss’ superb The Victory Machine: thank the living Lord for sports books written by people my age. What a balm. No Michael Jordan narratives. No “back in my day, them fellas didn’t have the interwebs.” It’s simply inconceivable to boomers that people my age remember a world before its wide web, a time before social media, and can in fact conceive of a history that predated our existence. Anyway, enough of that. There’s […]

Come Out And Play

The Victory Machine: The Making & Unmaking of the Warriors Dynasty by Ethan Sherwood Strauss

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Oh finally, a quality sports book written by someone my age. My kingdom for such a book. Thank you, Ethan Sherwood Strauss. To not have to deal with condescensions such as “Hey, ya know young fella, ol’ Michael Jordan never had Twitter. Larry Bird wasn’t on Facebook. Magic Johnson didn’t mess with the internets. We had to get our highlights the old fashioned way” as if it’s inconceivable that people realize there was a world before they were born. At any rate, that’s a big […]



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