By Steve Almond
Recommended By Ralph Guiteau, Readers' Services Librarian

Argues that not only is American football hazardous to players’ health, and especially to their brains, but also that American support of the sport encourages violence, prejudices, and other ethically troubling behavior.

By David Halberstam

Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist profiles the struggles of four unknown young men who compete to represent the U.S. as its lone single sculler (rowing) in the 1984 Olympics.

By Matthew Polly

This is the story of the childhood dream that led Polly to study martial arts at China’s famed Shaolin Temple, his initial disenchantement that turned into respect for the instructors, and the training that eventually led him to represent the Temple in international competitions.

By Rafi Kohan
Recommended By Lisa H., Readers' Services Librarian

An exploration of the modern American sports stadium traces the stories of iconic stadiums and fields as well as the rowdy customs that have become related traditions, from scalper turf wars and tailgate parties to fighter-jet flyovers and death-defying halftime shows.

By Chad Harbach
Recommended By Evelyn Hershkowitz, Readers' Services Librarian
With Evelyn Hershkowitz, Readers' Services Librarian

Tuesday, February 26, 2013.  1:30 PM.

A baseball star at a small college near Lake Michigan launches a routine throw that goes disastrously off course and inadvertently changes the lives of five people, including the college president, a gay teammate, and the president's daughter.

By Harlan Coben
Series Myron Bolitar Novels

When veteran golfer Jack Coldren, staging a comeback at the U.S. Open, is found dead in a sand trap, sports agent Myron Bolitar investigates, digging through twenty years of secrets to find a killer who is closer to him than he imagined.

By Fredrik Backman
Series Beartown Series
With Evelyn Hershkowitz, Readers' Services Librarian

Tuesday, August 28, 2018. 1:30 PM.

In the tiny forest community of Beartown, the possibility that the amateur hockey team might win a junior championship, bringing the hope of revitalization to the fading town, is shattered by the aftermath of a violent act that leaves a young girl traumatized.

By Daniel James Brown
Recommended By Jean Buchholtz, Library Clerk, Audrey Honigman, Library Clerk
With Evelyn Hershkowitz, Readers' Services Librarian

Tuesday, March 8, 2016. 7:30 PM.

Traces the story of an American rowing team from the University of Washington that defeated elite rivals at Hitler's 1936 Berlin Olympics, sharing the experiences of their enigmatic coach, a visionary boat builder, and a homeless teen rower.

By Ben Mezrich
Recommended By Megan Kass, Systems Manager

Describes how a group of overachieving, anarchist MIT students joined a decades–old underground blackjack club dedicated to counting cards and beating the system at major casinos around the world. They managed to legally take several Las Vegas casinos for more than three million dollars.

By Peter Golenbock

Reminiscences about the most beloved baseball team of all times.

By John Grisham
Recommended By John Shea, Library Page

“Follows the divergent paths of a rookie hitter for the Chicago Cubs and a hard-hitting Mets pitcher (From the Publisher).”

By Lars Anderson
Recommended By Barney Levantino, Reference Librarian

“A stunning work of narrative nonfiction, Carlisle vs. Army recounts the fateful 1912 gridiron clash that pitted Jim Thorpe, one of America's finest athletes, against Dwight D. Eisenhower, the man who would become one of the nation's greatest heroes. But beyond telling the tale of an epic afternoon whose reverberations would be felt for generations, Lars Anderson also reveals the broader social and historical context of the match, lending it his unique perspectives on sports and culture at the dawn of the twentieth century (From the Publisher).”

By Taylor Jenkins Reid
Recommended By Lisa H., Readers' Services Librarian

A retired tennis champion comes out of retirement at age 37 after watching a young phenom beat her long–standing record at the 1994 US Open.

By Mike McIntire
Recommended By Ralph Guiteau, Readers' Services Librarian

A Pulitzer Prize finalist presents a searing critique of how today's multi-billion-dollar sports empires are compromising universities, students and athletes, exposing the dark history of intercollegiate athletics as demonstrated by the history of the Florida State Seminoles and the experiences of whistleblower Christie Suggs.

By Kwame Alexander

Fourteen-year-old twin basketball stars Josh and Jordan wrestle with highs and lows on and off the court as their father ignores his declining health.

By Gene Luen Yang

An introverted reader starts understanding local enthusiasm about sports in his school when he gets to know some of his talented athletic peers and discovers that their stories are just as thrilling as the comics he loves.

By Marty Glickman

At the heart of this autobiography is the notorious incident at the 1936 "Nazi Olympics" in Berlin. Glickman and Sam Stoller, the only Jews on the American track and field team, were dropped from the 400-meter relay team. Marty recounts his football days at Syracuse University and goes on to describe his broadcasting career. He concludes with trenchant observations about his fellow sports broadcasters, the present-day Olympics, and tips on how to break into sports broadcasting.

By Stefan Fatsis
Recommended By Barney Levantino, Reference Librarian

“…Fatsis with wry candor and hard-won empathy unveils the mind of the modern pro athlete and the workings of a storied sports franchise as no writer has before (From the Publisher).”

By Ron Irwin

Working-class Rob receives a rowing scholarship to the Fenton School, where the team captain's brutal urge to win leads to tragedy.

By Jeff Pearlman
Recommended By Ralph Guiteau, Readers' Services Librarian

Traces the three seasons of existence of the United States Football League, revealing its early success, how it launched the careers of many football superstars, and how it ultimately crashed and failed due to the influence of Donald Trump and other team owners.

By Mark Schultz
Recommended By Megan Kass, Systems Manager

An Olympic gold medal-winning wrestler describes the 1996 murder of his brother by the eccentric heir to the du Pont dynasty, describing the complex relationship they shared with the increasingly unstable killer prior to the tragedy.

By H.G. Bissinger
Recommended By Kalpana Mehta, Reference Librarian

Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Bissinger tells of the year he spent 1988 in Odessa, Tex., a town obsessed with its champion high–school football team, the Permian Panthers.

Became the movie: Friday Night Lights and TV show: Friday Night Lights.

By Mark Kram

“The intense rivalry between two great boxers is traced in this epic history of a sports legend that sets readers up for one of the greatest sporting events of all time--the "Thrilla in Manila” (From the Publisher).”

By Jerry Amernic

Follows the coming-of-age of a young man who makes a special connection with his grandfather at the end of the latter’s life, a period marked by the grandfather’s hero-worship of Babe Ruth and memories about one of the athlete’s early home runs.

By Chris Cleave
Recommended By Audrey Honigman, Library Clerk

Cyclists Zoe and Kate are friends and athletic rivals for Olympic gold, while Kate and her husband Jack, also a world-class cyclist, must contend with the recurrence of their young daughter's leukemia.

By Kathleen West
Recommended By Evelyn Hershkowitz, Readers' Services Librarian

Twenty years after she failed to make the final roster on her hockey team that went for Olympic gold, Leigh returns to her Minnesota home town so that her daughter, a hockey prodigy, can have the chance she missed.

By Jon Krakauer
Recommended By Amy B., Children's Librarian

"Heroism and sacrifice triumph over foolishness, fatal error, and human frailty in this bone–chilling narrative in which the author recounts his experiences on an ill–fated, deadly climb. Thrilling armchair reading (From School Library Journal)."

By Derek Jeter
Recommended By Amy B., Children's Librarian

“Offers a photographic retrospective of the Major League Baseball star and five-time World Series champion who retired after the 2014 season (From the Publisher).”

By Ed Viesturs
Recommended By Neela Vass, Head of Acquisitions

A first American mountaineer to have ascended all 14 of the world's 8,000-meter peaks explores the history of K2 as reflected by six dramatic climbing campaigns, describing the tragedies that have marked many attempts as well as his own near-fatal 1992 ascent.

By Jane Leavy
Recommended By Jeanette Donohue, Programming

“Another biography of the late Yankee slugger - but this candid, compassionate portrait is worth a dugout full of the others. Sports journalist Leavy produces an enduring, though certainly not endearing, portrait of The Mick (Kirkus Reviews).”

By Kevin Cook
Recommended By Ralph Guiteau, Readers' Services Librarian

Describes the earlier years of the NFL, when players hitchhiked to practice and stayed in fleabag motels, and how the organization transformed into the corporate, scripted multibillion-dollar spectacle it is today.

By Harlan Coben
Series Myron Bolitar Novels

When a pregnant tennis star reports that her rock-artist husband has gone missing amid scandalous rumors, Myron Bolitar is forced to confront deep secrets about his client’s past while struggling with fatherhood roles in his personal life.

By Jaimy Gordon
Recommended By Sonia Grgas, Reference Librarian

“National Book Award-finalist Gordon's new novel begins and ends at a backwoods race track in early-1970s West Virginia, where horse trainer Tommy Hansel dreams up a scam (From Publishers Weekly).”

By Jonathan Eig
Recommended By Amy B., Children's Librarian

“Recounts the life of the Hall of Fame ballplayer whose career was cut short by the disease now commonly called after him, in a portrait that shares details about his rivalry with Babe Ruth, the onset of his illness, and the final years of his life (From the Publisher).”

By Ray Bradbury

In The Martian Chronicles, Ray Bradbury, America’s preeminent storyteller, imagines a place of hope, dreams, and metaphor— of crystal pillars and fossil seas—where a fine dust settles on the great empty cities of a vanished, devastated civilization. Earthmen conquer Mars and then are conquered by it, lulled by dangerous lies of comfort and familiarity, and enchanted by the lingering glamour of an ancient, mysterious native race.

By Brian Biegel

The captivating, utterly improbable but ultimately true story of one man’s quest to solve sports’ greatest mystery: What happened to the most famous of all home-run balls–the holy grail of sports.

By Molly Bloom
Recommended By Megan Kass, Systems Manager

All bets are off in this insider’s story of excess, greed and danger that follows the author, who in the late 2000s, ran the highest stakes, most exclusive poker game in existence until it all came crashing down around her and she lost everything.

By Marc Gunther

"In the early 1970s, Monday Night Football revolutionized television sports coverage... But in the broadcast booth, all was not beer and skittles… By concentrating on the interplay of  personalities, Gunther and Carter write a tale that will appeal to many more readers than just football fans (From the Publisher)."

By Michael Lewis
Recommended By Barry Ernst, Reference Librarian

Explains how Billy Beene, the general manager of the Oakland Athletics, is using a new kind of thinking to build a successful and winning baseball team without spending enormous sums of money.

Became the movie: Moneyball

By David Clay Large

A historical account of the 1936 Olympics discusses how the games represented a critical collision of athletics and politics for Nazi Germany, sharing details about the role of the Nazi Propaganda Ministry and international efforts to boycott the games.

By Richard D. Mandell

This book is an expose of one of the most bizarre festivals in sport history. It provides portraits of key figures including Adolf Hitler, Jesse Owens, Leni Riefenstahl, Helen Stephens, Kee Chung Sohn, and Avery Brundage. It also conveys the charade that reinforced and mobilized the hysterical patriotism of the German masses.

By Johnny Anonymous
Recommended By Ralph Guiteau, Readers' Services Librarian

A successful offensive lineman who secretly hates football and its politics shares behind-the-scenes observations about life in the NFL to expose its bizarre realities, customs, and prejudices.

By Victoria Patterson

The Canadian women's track and field team meets many challenges at the 1928 Amsterdam Olympics, the first games in which women were allowed to compete in track and field.

By John Grisham
Recommended By Rosemary Moran, Senior Library Clerk

Cut from the Cleveland Browns after the worst performance in the history of the NFL, Rick Dockery, desperate to play football, is hired by the Panthers of Parma, Italy, and finds himself confronted by the confusing diversity of Italian culture, language,and romance.

By Daniel J. Boynes

The Director of Recreational Rowing at Harvard University describes the struggle of the first all-female crew team's battle against gender prejudice, male domination, and bureaucracy to achieve international victory in one of the most grueling sports and offers profiles of the women and their coach who were a part of this winning crew team.

By Alexandra Heminsley
Recommended By Megan Kass, Systems Manager

A journalist and broadcaster shares her hilarious and inspirational personal journey from a self-proclaimed non-athlete to someone who, after many stumbling, painful efforts, has become a runner, which has transformed her relationships, her body and her life.

By Laura Hillenbrand
Recommended By Jean Buchholtz, Library Clerk

"Seabiscuit was one of the most electrifying and popular attractions in sports history and the single biggest newsmaker in the world in 1938… Author Laura Hillenbrand brilliantly re-creates a universal underdog story, one that proves life is a horse race (From the Publisher)."

By Walter Dean Myers

A love of basketball isn’t necessary to enjoy this gritty, feelingly told tale, but it would certainly help. Myers uses contemporary urban black phrasing to relay his narrator’s view of the mean streets of Harlem, as well as describe some heart–thumping hoop action in a novel that, like most good sports stories, is about more than just sports.

By Pete Hamill

Michael Devlin, an 11–year–old Irish American, meets Rabbi Hirsch, recently arrived from Europe, and in return for teaching the rabbi about baseball and English, the rabbi teaches Michael Yiddish and tells him about Prague, until an Irish gang becomes violent in its anti–Semitism.

By Joe Drape

An inside look into the 2011 season of the West Point football team reveals the unique pressures and expectations that make a year of Army football so much more than just a tally of wins and losses.