Ian O’Connor is a modern-day master of the sports biography, the unauthorized sports biography. Unauthorized is not a dirty word, though the industry needs to rebrand around it. We’ll workshop that …
Unauthorized = true journalism, no editorial input from the central figure, more likely closer to the truth instead of the central figure’s truth. It is not a collaboration.
This is the biography you want to read.
And in the hands of someone like Ian, there’s no better reader experience. Ian handled his latest mammoth figure in Out of the Darkness: The Mystery of Aaron Rodgers(Mariner Books) with utmost fairness and showed the grayness of Rodgers’s character, which makes for a gripping and complicated read.
Maddy is a special person in my life, has been a friend and mentor going on twenty-one years, dating back to a Diaries, Memoirs, and Journals class I took with her at the helm in Tobin (?) at UMass, Amherst back in the fall of 2003. May you have someone in your corner as generous and kind as I’ve had in Maddy over a couple decades.
It’s a book that chronicles the college hockey and the rise of hockey in the South. And at the heart of it is the Geoffrion familly whose bloodline in hockey goes back to the formation of the slapshot.
Blake Geoffrion had the pressure to keep the generational NHL lineage alive. And he did, though his career was cut short by a devastating head injury.
Of the many books I’ve read of Glenn’s, this one’s my favorite and it, at long last, is in movie theaters starring Daisy Ridley.
In this episode, we talk about the journey of how this book came to be adapted, the hiccups along the way, how serendipity played a role in the adaptation, and a lot more book-writing stuff you’ll love to hear about.
What a great interview to re-up. Tremendous insights into the craft of biography and the perfect way to lobby subjects about what it’s important for a credible journalist to tell their stories: Everybody gets forgotten. They might not thinks so, but it’s true. And Howard made that case to Rickey Henderson for Rickey: The Life and Legend of an American Original.
Usually after you have a discussion with your book editor, you have a clearer sense of what you’re doing. Energy. Gusto. I spoke with my editor on June 28. As you can tell, I haven’t written a word since. In fact, I’ve been sad. Like, I-can’t-face-the-day sad.
POV. POV. POV. POV. POV.
What’s my point of view in this biography? My whole concept — my instinct —was to just tell a good story with newer details from a longer lens. That’s not enough. Biographers must imbue the story with something that makes it wholly unique, looking askance at the central figure, even casting judgement. “As the biographer, you have your finger on the scale,” my very astute and downright brilliant editor told me.
I never knew creative block until this moment. I cannot crack this code of how to frame the book in a way that feels fresh and relevant. My interviews are falling flat because I’m running out of things to talk about. I don’t know how to bring fresh juice to these conversations. I thought building up certain “tent pole” moments would be exciting and great but … I don’t think so anymore.
I had a set of instincts going into this project and they’ve been cut off at the knees. And, at this writing, I have 8.5 to complete the reporting, the research, and the writing. As I wrote that sentence, my stomach dropped into my shoes.
Why am I writing this? What value-add is this for you? I can’t say there is any except a great lyric from Metallica’s “King Nothing”:
Careful what you wish, You might regret it Careful what you wish, You just might get it
I have a pal who has told me just to explain it now and write it later. My interpretation is to merely get things down on paper and worry about the sheen later, worry about the connective tissue later. Don’t worry so much about meaning but write the islands. Write out of chronological order.
Ultimately, this the Pressfieldian “Resistance” surfacing from the subterranean bowels of the lizard brain.
A mantra of sorts has helped me: Slow and steady. Deliberate focus.
This was a wonderful conversation from a brilliant writer and reporter, and a great advocate for the writing community at large. He’s the host of Two Writers Slinging Yang.
David Maraniss is the author of several biographies, including his latest, Path Lit by Lightning: The Life of Jim Thorpe (Simon & Schuster). This book will make a great addition to your sports biographies. But like great stories involving sport, it’s about so much more.
In this conversation we talk about David’s “four legs of the table” for writing biography, navigating around people who won’t talk, world building in biography, and a whole lot more.
It’s a tremendous books, one that delves into the life of the great lead-off hitter Rickey Henderson and puts his life into context, builds a world around Rickey.
She’s an incredible writer and reporter. She’s a senior staff writer for The Ringer. On top of that, she’s generous and insightful, and she brought all of that and more to this episode of the podcast.
We talk about failure and persistence and writing and ledes. This is a dream conversation if you’re into the nuts and bolts of writing and reporting long features and books.
