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There's Always This Year: On Basketball and Ascension
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About This Book
Growing up in Columbus, Ohio, in the 1990s, Hanif Abdurraqib witnessed a golden era of basketball, one in which legends like LeBron James were forged, and countless others weren't. His lifelong love of the game leads Abdurraqib into a lyrical, historical, and emotionally rich exploration of what it means to make it, who we think deserves success, the tensions between excellence and expectation, and the very notion of role models, all of which he expertly weaves together with intimate, personal storytelling. "Here is where I would like to tell you about the form on my father's jump shot," Abdurraqib writes. "The truth, though, is that I saw my father shoot a basketball only one time." There's Always This Year is a triumph, brimming with joy, pain, solidarity, comfort, outrage, and hope. No matter the subject of his keen focus—whether it's basketball, or music, or performance—Hanif Abdurraqib's exquisite writing is always poetry, always profound, and always a clarion call to radically reimagine how we think about our culture, our country, and ourselves.
Reviews
"But it's the vast stretches that he pulls off marrying the tenets of memoir, biography, and criticism with evocative kindness and incisive precision that make it feel as though this was the book that Abdurraqib was destined to write ..."
"This is another slam dunk from Abdurraqib."
"Fans of Abdurraqib and basketball will enjoy the book."
"Abdurraqib's willingness to pile everything he's able into his quasi-autobiographical, proto-philosophical inquiry into turn-of-the-twenty-first-century basketball ..."
"Beautiful reflections on personal and communal journeys that have the power to transform anyone willing to step on the court."
"Abdurraqib's chronicle of the game is fascinating, but it's his analysis of James — as a person, a baller, a phenomenon — that shines ..."
"If you are looking to read something that 'pushes against the door of reality and offers an elsewhere', I recommend this title."
"Lyrically stunning and profoundly moving, the confessional text wanders through a variety of topics without ever losing its vulnerability, insight, or focus."
"Abdurraqib keeps multiple balls in the air as he swerves, spins, and scores, and every thoughtfully considered and vividly described element and emotion, action and moment, ultimately, connects."
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