Books You Might Like:

 

Sports - Fiction

 

Night hoops by Carl Deuker.

While trying to prove that he is good enough to be on his high school's varsity basketball team, Nick must also deal with his parents' divorce and the erractic behavior of a troubled classmate who lives across the street.

Accelerated Reader Reading Level - 4.5

 

Painting the black by Carl Deuker.

When star athlete Josh Daniels moves in across the street, Ryan Ward doesn't realize how much his life will change during his senior year at Seattle's Crown Hill High.

Accelerated Reader Reading Level - 4.4

 

St. Michael's scales by Neil Connelly.

Keegan Flannery, feeling responsible for his twin brother's death and his mother's mental illness, believes he must atone by committing suicide before his sixteenth birthday, but he gains new insights when he joins his school's wrestling team.

Accelerated Reader Reading Level - 5.7

 

Imitate the tiger by Jan Cheripko.

A high school football player has to face his collapsing world brought on by his drinking problem.

Accelerated Reader Reading Level - 4.1

 

Home of the Braves by David Klass.

Eighteen-year-old Joe, captain of the soccer team, is dismayed when a hotshot player shows up from Brazil and threatens to take over both the team and the girl whom Joe hopes to date.

Accelerated Reader Reading Level - 6.1

 

Fielder's choice : a novel by Rick Norman.

ax is a kid who loves to pitch and for a brief while he realizes his dream of playing in the pros. Then in 1941, he finds himself in the Army Air Corps and later a prisoner of war.

Accelerated Reader Reading Level - 5.3

 

Free radical by Claire Rudolf Murphy.

In Fairbanks, Alaska, in the middle of the summer Little League baseball season, fifteen-year-old Luke is stunned when his mother confesses that she is wanted by the FBI for her role in the death of a student during an anti-Vietnam War protest thirty years ago.

Accelerated Reader Reading Level - 4.4

 

The brave by Robert Lipsyte.

Having left the Indian reservation for the streets of New York, seventeen-year-old boxer Sonny Bear tries to harness his inner rage by training with Alfred Brooks, who has left the sport to become a policeman.

Accelerated Reader--Level 4.2

 

Eight seconds by Jean Ferris.

Rodeo school teaches eighteen-year-old John how to stay on a bull for eight seconds, as well as the key to his identity.

Accelerated Reader Reading Level - 4.6

 

Slam! by Walter Dean Myers.

Sixteen-year-old "Slam" Harris is counting on his noteworthy basketball talents to get him out of the inner city and give him a chance to succeed in life, but his coach sees things differently.

Accelerated Reader Reading Level - 4.5

 

Tartabull's throw by Henry Garfield.

In 1967 an encounter with a mysterious young woman from Maine involves a nineteen-year-old baseball player in an investigation of a vicious, murderous werewolf.

Accelerated Reader Reading Level - 5.9

 

How I fell in love & learned to shoot free throws by Jon Ripslinger.

Seventeen-year-old Danny Henderson, an indifferent basketball player, has his eye on Angel McPherson, star of the girls' team in their Iowa high school.

Accelerated Reader Reading Level - 4.0

 

Fighting Ruben Wolfe by Markus Zusak.

Partly because of their family's poor finances and partly to prove themselves, brothers Ruben and Cameron take jobs as fighters and find themselves reacting very differently in the boxing ring.

Accelerated Reader Reading Level - 3.6

 

Out of order by A.M. Jenkins.

Popular sophomore baseball star Colt Trammel faces a personal crisis when his girlfriend dumps him, his failing grades threaten to bump him from the team, and he finds himself drawn to a new, green-haired girl at school.

Accelerated Reader Reading Level - 4.2

 

Holding at third by Linda Zinnen.

When thirteen-year-old Matt's older brother Tom moves to a different hospital to receive a "treatment of last resort" for his cancer, Matt tries to adjust to a new home and school, a new baseball team, and his feelings about his brother.

Accelerated Reader Reading Level - 4.4

 

Damage by A.M. Jenkins.

Seventeen-year-old football hero Austin, trying to understand the inexplicable depression that has drained his interest in life, thinks that he has found relief in a girl who seems very special.

Accelerated Reader Reading Level - 4.9

 

Warrior angel by Robert Lipsyte.

Native American boxer of the Moscondaga Nation, Sonny Bear must fight to retain his heavyweight championship title.

Accelerated Reader Reading Level - 4.5

 

Hard ball by Will Weaver.

A fourteen-year-old Minnesota farm boy has to figure out how to get along with the arch-rival in his love life and on the baseball diamond, and both boys must learn how to deal with the unfair expectations of their fathers.

Accelerated Reader--Level 4.4

 

Bull catcher by Alden R. Carter.

Pete and Jeff continue their friendship and love of baseball as they progress from ninth grade through high school in their small Wisconsin town.

Accelerated Reader--Level 4.4

 

Losing is not an option : stories by Rich Wallace.

Eleven episodes in the life of a young man, from sneaking into his tenth football game in a row with his best friend in sixth grade to running his last high school race, the Pennsylvania state championships.

Accelerated Reader Reading Level - 4.7  

 

Whale talk by Chris Crutcher.

Intellectually and athletically gifted, TJ, a multiracial, adopted teenager, shuns organized sports and the gung-ho athletes at his high school until he agrees to form a swimming team and recruits some of the school's less popular students.

Accelerated Reader Reading Level - 6.1 

 

River thunder by Will Hobbs.

Despite some reservations, sixteen-year-old Jessie joins her companions from the previous year's adventure on the Colorado River for a legal rafting trip through the Grand Canyon.

Accelerated Reader Reading Level - 5.0

 

 

Sports - Nonfiction

 

 

How Angel Peterson got his name : and other outrageous tales about extreme sports by Gary Paulsen.

Author Gary Paulsen relates tales from his youth in a small town in northwestern Minnesota in the late 1940s and early 1950s, such as skiing behind a souped-up car and imitating daredevil Evel Knievel.

Accelerated Reader Reading Level - 6.0

 

Only the strong survive : the odyssey of Allen Iverson by Larry Platt.

Tells the life story of Philadelphia 76ers basketball star Allen Iverson and examines his place in mainstream and hip-hop culture.

 

The 12 greatest rounds of boxing : the untold stories by Ferdie Pacheco with Jim Moskovitz.

Profiles twelve of the best fights in the history of boxing and provides behind-the-scenes information for each of them.

 

The black lights : inside the world of professional boxing by Thomas Hauser.

Discusses professional boxing--the sport and the business.

 

Loose balls : easy money, hard fouls, cheap laughs, and true love in the NBA by Jayson Williams with Steve Friedman.

Loose Balls is the basketball book everyone has been waiting for: no inspirational pieties or chestthumping boasting, just real insider tales of refs, groupies, coaches, entourages, and all the superstars, bench warmers, journeymen, clowns, and other performers in the rarefied circus that is professional basketball.

 

How to be like Mike : life lessons about basketball's best by Pat Williams with Michael Weinreb.

The author identifies the eleven characteristics of basketball star Michael Jordan that he believes account for Jordan's greatness on and off the court, and shares related anecdotes and quotes collected in over 1,500 interviews.

 

College football : history, spectacle, controversy by John Sayle Watterson.

A comprehensive, hundred-year history of AmericaÕs popular pasttime.

 

Rites of autumn : the story of college football by Richard Whittingham.

A historical look at the game of college football featuring the great players, coaches, and rivalries that have been featured every autumn since the late 1800s.

 

The concrete wave : the history of skateboarding by Michael Brooke.

An illustrated history of skateboarding, from 1959 through the 1990s, featuring interviews with some of the world's top skaters, and including true stories of the sport.

 

They cleared the lane : the NBA's Black pioneers by Ron Thomas.

In the late 1940Õs, during which time the NBA was formed, team owners originally imposed an unwritten ban on black players.  Pressured by several progressive owners, and the increasing emergence of talented black players, the NBA gradually accepted integration.  Through in-depth interviews with players, their families, coaches and teammates, Ron Thomas tells the largely untold story of what basketball was really like for the first black NBA players.

 

One dream : the NFL by Woody Falgoux.

Chronicles the day-to-day exploits of 10 undrafted rookies as they go through training camp with the New Orleans Saints.

 

Last call : memoirs of an NFL referee by Jerry Markbreit and Alan Steinberg.

Last call is the first comprehensive look at football through the officialÕs point of view.  Goal line to goal line, Jerry Markbreit takes us inside the real action to reveal the players, the play, and some of the best and worst calls of all time on a football field.

 

A whole new ball game : the story of the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League by Sue Macy.

Describes the activities of the members of the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League, the women's professional baseball league that existed between 1943 and 1954.

Accelerated Reader--Level 7.8

 

Kick boxing by Eddie Cave.

An introduction to kickboxing that provides information on the sport's history, technical elements, training, basic techniques, and professional competitions.

 

Have board, will travel : the definitive history of surf, skate, and snow by Jamie Brisick.

Presents one hundred years of history of surfing, skateboarding, and snowboarding and shows the connection between the three sports, individual competitions, and the athletes who participate.