Across the River, Kent Babb
Across the River, Kent Babb
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Across the River
Life, Death, and Football in an American City

Author: Kent Babb

Narrator: Ryan Vincent Anderson, Kent Babb

Unabridged: 11 hr 39 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: HarperAudio

Published: 08/10/2021

Includes: Bonus Material Bonus Material Included


Synopsis

On the west bank of the Mississippi lies the New Orleans neighborhood of Algiers. Short on hope but big on dreams, its mostly poor and marginalized residents find joy on Friday nights when the Cougars of Edna Karr High School take the field. For years, this football program has brought glory to Algiers, winning three consecutive state championships and sending dozens of young men to college on football scholarships.Although he is preparing for a fourth title, head coach Brice Brown is focused on something else: keeping his players alive. An epidemic of gun violence plagues New Orleans and its surrounding communities and has claimed many innocent lives, including Brown’s former star quarterback, Tollette “Tonka” George, shot near a local gas station.In Across the River, award-winning sports journalist Kent Babb follows the Karr football team through its 2019 season as Brown and his team—perhaps the scrappiest and most rebellious group in the program’s history—vie to again succeed on and off the field. What is sure to be a classic work of sports journalism, Across the River is a necessary investigation into the serious realities of young athletes in struggling neighborhoods: gentrification, eviction, mental health issues, the drug trade, and gun violence. It offers a rich and unflinching portrait of a coach, his players, and the West Bank, a community where it’s difficult—but not impossible—to rise above the chaos, discover purpose, and find a way out.Supplemental enhancement PDF accompanies the audiobook.

About Kent Babb

KENT BABB is a reporter for The Washington Post and author of the acclaimed Not a Game: The Incredible Rise and Unthinkable Fall of Allen Iverson. His writing examines the intersection of sports and culture, and three of his stories appeared in The Best American Sports Writing. The Associated Press Sports Editors have three times honored his features as the nation’s best, and Not a Game was shortlisted for the PEN/ESPN Award for Literary Sports Writing. He lives in the Washington, DC, area with his wife and daughter.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Barbara

Justifiably compared to Friday Night Lights, which was published more than three decades ago, this masterful work of nonfiction is required reading for anyone trying to understand the challenges that many young Black males experience while living in an urban area such as New Orleans. The difference......more

Goodreads review by Jake

A really good, powerful read. Whether or not you're a football fan (I'm not anymore), the storytelling by Babb of the coaches' and players' lives is brilliant. This is a book about far more than a sport — it's about a coach and his staff's dedication to saving kids' lives.......more

Goodreads review by Erika

Across the River is one of the most important books I’ve read. I only wish I had found it sooner when I first started teaching in New Orleans. Winning is the goal for these coaches and students, but their why for football and for winning is much bigger than winning. It’s surviving New Orleans for th......more

Goodreads review by Alexis

I need 500 more books to read like this. And there needs to be 1000 more Coach Brown’s in the world. My favorite quote from the book is the perfect summation of the journey this team, this coach, and this book took us on. “He worried that without the structure of football season, players he loved wo......more