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Books4Guys - Keith O'Brien - New York Times Best Selling Author · Books4Guys

• 0:15
  SPEAKER_00: But no, Keith, this is gonna be cool, man.
• 0:17
  SPEAKER_00: Like I said, I think uh w for those that don't know, March Madness kicks off today.
• 0:23
  SPEAKER_00: And uh Keith, I found your book a couple weeks ago, Heartland, about uh Larry Burt.
• 0:29
  SPEAKER_00: And uh I was like, man, what what is this?
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_00: And and Keith, then I then I discovered a lot of your other books as well.
• 0:35
  SPEAKER_00: And I was like, man, I gotta get Keith on the podcast.
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I appreciate you finding me, uh, Chris.
• 0:40
  SPEAKER_00: It's great to be here.
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely, absolutely.
• 0:44
  SPEAKER_00: Well, Keith, to kind of kick things off, just you've been writing for a long time.
• 0:48
  SPEAKER_00: You're a New York Times bestselling author.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you've, like I said, you've got several books, but Heartland is your latest one that came out this month, and it tells the story about Larry Bird, um, Indiana State, his whole story there.
• 1:02
  SPEAKER_00: And I actually we hear all these great things about Larry Bird and his Hall of Fame career and the Indian Indiana State good, the good uh, I guess, notes of the story.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_00: But I personally wasn't aware of the backstory of Larry Bird may have very easily could have gone a different path, and we never may have even heard of him.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but talk a little bit about your book and how you came across the story and and just your uh your process of getting it all together.
• 1:30
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 1:30
  SPEAKER_01: Well, so Heartland is an origin story.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_01: Uh this narrative unfolds between 1973 and 1979.
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_01: It unfolds almost exclusively in rural Indiana.
• 1:41
  SPEAKER_01: Everything after 1979 is epilogue, uh, epilogue material for me.
• 1:46
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, and you know, the the reason why I wanted to write it this way is really a simple one.
• 1:51
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I feel like every time we've come to this story over the past 50 years, we always tell it one way.
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, we always do the bird magic story.
• 2:01
  SPEAKER_01: You know, we weave together the story of Larry Bird and Magic Johnson.
• 2:05
  SPEAKER_01: And listen, I understand why we do that, of course, as a storyteller.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_01: You know, Bird and Magic will play against each other in that epic championship game in March 1979, the most watched college basketball game of all time, 50 million viewers.
• 2:19
  SPEAKER_01: And then, you know, they're gonna go on to change and redefine and save the NBA, both becoming icons.
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_01: So I get it.
• 2:27
  SPEAKER_01: But the reality of the situation is this: in the 1970s, Bird and Magic barely know each other.
• 2:33
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, they've met one time.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_01: In that one time, they've hardly spoken.
• 2:38
  SPEAKER_01: So, you know, they're not friends, they're not rivals, they're not anything.
• 2:42
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, Magic Johnson to Larry Bird is no different uh, you know, than Sidney Moncrief, uh, a great player for Arkansas, who Bird plays in March of 79, or Mark Aguire, a great player for DePaul, who Mark uh Bird plays in March of 79.
• 2:59
  SPEAKER_01: So what I really wanted to do here was uh tilt the camera just a little bit differently and change the perspective and zoom in on this origin story.
• 3:09
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and when you do that, what you get is almost a completely different story.
• 3:14
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and uh maybe more compelling, you get this totally new cast of characters.
• 3:20
  SPEAKER_01: Uh people who were around Bird uh in the 1970s who do form and change and at times save him.
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_01: Uh that's the story I'm trying to tell in Heartland.
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, you know, and and I think it's far bigger than a sports story.
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_01: I think it's just a compelling human narrative.
• 3:39
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 3:39
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 3:40
  SPEAKER_00: No, and like I like I said, Keith, I had never been introduced to this part of Larry Bird's story.
• 3:47
  SPEAKER_00: Um I've always thought it's incredible that, yeah, Magic, Larry, uh, they play in college and they go on to this incredible, you know, rivalry throughout their NBA careers.
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_00: But that's kind of all we look at.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_00: We just talk about greatness and how awesome they were, but we don't, we haven't taken the time, no one, no one has until you to really dig into the backstory uh before all of that and and put that out there.
• 4:11
  SPEAKER_00: And talk a little bit more, uh, don't give too much away because I want people to pick up your book and read it, but tell a little bit about because Larry Bird almost didn't even go to college.
• 4:21
  SPEAKER_00: Um he he he almost he he went to work for a trash c company.
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_00: And I again that's such an incredible thing to learn because I've never heard that before.
• 4:31
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I think, you know, uh sports fans, Larry Bird fans, Celtics fans will know the the broad strokes, you know that you know, Bird grows up in French Lake, Indiana.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_01: He he he briefly has a chance to play at Indiana University for the great Bob Knight, uh, then you know doesn't last there, leaves after just three weeks, ends up back in French Lake, where you know he does get that job working for the City Street Department, uh, where among other things he is collecting the trash.
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_01: I uh I think people know the broad strokes, but it's it's far darker than that, far uh far more troubled than that.
• 5:10
  SPEAKER_01: You know, uh, you know, French Lake in the 1970s uh, you know, is is an incredibly poor town uh in Orange County, Indiana, which was the second poorest county in Indiana in the 1970s.
• 5:25
  SPEAKER_01: Uh so it's a really hard place to grow up.
• 5:27
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, you know, Bird's family struggles financially, his father struggles personally.
• 5:33
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, you know, unemployment at times in Orange County in the 70s is hovering at you know 18, 20% unemployment.
• 5:40
  SPEAKER_01: Uh Bird's father struggles with that.
• 5:42
  SPEAKER_01: He struggles to hold and land jobs, struggles with drinking.
• 5:47
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, you know, for all these reasons, Bird isn't really dreaming of going to college.
• 5:53
  SPEAKER_01: He isn't dreaming of playing the NBA.
• 5:55
  SPEAKER_01: Those are dreams far too absurd for a boy to have in French Lick in the early 1970s.
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_01: He just wants to play on the varsity basketball team at Springs Valley High School.
• 6:05
  SPEAKER_01: That's it.
• 6:06
  SPEAKER_01: And this is a tiny little school uh, you know, with a tiny basketball program.
• 6:11
  SPEAKER_01: You know, they don't typically compete for anything uh there in Springs Valley.
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and in his first three years as a player there, Bird is never the best player on his own teams.
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, he's uh a good player, but he's not turning any heads.
• 6:27
  SPEAKER_01: I interviewed one guy who played for a rival school.
• 6:31
  SPEAKER_01: A man named Bill Butcher uh plays for a rival school heading into the uh Bird senior year.
• 6:37
  SPEAKER_01: He told me he didn't even know who Bird was, even though they had played them every year.
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_01: Uh so uh, you know, this is Larry Bird.
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_01: And then, you know, he has uh a growth spurt that's frankly gonna change history.
• 6:51
  SPEAKER_01: You know, uh in between his junior and senior years, Bird grows three or four inches, an incredible growth spurt.
• 6:58
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and and now it's different.
• 7:00
  SPEAKER_01: You know, he's almost 6'7 now, six, six, six, seven.
• 7:05
  SPEAKER_01: Uh now he's turning heads.
• 7:07
  SPEAKER_01: Now people are coming.
• 7:08
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know, Bobby Knight does recruit him.
• 7:10
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, but you know, Bird isn't considered a top 15 player in the state of Indiana.
• 7:15
  SPEAKER_01: In the state of Indiana, I think it's important to restate that.
• 7:19
  SPEAKER_01: People thought there were 15 players better than Larry Bird.
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and uh, you know, he doesn't last at Indiana and really then does have this dark winter coming home, where I do believe uh it is very possible that that Bird could have slipped away forever.
• 7:36
  unknown: Yeah.
• 7:37
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, we would have never had the incredible stories or matchups or or any of that.
• 7:43
  SPEAKER_00: And it's uh, I mean, I love stories like this, Keith.
• 7:47
  SPEAKER_00: Because you're a big sports guy.
• 7:48
  SPEAKER_00: Obviously, I'm a big sports guy, and and obviously you like the the rooting for the games and all that, but it's the stories of the athletes that really get your heart, you know.
• 7:59
  SPEAKER_00: You you learn about these guys, and then you and all of a sudden you feel like you know them.
• 8:02
  SPEAKER_00: Um which I'm I'm sure as you got to do all these interviews and and and learn about all these things, which kind of leads me to another question for you, Keith.
• 8:12
  SPEAKER_00: It's as you were digging into to putting this book together and interviewing people and learning things, what were some things that really surprised you?
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_00: I I know there's, you know, like like you interviewed the guy and he's like, I don't even know who Larry Bird was, you know, but what are some things that you were like, wow, that's just that's insane?
• 8:33
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I mean so much, honestly.
• 8:35
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I uh I am a sports fan uh in general, uh, but you know, I would say all I knew about Bird going into this project was, you know, those broad strokes.
• 8:47
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, you know, French Lick, Indiana for a minute, Indiana State, Bird Magic saves the NBA.
• 8:53
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, you know, I I know the broad strokes.
• 8:56
  SPEAKER_01: So I I learned so much and I'm always learning so much when I'm doing a project.
• 9:02
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, you know, uh a couple things.
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I mentioned a minute ago that, you know, Bird was never the best player on his own teams until that senior year of high school.
• 9:10
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, you know, I think another thing for people to know, you know, parents or grandparents out there, uh, you know, none of this was destined.
• 9:19
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, none of this was written.
• 9:21
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, it didn't have to happen this way.
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_01: And even after Bird is playing on the varsity team at Springs Valley High School, um, he isn't always, you know, driven for greatness, you know, as a boy.
• 9:35
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, there were days when his head coach, a man named Jim Jones, a man I interviewed, he's in his 80s today.
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, there were days when Jim Jones had to go into the house uh and wake Bert up uh just uh to get him to come to school.
• 9:50
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, you know, uh so, you know, uh what I've learned over this project and my last book on Pete Rose uh called Charlie Hustle is that you know these these athletes who go on to become icons, you know, they do have certain qualities about them that are going to, you know, drive them to success.
• 10:14
  SPEAKER_01: But in in both of those cases, there were people around them, you know, who lift them up, who push them forward, who who carry them at times uh in in in the darkest times.
• 10:25
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and and that's certainly true with Bird.
• 10:28
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and you know, again, in in our in our efforts over the years to tell this story, uh, you know, we've we've you know oversimplified it to the point of almost being wrong, you know.
• 10:41
  SPEAKER_01: Uh uh and and uh one one character, you know, who's been mentioned in past stories, but never really has gotten his full due, uh, who is is is an important protagonist in my book, uh, is a man named Bill Hodges.
• 10:57
  SPEAKER_01: You know, were it not for Bill Hodges, I do believe uh we don't know the name Larry Bird.
• 11:03
  SPEAKER_01: Uh he never leaves French Lick, he never returns to college.
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_01: I do believe that.
• 11:07
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, you know, in the spring of 75, uh, you know, 10 months after having left uh Bloomington and Bobby Knight in Indiana, uh, you know, Larry Bird is in a very dark place.
• 11:21
  SPEAKER_01: You know, he has come back to French Lick.
• 11:24
  SPEAKER_01: He has briefly enrolled in vocational school, briefly played for the basketball team there, then quit that team, quit that school, then gotten that job working for the City Street Department, where among his other duties he's collecting the trash while all that's happening.
• 11:39
  SPEAKER_01: His father is fully unraveling, you know, tragedy at the doorstep of the Bird House.
• 11:44
  SPEAKER_01: And by the spring of 75, Bird is telling everybody, including his mother, that he's not going back to school.
• 11:51
  SPEAKER_01: He's done.
• 11:52
  SPEAKER_01: And one thing I've learned about Bird uh over the course of this project is uh when Bird says something, he means it.
• 11:58
  SPEAKER_01: And he almost always follows through.
• 12:00
  SPEAKER_01: He's incredibly consistent like that.
• 12:03
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and uh in that moment in time, this man Bill Hodges shows up in French Lick.
• 12:08
  SPEAKER_01: You know, Bill Hodges is a journeyman assistant coach, uh, newly hired at Indiana State.
• 12:16
  SPEAKER_01: Uh he has uh moved on from three different schools in three years.
• 12:20
  SPEAKER_01: He's gone from Tennessee Tech to Armstrong State to Indiana State.
• 12:25
  SPEAKER_01: Not really moving in the right direction here.
• 12:27
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and uh, you know, Hodges only gets the job at Indiana State because he knows Indiana.
• 12:33
  SPEAKER_01: Uh the new head coach at Indiana State has spent most of his career in New Mexico and Iowa.
• 12:39
  SPEAKER_01: He doesn't know Indiana.
• 12:41
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and Indiana State isn't going to be recruiting nationally, let's just be honest.
• 12:45
  SPEAKER_01: They're going to be recruiting in small towns in rural Illinois, rural Indiana.
• 12:51
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and so, you know, the head coach needs someone who knows the state.
• 12:54
  SPEAKER_01: Bill Hodges does.
• 12:56
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, he knows every little bandbox gymnasium in every little town, and uh, you know, he gets the job for that reason and goes down to French Lick looking for Larry Bird.
• 13:07
  SPEAKER_01: You know, just pause here for a moment.
• 13:10
  SPEAKER_01: You know, in 2026, you know, a talented athlete in a rural community, poor rural community like French Lick, you know, would have a team around him or her from the age of 16 or 14.
• 13:25
  SPEAKER_01: You know, a team of handlers, agents, lawyers.
• 13:28
  SPEAKER_01: You wouldn't go looking for them today.
• 13:30
  SPEAKER_01: They would come looking for you, uh, even in a poor rural community.
• 13:35
  SPEAKER_01: Uh Bill Hodges is driving the streets looking for Larry Bird, finds him, and then really connects with him.
• 13:42
  SPEAKER_01: You know, Hodges is still alive.
• 13:45
  SPEAKER_01: He's in his early 80s.
• 13:46
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, he's he's stubborn like Bird.
• 13:50
  SPEAKER_01: He's from rural Indiana like Bird.
• 13:52
  SPEAKER_01: He's a straight talker like Bird.
• 13:55
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know, uh those two men have a connection, which is why Bird ultimately agrees later that summer, okay, fine, I'll come back to school.
• 14:05
  SPEAKER_01: Give it one more chance.
• 14:06
  SPEAKER_00: And it worked out.
• 14:08
  SPEAKER_00: Better than he could have expected.
• 14:11
  SPEAKER_00: But Keith, again, I think this is so cool because I mean, you mentioned super fans or fans of a certain era know the the basic facts of some of this.
• 14:21
  SPEAKER_00: But like you also said, the good story's been told so many times that that the base of it kind of gets forgotten, especially for guys, I think, my age, um, where we, you know, we know Larry Bird and Magic Johnson, those guys, but we didn't we haven't we didn't follow them, we didn't watch them play really.
• 14:38
  SPEAKER_00: And now they're just almost like they're they're legend status.
• 14:41
  SPEAKER_00: All we know them as this great finished product, but we we haven't really, I've never looked that deep into Larry Bird.
• 14:47
  SPEAKER_00: I just think he's you know top 10 greatest player.
• 14:49
  SPEAKER_00: Everyone always talks about how great he is.
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_00: But um I think it's important to share the struggle piece to it too, because that's kind of again, I like highlighting these stories on books for guys because I always say this all the time.
• 15:02
  SPEAKER_00: You you see greatness outside of sports too, and people just see the highlight reel and go, oh man, they're awesome.
• 15:07
  SPEAKER_00: Like everything they touch is gold.
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_00: But I love learning about the struggle that these successful people have because it almost puts them in line with you on a certain level where you're like, hey, I I've got problems I'm dealing with too.
• 15:20
  SPEAKER_00: If they can Larry Bird was picking up trash, well, shoot, what I'm doing is not really that bad.
• 15:24
  SPEAKER_00: And look, look what happened to him.
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_00: So, you know, as a broader message, I I think it's important to share these stories with people and so you can see the mountains they they had to climb and the struggles they had to deal with to get to where they were, because it wasn't could have gone a totally different route.
• 15:42
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, absolutely, absolutely.
• 15:44
  SPEAKER_01: And I feel like, again, you know, uh because we've always been enamored by the bird magic story, yeah, we have really just missed this incredible story sitting right here, just to the left, you know, right here.
• 15:59
  SPEAKER_01: Uh I do believe that this is an underdog story that then is then is ultimately wrapped within another underdog story.
• 16:08
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, because, you know, uh you know, even after Byrd gets to Indiana State, uh no one no one cares.
• 16:16
  SPEAKER_01: Uh no one expects anything.
• 16:18
  SPEAKER_01: It's Indiana State.
• 16:20
  SPEAKER_01: They're uh they're not even in a conference, they're teetering on the edge of Division II.
• 16:24
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, you know, they're they're drawing crowds that are smaller than are being drawn by high school teams in Indiana.
• 16:32
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, you know, that's that's where this begins.
• 16:35
  SPEAKER_01: And where it ends is just completely different.
• 16:37
  SPEAKER_01: And again, you know, skipping ahead, you know, you uh for those who were alive in '79 or remember the story or grew up on the myth of the bird magic game, you know, that draws that enormous television audience, 50 million viewers.
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, you know, in the days before that Final Four, uh NBC, the the network that broadcast the NCAA tournament in those days, the only network that carried games, by the way.
• 17:06
  SPEAKER_01: There was only one place to watch them, uh, wasn't talking about bird magic.
• 17:11
  SPEAKER_01: You know, executives there weren't talking about bird magic.
• 17:14
  SPEAKER_01: What they were talking about out loud in the newspapers, uh, was Indiana State.
• 17:20
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 17:20
  SPEAKER_01: Uh this Cinderella story from nowhere, uh, you know, steamrolling into the Final Four at 32 and oh.
• 17:28
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, you know, um, that's what that NBC was talking about.
• 17:31
  SPEAKER_01: And as one NBC executive says, again, out loud, about three days before the Final Four, if Indiana State is in the finals, we will go over the top.
• 17:43
  SPEAKER_01: And I do believe that's true.
• 17:45
  SPEAKER_01: I think, you know, if it had just been Byrd and this ragtag Cinderella underdog team, now coached by Bill Hodges, uh, in the finals, playing anybody, uh, that NBC would have set uh a viewing record uh even without magic.
• 18:03
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 18:03
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 18:04
  SPEAKER_00: That's incredible.
• 18:05
  SPEAKER_00: That's incredible.
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_00: Just again, it's just the one of those sports moments and stories where you're just like and which kind of Keith, I want to ask you this because your other books too, Charlie Hustle, Fly Girls, you know, incredible books that again, New York Times bestsellers, what's your process or like a book like this?
• 18:26
  SPEAKER_00: How do you, I don't know, how do you get introduced to the story?
• 18:30
  SPEAKER_00: And then how does your cur curiosity, I guess, the path, how what path does it take for you to really go down the rabbit hole to say, like, I've got something here?
• 18:38
  SPEAKER_00: And just, you know, from an author's standpoint and writing, pure question here, what's your process and how do you go about determining what you want to write about and then putting in the work to put this together?
• 18:49
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, great question.
• 18:50
  SPEAKER_01: You're using words that I use, you know, curiosity, rabbit holes.
• 18:54
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, this is what I do.
• 18:55
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, this is what nonfiction writers do.
• 18:58
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, you know, just to the right of me, right here on my office wall, I got like 10, 12 ideas, you know, jotted on scraps of paper taped and tacked to the wall.
• 19:07
  SPEAKER_01: Some of those, you know, may become magazine stories or NPR stories.
• 19:12
  SPEAKER_01: Some of those will die completely.
• 19:16
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, I'll tear them up and throw them out.
• 19:18
  SPEAKER_01: You know, maybe one will become uh the next book.
• 19:21
  SPEAKER_01: Uh it does begin with curiosity.
• 19:24
  SPEAKER_01: You know, it begins by just thinking about ideas.
• 19:28
  SPEAKER_01: I do believe uh that, you know, journalism, storytelling, it's an idea business.
• 19:34
  SPEAKER_01: Uh not all ideas are created equal.
• 19:37
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, it is about your perspective, your framing of the story.
• 19:41
  SPEAKER_01: I think that's crucial.
• 19:43
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, you know, I'm I'm all so I'm always thinking about ideas.
• 19:47
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, you know, if I'm in a conversation at a backyard barbecue and someone's telling a story about their work life or their grandfather or whatever, uh, I'm thinking, well, is this a story?
• 19:59
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, this is just how my mind works.
• 20:01
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 20:01
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and then once you have an idea that you're pursuing or thinking about, or you sort of uh sort of can't stop thinking about, uh, you know, you do go down the rabbit hole.
• 20:13
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know, a lot of rabbit holes end up dark, you know, and end up dead ends.
• 20:18
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, but every once in a while, you know, the that rabbit hole goes deep and you start to feel like you you can do this.
• 20:28
  SPEAKER_01: You know, a book is, you know, most readers don't think about it this way, but a book is like an 80,000 or 100,000 or 120,000 words.
• 20:37
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 20:37
  SPEAKER_01: Uh not every story can carry that kind of length.
• 20:42
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 20:42
  SPEAKER_01: Uh so you do need to think critically about it.
• 20:45
  SPEAKER_01: And it does often take weeks of just, you know, reporting on the fringes, trying to figure out what are the beats of this narrative, uh, what are the highs and lows, where does it start, where does it end?
• 20:57
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 20:58
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, because, you know, that's another choice that a writer is making.
• 21:02
  SPEAKER_01: You know, where does this story start?
• 21:04
  SPEAKER_01: Where does this story end?
• 21:05
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 21:06
  SPEAKER_01: And if that's the framing, who are who are the protagonists who populate this world?
• 21:10
  SPEAKER_01: Who are the antagonists who populate this world?
• 21:13
  SPEAKER_01: Who are the heroes?
• 21:14
  SPEAKER_01: Who are the villains?
• 21:15
  SPEAKER_01: What is the arc?
• 21:16
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, these are these are things that need to be sorted out long before uh you say, Oh, yeah, I'm writing about this, you know.
• 21:23
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and for me, it it it often takes weeks, maybe a few months to to to to um line that all out.
• 21:31
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 21:32
  SPEAKER_00: No, it's interesting.
• 21:33
  SPEAKER_00: And obviously you're you're proud of of each piece of work that you're that you've put out there.
• 21:40
  SPEAKER_00: But what what book for you was the most challenging to to the point to where you're the most proud of finishing and putting that that book out there?
• 21:53
  SPEAKER_01: It's such a great question.
• 21:54
  SPEAKER_01: And you know, it it's so hard to answer because every book has its own unique.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_01: Challenge, its own unique obstacle.
• 22:03
  SPEAKER_01: I would say in every book I've done, that unique obstacle often feels insurmountable.
• 22:10
  SPEAKER_01: And you do wonder, am I going to be able to do this?
• 22:12
  SPEAKER_01: I think there is a point in every project where you do wonder that and ask that question.
• 22:19
  SPEAKER_01: So it's hard to answer.
• 22:22
  SPEAKER_01: But I won't dodge it.
• 22:23
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I could give an answer for every book.
• 22:26
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I could answer that question with an example from every book.
• 22:30
  SPEAKER_01: But I'll say this.
• 22:31
  SPEAKER_01: You know, uh, you mentioned a book that I wrote uh uh a couple books ago, a book called Fly Girls.
• 22:38
  SPEAKER_01: Um that's uh again, narrative nonfiction.
• 22:40
  SPEAKER_01: All my books are narrative nonfiction.
• 22:42
  SPEAKER_01: Uh it's a story about female aviators in the 1920s and 30s fighting for the right to fly and race planes.
• 22:50
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, it's essentially a story of Amelia Earhart and her friends, uh, this group of women who were right there with her in those years, uh, who were often, frankly, better flyers than her, uh, you know, who have all been wrongly sort of erased from the picture.
• 23:06
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know, that was my second book.
• 23:11
  SPEAKER_01: And I, you know, um, it was completely different from what I had done in the past because obviously all of those characters, all those protagonists, they're all gone.
• 23:23
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 23:24
  SPEAKER_01: There's no one to interview, uh, there's no one to call.
• 23:27
  SPEAKER_01: Uh I had to really track down documents, you know, journals, diaries, flight logs, memos, uh court cases, inquests, uh, oral histories.
• 23:42
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, it was just exhaustive.
• 23:44
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 23:45
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know, I know that if I interview you and I'm writing about you, some super, you know, Arkansas Razor's Backs fan or whatever.
• 23:54
  SPEAKER_01: I know that if I'm gonna meet with you for two hours in your house, like I'm gonna find the nut of who you are and I'm gonna, I'm gonna find the uh the story there, uh, because we're gonna talk about it.
• 24:07
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, but in this case, I I I didn't, I couldn't use that uh that that superhero power that I have, right?
• 24:14
  SPEAKER_01: I had to live in archives, live in libraries.
• 24:18
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, and and and you know, I did wonder, am I gonna be able to bring these folks, these characters, these heroes, you know, back uh to life on the page.
• 24:29
  SPEAKER_01: And so um that was an incredible challenge and one I'm certainly proud of.
• 24:33
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 24:33
  SPEAKER_00: I can see where that took took a lot of work, a lot of willpower to get that one, get that one to the the finish line.
• 24:41
  SPEAKER_00: But no, I'm I I'm always curious again, because you know, especially good authors and great authors who have put multiple pieces of work out there and especially on the nonfiction side about other people, you know, what that process looks like of being able to gather all that information and put it together uh in a way that um is respectful and tells the real story about who you're writing about.
• 25:03
  SPEAKER_00: I'm sure there's so much that goes into that to making sure you piece it together accurately um and do do it justice for those people.
• 25:10
  SPEAKER_00: And especially like you said, they're not there, so you've got to figure out how to do that um for their families to see it and friends to see it, and anyone else that that was close to that.
• 25:20
  SPEAKER_00: And so, no, it's really cool.
• 25:22
  SPEAKER_00: Um, Keith, I got one last question for you, and I appreciate this so much.
• 25:26
  SPEAKER_00: This has been such a fun conversation as um I've I'm I'm getting all your books on the website, and I've I've got them all added to my want-to-read list because these are all stories that I want to dive into just to know more about um beyond the surface level.
• 25:40
  SPEAKER_00: But um obviously you're a writer, and I see a bunch of books behind you, so I know this may be a tough one, but I love to ask people this.
• 25:47
  SPEAKER_00: And it's what is a book or two that has had a major impact on you, either personally or professionally?
• 25:54
  SPEAKER_00: And then if if someone like me just says, Hey, Keith, I need a I need a book recommendation for my next book, what's one of your go-tos that you like to recommend to other people?
• 26:04
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, great question.
• 26:06
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I've been, you know, uh moved and shaped and changed by by so many books, so many authors.
• 26:14
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, you know, uh it's um uh it's again hard to pin down.
• 26:19
  SPEAKER_01: Uh I'll say this, you know, uh I was asked recently, you know, like what's my Mount Rushmore of sports books?
• 26:26
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 26:26
  SPEAKER_01: And I I write more than sports, you know, and I and I I really am not interested in the box score or the final score or the statistics.
• 26:35
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I'm writing sports stories because they speak to something broader about the human experience or about uh the American experience.
• 26:45
  SPEAKER_01: Uh but, you know, because I am drawn to sports stories from time to time, I'll I'll mention a few books that I think would be on my Mount Rushmore of sports books.
• 26:54
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, you know, David Halberstam, uh the great late reporter and historian, uh, you know, really uh influenced me as a young man.
• 27:06
  SPEAKER_01: Uh if you haven't read David Halberstam books, I I recommend uh them to anyone.
• 27:11
  SPEAKER_01: Uh he would write about politics or American culture, then also about sports.
• 27:16
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and uh his book, October 1964, about the World Series that year and sort of the cultural changes that were happening in America that were reflected in that series, uh, it would be, you know, in my Mount Rushmore.
• 27:30
  SPEAKER_01: Uh Laura Hillenbrand's Seabiscuit, I think, is one of the great uh great narratives of the past uh of this century uh would be you know on my list.
• 27:42
  SPEAKER_01: Um John Feinstein's The Season on the Brink, a Season on the Brink, uh, you know, chronicling one season with Bobby Knight in Indiana uh is a groundbreaking work of uh uh sports writing and narrative nonfiction.
• 27:59
  SPEAKER_01: And then, you know, probably the book that changed me the most when I was in college, and I'm dating myself here, uh, was uh Buzz Bissinger's Friday Night Lights.
• 28:10
  SPEAKER_01: I remember exactly where I was when I read it in the early 90s.
• 28:15
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and I remember thinking how incredible it was that he got access to what he uh to the story he he chronicled in rural Texas.
• 28:25
  SPEAKER_01: And uh and I remember being enamored by that and wondering if I might be able to do something like that.
• 28:30
  SPEAKER_01: So, you know, all of those books just fundamentally inspired or or or changed me.
• 28:39
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 28:39
  SPEAKER_01: Um as for recommendations, I mean, so many.
• 28:43
  SPEAKER_01: Uh a lot of them are right there on the wall behind me.
• 28:47
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 28:47
  SPEAKER_01: Uh uh, I'll say this since we're on a uh Books for Guys podcast.
• 28:52
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, if you haven't read The Barn uh by Wright Thompson, the great ESPN writer, uh, which really tells uh the the untold story of the the murder of Emmett Till uh in the 1950s and the long legacy of that uh of that uh tragedy.
• 29:14
  SPEAKER_01: Uh I I highly recommend uh The Barn by Ray Thompson.
• 29:18
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 29:18
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I haven't read that, so I'm adding that to my list too.
• 29:21
  SPEAKER_00: Um that's a great recommendation.
• 29:23
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you, Keith.
• 29:25
  SPEAKER_00: But uh no man, hey, this has been so awesome.
• 29:28
  SPEAKER_00: Again, I I saw your book come out and I was like, man, and I started digging into more of your work, and I just became more and more fascinated um by the books and the stories that you cover.
• 29:39
  SPEAKER_00: And so uh, man, keep keep doing what you're doing, Keith.
• 29:43
  SPEAKER_00: I can't wait to follow your future work, read all of the work that you've already put out there and share it as much as possible.
• 29:49
  SPEAKER_00: So I really appreciate you taking the time to do this.
• 29:52
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, it's my pleasure, Chris.
• 29:54
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks for the conversation and good luck to your Razorbacks.
• 29:58
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you.