Rising Above Tells The Stories of 11 Athletes Who Succeeded Despite Enormous Challenges
Rising Above: How 11 Athletes Overcame Challenges in Their Youth to Become Stars, by Gregory Zuckerman, with Elijah and Gabriel Zuckerman, is an inspirational collection of true stories about famous athletes and the tough challenges they tackled in order to achieve phenomenal success. The stories gathered here are fascinating. There’s Team USA soccer goalkeeper Tim Howard, whose Tourette’s Syndrome, with its tic and compulsions, made it doubtful if his innate athletic abilities would be recognized. There’s Stephen Curry, considered too puny to ever make it in college basketball, let alone in the NBA. He never gave up his dream, and put in the hours of hard work needed to make it happen. Dwayne Wade overcame a childhood of violence and poverty to reach phenomenal success in the NBA, and Jim Abbot, a major league pitcher born without a right hand, learned to pitch and field with just his left one. These are just a few of the great athletes profiled here; others faced challenges like childhood abuse, illiteracy, and even civil war in the Congo. Even if you aren’t a sports fan, their stories still make great reading, and will inspire anyone to keep trying to overcome their own personal challenges. For young sports fans, this is spot on, and would make for great summer reading!
Rising Above: How 11 Athletes Overcame Challenges in Their Youth to Become Stars
Hardcover $17.99
Rising Above: How 11 Athletes Overcame Challenges in Their Youth to Become Stars
By Gregory Zuckerman , Elijah Zuckerman , Gabriel Zuckerman
In Stock Online
Hardcover $17.99
Rising Above is a collaborative effort by Gregory Zuckerman and his two teenaged sons, Elijah and Gabriel, and it’s my pleasure to welcome them to the B&N Kids’ Blog today, where they are answering some questions about their book.
How did this book come to be? Whose idea was it, and how did it develop?
Greg: Eli had the idea in late 2014. He’s a sports nut and knew that many players had overcome tremendous obstacles to become stars. He wanted to talk to them to hear details of their stories. As for me, I’m a newspaper reporter and author, and I’m always chasing entertaining stories about interesting characters. I thought putting these amazing stories together would be something young people and adults would enjoy.
Eli: I also thought the stories might inspire other kids.
Gabriel: I love writing and reading and I jumped on the opportunity to write a book full of inspirational stories while spending time with my father and brother.
Are the three of you involved in sports yourselves (in the past or the present)?
Greg: Oh yeah. I play left field on a local softball team.
Eli: I’m the starting goalie on my school’s soccer team and on a travel team for my town and play other sports too.
Gabriel: I play defense on my high school’s soccer team. We won the championship last year and are in the middle of playoffs now.
How did the collaboration part between the three of you work?
Greg: We had a blast. We each had different roles, though we did a little of everything. Eli and Gabriel were largely responsible for finding the best stories and the right players, as well as track down the agents and managers of the players we wanted to meet. I reached out to them and we all conducted most of the interviews together, either on the phone or in person. I did most of the writing but the boys did some and edited my work.
How did you pick which athletes to feature? There are so many great athletes out there, and it must have been hard to narrow it down to the 11 in the book!
Gabriel: We tried to pick the best stories that were most relatable to kids. We also wanted the most touching stories. We searched for different types of challenges for players in different kinds of sports, but we really emphasized how they managed to overcome them.
How hard was it to get in touch with the athletes you feature, and to convince them to share very personal details of their lives?
Greg: Some players were easier than others. There are so many agents and managers involved today. But what we found when we finally got in front of the players is they each were eager to share stories with me and especially with my boys. They seemed interested in passing lessons on to young people and saw my sons as a way to do that.
Thanks, Greg, Elijah and Gabriel. Indeed, Rising Above succeeds in making these great stories fresh, interesting, and inspiring to young readers!
Rising Above is a collaborative effort by Gregory Zuckerman and his two teenaged sons, Elijah and Gabriel, and it’s my pleasure to welcome them to the B&N Kids’ Blog today, where they are answering some questions about their book.
How did this book come to be? Whose idea was it, and how did it develop?
Greg: Eli had the idea in late 2014. He’s a sports nut and knew that many players had overcome tremendous obstacles to become stars. He wanted to talk to them to hear details of their stories. As for me, I’m a newspaper reporter and author, and I’m always chasing entertaining stories about interesting characters. I thought putting these amazing stories together would be something young people and adults would enjoy.
Eli: I also thought the stories might inspire other kids.
Gabriel: I love writing and reading and I jumped on the opportunity to write a book full of inspirational stories while spending time with my father and brother.
Are the three of you involved in sports yourselves (in the past or the present)?
Greg: Oh yeah. I play left field on a local softball team.
Eli: I’m the starting goalie on my school’s soccer team and on a travel team for my town and play other sports too.
Gabriel: I play defense on my high school’s soccer team. We won the championship last year and are in the middle of playoffs now.
How did the collaboration part between the three of you work?
Greg: We had a blast. We each had different roles, though we did a little of everything. Eli and Gabriel were largely responsible for finding the best stories and the right players, as well as track down the agents and managers of the players we wanted to meet. I reached out to them and we all conducted most of the interviews together, either on the phone or in person. I did most of the writing but the boys did some and edited my work.
How did you pick which athletes to feature? There are so many great athletes out there, and it must have been hard to narrow it down to the 11 in the book!
Gabriel: We tried to pick the best stories that were most relatable to kids. We also wanted the most touching stories. We searched for different types of challenges for players in different kinds of sports, but we really emphasized how they managed to overcome them.
How hard was it to get in touch with the athletes you feature, and to convince them to share very personal details of their lives?
Greg: Some players were easier than others. There are so many agents and managers involved today. But what we found when we finally got in front of the players is they each were eager to share stories with me and especially with my boys. They seemed interested in passing lessons on to young people and saw my sons as a way to do that.
Thanks, Greg, Elijah and Gabriel. Indeed, Rising Above succeeds in making these great stories fresh, interesting, and inspiring to young readers!