There’s Always This Year. On Basketball and Ascension. Hanif Abdurraqib.
Hanif Abdurraqib is an interesting person, has led an intriguing
life and happens to be a rising author receiving much acclaim for his past
work. His latest, There’s Always This
Year, is under review for this blog. I
will say we like the title and the cover.
The content, however, was challenging to finish. Inside the reader finds a clear writing
style of telling parts of the story, largely his own upbringing and background
and then alternating to how a city, and perhaps, an entire state, was rallying
around its only NBA franchise to finally win a championship with its own
favorite son.
The best part of this somewhat lengthy book of three hundred
and twenty pages is the discussion of his own life. An inner-city Columbus, Ohio native,
Abdurraqib talks about his family life, his love life, the difficulty of
finding love, loss of loved ones and of course the love of basketball not just
as a game but as a likely connector of regular folks in his neighborhood and
community. The stories he tells are all
blended poetically with good, bad and trying times throughout his youth and
early adulthood.
The author tries hard to connect his basketball playing
days and experiences to the ongoings with the only in-state professional team,
the Cleveland Cavaliers. Early on the
reader is expected willingly or otherwise to become an NBA fan and acquire an
emotional attachment to the favorite superstar son in Lebron James. James was a high school prodigy in Akron,
Ohio. The author would have the reader
believe that everybody in Ohio, at least in his hometown, would flock to the
arena to watch him play even in high school since any fan worth his salt could
sense greatness in the making. Of
course, James was a high school phenom and bypassed college straight to the pro
ranks. As fate would have it, he
started his career with the Cleveland organization. The locals rallied around that hunger for a
championship in any sport but especially now in basketball. But then James decided to leave the state
and his local, loyal fans behind by jettisoning to another well-out-of-state
franchise. Sometimes truth is better
than fiction and James later returns to his native state and finally does lead
the Cavaliers to their first ever championship and the city of Cleveland, its
first in a half of a century.
While this is an interesting story itself and displays
the mindset and loyalty of basketball fans, NBA in particular, what we found
more intriguing was the author’s personal life. The loss of a parent at a relatively young
age, the troubled connection with his older and younger siblings as well as his
father being left alone to help raise and protect the family. Abdurraqib seems to long for a greater
connection to his father and siblings, but something seemed to keep him from
that bond. He talks about learning how
to cut hair, a skill he picked up from his older brother. He writes frequently in his book about a
love and strong interest in jazz music which served him well working in a
record store. Abdurraqib even wistfully wonders about his father’s
youth and his early basketball playing days that seemed to vanish for good long
before the author became a devout fan of the game. There is even a lengthy
discussion about personal struggles as a young adult. He experienced homelessness as he struggled
to find and keep steady employment.
Even more captivating but perhaps equally heartbreaking was the
revelation of incarceration for brief pockets of his early adult life. Seems Abdurraqib picked up a bad habit of
stealing from others and unfortunately was caught in the act likely more than
once.
Nonetheless, as promising as the book seemed to be just
looking at its cover and title and as well written and organized as it comes
across throughout all the chapters, there seems to be something either missing
or lacking in the overall story. The
metaphors are strongly blended between life and basketball experiences. However, the constant documenting of time
from one section to another with little explanation of what it indicates seemed
more of a distraction rather than attraction.
There is always this year to help rally behind our favorite sports team
or inspire us to accomplish something in the now. However, after reading the book, the connection
seems to get lost amid the distinct writing pose and the constant change and
shifting of topics.
· You
might like to read this book if you enjoy parallels of basketball tying to fandom,
state, city and community pride.
· You
might like to read this book if you enjoy reading about urban life and its
struggles.
· You
might like to read this book if you like poetry, basketball and urban strife
tied together in one story.
Read more about the author on X: https://x.com/NifMuhammad
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