this was my first hanif book and i will say it def lives up to the hype. the authors words are like poetry. this book looks like it's about basketball but it's really about grief,. I hope to maybe reread this with some friends one day. i think it would make for a great book club discussion.

There is really just no one quite like Hanif Abdurraqib. In what is probably his most personal work, Abdurraqib tells the story of a city, of a basketball team, of an icon in Lebron James. But even more so than a story about basketball, There’s Always This Year weaves together James’ career and Hanif’s upbringing in Columbus - two black men from Ohio who always wanted to fly.

The writing in this is exceptional, Hanif evokes so many emotions as he winds through both his and James’ trials and tribulations. It’s packed with solemn reflections on being black in America, nostalgia for home and for the past, and so much heart it leaps off the pages.

I’ve said it before, I would read Abdurraqib’s grocery list. I also think we should all aspire to love something as much as Hanif Abdurraqib loves Ohio, a love story truly for the ages.

Hanif Abdurraqib reflects on his childhood in 1990s Columbus, Ohio, exploring basketball's cultural significance and the complexities of success, role models, and personal storytelling. Through lyrical prose, he weaves themes of joy, pain, and hope, challenging readers to rethink their perspectives on culture and identity.

As a kid who grew up loving and playing basketball, I was really interested in this memoir. I received a digital copy from NetGalley and the publisher for review, and I paired it with the audio. All thoughts are my own.

There is nothing like listening to someone tell their story. The reflections hit harder, my interest is greater, and the story feels more real. I loved how this story was told, relating it to LeBron James and other basketball stars. The prose in this book is *chef’s kiss* amazing. There were times I listened to a section more than once. The last 10% was really impactful. I will definitely revisit this one in the future.

Hanif is an incredible storyteller. I felt for him, when he won and when he lost. Joy and pain, love and sadness, luck and hard work. There’s so much valuable information here.

Fully recommend and would absolutely pair a physical or digital book with the audiobook for maximum impact.

You might know Hanif Abdurraqib for his poetry, or perhaps for his 2017 bestselling essay collection, They Can’t Kill Us Until They Kill Us, named book of the year by over eight outlets, including BuzzFeed, NPR, and CBC. You might also know him for his beloved music criticism podcast, Object of Sound. Or you might know Hanif Abdurraqib, as some may have first encountered him, for a viral image of him presenting on Carly Rae Jepsen’s “Your Type.”

In There’s Always This Year, Abdurraqib turns his attention from the radio to the courts, chronicling the era of basketball he grew up alongside of in Columbus, Ohio. The book is equal parts sensitive personal memoir and Homeric ode to Ohio’s legends, both triumphant and defeated: LeBron James, Estaban Weaver, Kyrie Irving, among others. Throughout these historic highs and lows, Abdurraqib weaves meditations on precarity and fantasy, on homecomings and exits, on the metaphorical and material ways a sport can hold a neighbourhood together.

Because it is Abdurraqib, the text is romantic, guided by feeling over fanatical statistics. He finds intimacy as easily in enmity as comradery, and it’s his palpable adoration—for the game, for his friends, for his heroes, and for his home—that carries readers from page to page. Fans of basketball will, no doubt, revel in his nuanced and impassioned relationship to the sport, but those unfamiliar with layups and free throws will be just as compelled by his generous, genius cultural criticism.

Intimacy, Abdurraqib argues, is rooted in attention, and what a gift it is to be scrutinized by this poet-essayist, to be his subject. Innovative and illuminating, There’s Always This Year is a love letter in the fullest sense of the term.

When Hanif announced this book I was like "look I don't know anything about basketball but I do know that Hanif Abdurraqib is one of the greatest writers of our time" and so l ordered it. Then I attended a few events around New York where he talked about this book and it became very clear that you don't need to understand basketball to get this book because it's about place & grief & devotion-themes were all familiar with one way or another.

This book was brilliant and also deeply romantic. It's clear Hanif is in love with Columbus and his idea of ascension is not a sort of ascension in which you leave the place you're from behind in pursuit of your dreams but an ascension in which your dreams can be reached within the place you're from because it is a place you love and more importantly-it loves you back.

How blessed we are to live at the same time as Hanif, someone who has the ability to take all the jumbled up feelings many of us have and turn them into words and sentences and paragraphs and entire novels that make you feel known.

I'm not a particular fan of basketball, but in Abdurraqib’s hands, I couldn’t get enough of that world. From Columbus, Ohio to LeBron James this is an inventive, wide-ranging work. Abdurraqib shares fascinating anecdotes and details about the game, and uses the ball itself as a gateway to explore the passage of time, the fragility of life, and the joy of rooting for the underdog. I was so impressed with this author's outstanding storytelling and will absolutely be exploring his backlist.

A fascinating memoir on basketball and life and the intersection of the two. Masterfully written, and the beauty of the prose draws you deeper and deeper into the story.

Really insightful book about class, basketball, and the authors experiences with religion as well. I haven’t thought about sports in this way before. The author has a singular voice and appreciated learning about his experiences

I believe Hanif Abdurraqib cannot write a bad book. You don’t have your know anything about basketball to enjoy his lyrical storytelling. His stories bring me to tears every time, both happy and sad. He had a way of connecting the games to his experiences and moments in time that just make sense.

Hanif has done it again. I absolutely adore his writing and even though I am not a basketball fan, his essays about it were so great and wide-reaching outside of the sports world

Hanif is a genius and I will read anything he writes. I didn't have reading a book about basketball on my 2024 bingo card but this will be a fav of the year for sure!

There's Always This Year
By Hanif Abdurraqib

This book is a paean to basketball and black men. It speaks to the writer's love affair with the sport – and such stars as Michael Jordan and the Fab Five at Michigan in the 1990s.

While most of this book was outside my area of interest, the author did make one statement that resonated: "So much of the machinery of race-and/or culture-driven fear relies on who is willing to be convinced of what."

For fans of basketball and fans of memoirs, especially memoirs about basketball, "There's Always This Year" is the book for you. Set mainly in Columbus, Ohio, Hanif Abdurraqib wrote about lyrical, poetic in style book about his reflections on life and basketball. Abdurraqib narrates the ups and downs of his life alongside the highs and lows of his city's basketball team, the Cleveland Cavaliers. I'm not a huge sports fan, but his fanaticism for basketball, from high school games to the big leagues, inspired me to pay closer attention to how sports underscores the culture of where I live. Sometimes it seems that Abdurraqib is rambling, but then he pulls the thread through the story he is telling to emphasize his life's meaning, especially one shaped so deeply by Columbus. I really liked the book and think you will too!

I've never been disappointed by a Hanif Abdurraqib book and this one is no exception. As someone who would not consider themselves a basketball fan, I found a lot to relate to because although the main theme here is baseball there are also looks at life lessons, pop culture, and more. This would be a GREAT book to recommend to baseball fans but it would also make a good recommendation for anyone who is a fan of cultural critique or nostalgia.

I LOVE IT WHEN POETS WRITE BOOKS
the prose of this almost reads like spoken word, which prompted me to want to try the audiobook. but then there was so much good stuff in every single line, which meant that the audiobook went too fast for me. so instead, I read it in my head as if I was reading it out loud to my dad on a road trip (my favorite thing to do with books I love). and that was the ideal reading experience. I could almost hear his reactions.
I thought the format of this book (laid out within the ticking down seconds of a basketball game) was brilliant. I think the third quarter was my favorite, but it was so fun to explore each section.
Hanif Abdurraqib has a way with wordssss and is the only author who can convince me to put down my phone and pick up google. Normally if an author describes an event or a song or a poem that I'm not familiar with, I power on. But Hanif's description of music had me swapping my Kindle for Spotify and doing late-night listening sessions instead of before-bed reading.
there were a few moments that dragged or confused me, but overall I just loved it. I love basketball, I loved Hanif's thoughtful reflections on fandom and cities and hope and love. It was informative (I learned so many brand new things) while also feeling so relatable. The wildest moment for me was when he was saying, like, "There's this internet video that makes me cry every single time." And I was like "me with the raccoon losing his cotton candy in a puddle." And then he went on to describe that exact video.
small world!! beautiful world! beautiful game!

The second I saw this book I knew it was for me. I am in my basketball era and love to read about others who have the love for the game.

Adburraquib told his own story, set against Lebron's career as they both came up in Ohio. I liked this approach, and the balance between personal story and basketball. At times I questioned if it was really a clear ARC of his life, and who he is, but somehow it all worked. I was so excited to read this one I actually ended up buying the audio so I could listen more frequently.

It's so nice to anticipate loving a book, and have it live up to my expectations!


Thank you to Random House and NetGalley for an ARC of this book.

“…to talk about our enemies is also to talk about our beloveds. To take a windowless room and paint a single window, through which the width and breadth of affection can be observed. To walk to that window, together, if you will allow it, and say to each other How could anyone cast any ill on this. And we will know then, collectively, that anyone who does is one of our enemies. And so I've already led us astray. You will surely forgive me if I promised we would talk about our enemies when what I meant was that I want to begin this brief time we have together by talking about love, and you will surely forgive me if an enemy stumbles their way into the architecture of affection from time to time. It is inevitable, after all.
“But we know our enemies by how foolishly they trample upon what we know as affection. How quickly they find another language for what they cannot translate as love.”

It seems fitting to post my reflections on this beautiful book as we are well into this year’s NBA post-season. Because There’s Always This Year is about basketball. But it also isn’t; it’s about so much more because, as the saying goes, ball is life.

In There’s Always This Year, Hanif Abdurraqib takes the idea of sports as metaphor to a deeply thoughtful place as he retraces the early lives of two young men who grew up in Ohio: basketball legend LeBron James…and himself.

Abdurraqib takes that idea and extends and stretches and bends it as far as he can, then folds in commentary on racism, poverty, community, urban life, music, faith, and more, and from all that molds a wholly unique book. It’s essay and memoir structured, not into formal chapters or essays, but into the framework of a basketball game. The minutes count down, there are intermissions and through all of it wind big ideas and personal stories. It’s a truly unique reading experience.

In the hands of a lesser author, this metaphor could well bend past the point of breaking but in the hands of Abdurraqib, it is luminous and revelatory. We feel his grief, his rage but also his hope, his resilience, his inspiration. This book is a cry, a shout, and at times, a joyous incantation.

Abdurraqib muses on the challenges of growing up in America and the many hurdles along the way. From poverty to racism to incarceration, from fathers to sons, he speaks plainly asking readers to understand, to empathize, to make change.

And yet, he doesn’t speak plainly at all. Abdurraqib’s prose is expansive and poetic and just downright gorgeous. Not just poetic…there are actual poems in the book. I read this book, but I wish I’d listened to the audiobook because these words beg to be read aloud, to be listened to. Abdurraqib brings us close, whispering intimately, and then he turns around to speak to a large audience.

I truly loved this book. To start with, I love basketball, but that’s not the reason. The writing is glorious, the ideas are insistent and important. I’m eager to go back and read more of Adburraqib’s work.

Hanif Abdurraqib brilliantly weaves in and out of recalling his memories of basketball (both youthful games and the Cavaliers) and talking about life. As a non-basketball fan, I appreciate the way he speaks about the topic in such a way that pulls any reader in. Do I think that was his goal? Not necessarily. I think it’s more a testament to how good of a story teller he is. Learning about bits of Hanif Abdurraqib’s life was touching and beautiful. I’m sucked in! Excited to read more by this writer.

I won't be sharing a review publicly for this one because I put it down after two chapters. I had seen some raves for it, specifically ones that mentioned that even though they don't follow basketball they still enjoy its beauty. I wish I could have said the same thing but it was just too much basketball for me personally. I am interested in this author's other work though because his writing was beautiful.

Wow. Hanif Abdurraqib’s writing is beautiful. There’s Always This Year offered some really incredible reflections on success, basketball, culture, and role models. I am eager to read more of his work!