cover image Let Me Tell You a Story: A Lifetime in the Game

Let Me Tell You a Story: A Lifetime in the Game

John Feinstein, Red Auerbach. Little Brown and Company, $25.95 (368pp) ISBN 978-0-316-73823-1

Every Tuesday for four years, Feinstein, the author of two of the bestselling sports books of all time, A Good Walk Spoiled and A Season on the Brink, played story collector, gathering tales for this, his 16th offering. During those four years, Feinstein lived for the Monday-night phone call that delivered five words to him every week: ""Tuesday. Eleven o'clock. China Doll."" Those words invited him to the most exclusive lunch club in sports, led by legendary Boston Celtics coach Auerbach and frequented by coaches, secret service agents, close friends and Auerbach relatives, as well as by anyone in D.C. lucky enough to receive an invitation. Between bites of Mu-Shu pork and chicken-fried rice, Auerbach and his crew chewed on subjects from politics to women's basketball to today's coaches, and Feinstein jotted it all down. The Feinstein-Auerbach collaboration brings together two of the most sought-after storytellers in sports and gives readers their own invitation into the China Doll club. In more than 50 years with the green and gold, Auerbach collected countless friends, admirers and stories. Now 86, he's forgotten nothing and has an opinion on everything. ""I ever tell you how I got to know Joe Dimaggio?"" begins chapter three. ""I ever tell you how I got thrown out of the all-star game in 1967? About the time I met Clinton and Gore?"" These great storytellers make this book so effortless to read that you can almost hear Red reciting each line and smell him lighting up that famous cigar. Tuesday. Eleven o'clock. Don't be late. And never, under any circumstances, offer to pick up the check. 8 pages of b&w photos.