cover image Nike is a Goddess: The History of Women in Sports

Nike is a Goddess: The History of Women in Sports

. Atlantic Monthly Press, $24 (320pp) ISBN 978-0-87113-726-5

The pithy title promises a more powerful punch than is actually delivered in this collection of longwinded essays by women sportswriters on women's successes and struggles in 13 different sports. With the current wave of interest in female athletes this book is intended to provide comprehensive coverage of the topic: ""Compared to the relentless daily barrage of information about male athletes, news about women's accomplishments is still strangely sketchy and distorted,"" writes Nelson. But most of the essays, in giving detailed historical overviews of the key figures and events in each sport, lack focus and read like chapters of a textbook, only not as well organized. The exceptions are Grace Lichtenstein's examination of great tennis rivalries, and Michelle Kaufman's eloquent analysis of figure skating. Beyond these, the interesting stories--such as Anita DeFrantz, the rower who led would-be Olympians in the fight against Jimmy Carter's 1980 boycott--are lost among endless anecdotes and dry statistics. If it's the facts you're after, skip to the back of the book, where a timeline from 776 B.C. to the present tells more about women in sports. (Oct.)