A thoroughly obsessive, intermittently uplifting, and occasionally unbiased account of the Duke–North Carolina basketball rivalry
To Hate Like This Is to Be Happy Forever
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Book Description
--This text refers to the
Paperback
edition.
Editorial Reviews
From Publishers Weekly
[Signature]Reviewed by Sara NelsonFor a reviewer who's not all that clear on the difference between basketball and basket weaving, this book is a revelation. Former Esquire editor Blythe's debut is an examination of the rivalry between the University of North Carolina and Duke University college teams; in it, he interviews and profiles players and coaches, and even gives play-by-plays of key games. And yet, it is not "just" a sports book. At heart it's a memoir. Like Pat Conroy's My Losing Season and even Frederick Exley's A Fan's Notes, to which the author Anthony Wofford compares it, To Hate Like This is about family and passion and people and parents and aging and, oh, yeah, some sports, too.Blythe is a native North Carolinan whose UNC passion was bred in the bone; he and his siblings were raised to be genteel and polite about all things, except while watching basketball games, particularly against arch-rival Duke. After living in New York for many years, Blythe returns home as his father is dying and reflects on the passion that has shaped him and, he suggests, his region. Forget the Mason Dixon line, the real division in this border war is between Carolinians who support the Blue Devils and those who live for the Tarheels.Sports fans can expect to enjoy the accounts of particular pivotal games recounted here, but the real revelations for the relatively uninitiated are Blythe's portraits of his characters: the tough-guy coaches like Mike Krzyzewski and Dean Smith, one of whom nearly breaks down confessing that he's still in love with his ex-wife; the nurse tending Blythe's dying father; and, most of all, the father himself, the kind of personality you expect to meet in great southern novels from Harper Lee to Pat Conroy. To call To Hate Like This a sports book is to be only about one-third right. An elegy to place and time and generation, it is also a story of fathers and sons and an elegant testament to the way pastimes are far more than ways to pass the time. (Mar. 1)Sara Nelson is the editor-in-chief of Publishers Weekly.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Review
You don’t have to be a Tar Heel or Blue Devil to like [THLT], because it’s funny, perceptive, and smart. (Jonathan Yardley, Washington Post )
An exceptionally entertaining parable in defense of good, healthy, all-American loathing.... an animosity the whole family can share. (New York Post )
The best book about politics I´ve read since All the King´s Men ... it’s about basketball [like] Moby Dick is about whaling. (Hartford Courant )
“A revelation.... an elegant testament to the way pastimes are far more than ways to pass the time.” (Publishers Weekly (signature review) )
“The kind of sportswriting that comes along so rarely you can count the classics on one hand . . . read this book.” (Play (New York Times Magazine sports supplement) )
“Blythe seduces with his story of Southern identity...passed down from fathers to their roaming sons...raucous, tender, and fierce.” (Adrian Nicole LeBlanc, author of "Random Family" )
“The best book on basketball I have ever read ... destined to become a classic of sports literature.” (Pat Conroy )
“Not since Exley’s A Fan’s Notes has anyone produced such a graceful and elegiac evocation of place, family, and sport”. (Anthony Swofford, author of Jarhead )
Goes far beyond the facile John Feinstein “inside a season” formula ... [Blythe] writes amusingly, self-deprecatingly and often beautifully. (New York Times Book Review )
Blythe writes like a wizard ... Even if college basketball isn’t your obsession, you’ll get caught up in this. (Elle )
Hilarious and remarkably wise ... you don’t want to say too much about [this book], for fear of spoiling the surprises. (Sports Illustrated )
Blythe makes you want to scream from the sidelines... while his hate is contagious, the obvious affection behind it remains. (New York Post )
Blythe brings great wit, style, and insight... a long-awaited American answer to Fever Pitch. (Baltimore Sun )
The best book about loving a team since “A Fan’s Notes” ... [a book] about a lot more than basketball. (Greensboro News & Record )
An exceptionally entertaining parable in defense of good, healthy, all-American loathing.... an animosity the whole family can share. (New York Post )
The best book about politics I´ve read since All the King´s Men ... it’s about basketball [like] Moby Dick is about whaling. (Hartford Courant )
“A revelation.... an elegant testament to the way pastimes are far more than ways to pass the time.” (Publishers Weekly (signature review) )
“The kind of sportswriting that comes along so rarely you can count the classics on one hand . . . read this book.” (Play (New York Times Magazine sports supplement) )
“Blythe seduces with his story of Southern identity...passed down from fathers to their roaming sons...raucous, tender, and fierce.” (Adrian Nicole LeBlanc, author of "Random Family" )
“The best book on basketball I have ever read ... destined to become a classic of sports literature.” (Pat Conroy )
“Not since Exley’s A Fan’s Notes has anyone produced such a graceful and elegiac evocation of place, family, and sport”. (Anthony Swofford, author of Jarhead )
Goes far beyond the facile John Feinstein “inside a season” formula ... [Blythe] writes amusingly, self-deprecatingly and often beautifully. (New York Times Book Review )
Blythe writes like a wizard ... Even if college basketball isn’t your obsession, you’ll get caught up in this. (Elle )
Hilarious and remarkably wise ... you don’t want to say too much about [this book], for fear of spoiling the surprises. (Sports Illustrated )
Blythe makes you want to scream from the sidelines... while his hate is contagious, the obvious affection behind it remains. (New York Post )
Blythe brings great wit, style, and insight... a long-awaited American answer to Fever Pitch. (Baltimore Sun )
The best book about loving a team since “A Fan’s Notes” ... [a book] about a lot more than basketball. (Greensboro News & Record )
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
25 of 28 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase
Some of the best American nonfiction writing is about sports, and some of the best American writers are sportswriters.
Even though he isn't, to the best of my knowledge, a sportswriter (strictly speaking) Will Blythe has written an absolutely brilliant book about one of the most storied and heated rivalries in college basketball: UNC vs. Duke.
He has all the qualifications one needs to opine authoritatively: he was born and raised in North Carolina, he went to school at UNC, and like most of us who did (I fit that profile myself), he's a rabid Carolina basketball fan.
And while this book will be of obvious and direct interest to anyone who has spent some time on Tobacco Road--it is as authentically North Carolinian as a plate of barbecue and a glass of sweet iced tea--*any* college basketball fan, or any sports fan, really, or even anyone who appreciates the fine art of the wry personal memoir, would find "To Hate Like This..." engaging and delightful reading.
Even though he isn't, to the best of my knowledge, a sportswriter (strictly speaking) Will Blythe has written an absolutely brilliant book about one of the most storied and heated rivalries in college basketball: UNC vs. Duke.
He has all the qualifications one needs to opine authoritatively: he was born and raised in North Carolina, he went to school at UNC, and like most of us who did (I fit that profile myself), he's a rabid Carolina basketball fan.
And while this book will be of obvious and direct interest to anyone who has spent some time on Tobacco Road--it is as authentically North Carolinian as a plate of barbecue and a glass of sweet iced tea--*any* college basketball fan, or any sports fan, really, or even anyone who appreciates the fine art of the wry personal memoir, would find "To Hate Like This..." engaging and delightful reading.
8 of 8 people found the following review helpful
By Elderkin
Format:Hardcover
I purchased this book intending to give it to my UNC grad father-in-law. Before I could get it in the mail I started reading it and could not put it down. I am neither a lover nor a hater of either Duke or North Carolina, but that hardly matters. The writing is clear, mostly free of sports cliches and in many parts funny and insightful, especially when the author writes about his mother and deceased father. Thankfully, the author spends little time with game summaries and much more time dealing with the personalities connected to the Duke-UNC rivalry, both past and present. My only criticism is that the Duke bashing is a little over the top at times, but the author is a UNC alum after all. This book reminded me in a lot of ways of "Rammer Jammer Yellow Hammer", a look at obsessive Univ. of Alabama football fans. Both books are well worth the time.
10 of 11 people found the following review helpful
By JWS
Format:Hardcover
The first chapter of this book is worth the entire price. Laugh out loud funny. And then Will Blythe digs into the paradoxes and subtleties of what hating Duke, er, Dook (yes, I'm a Carolina alum), really means to him, even after he gets to know the personalities he loves to hate. Where does he wind up? Well, I won't give it away but believe me, he doesn't lose any of his passion for the Tar Heels. This is a must read for any Carolina fan. Similarly obsessed Dook fans will appreciate it as well. And curious outsiders who want an insider's view of what it's like to live inside the crazed, obseesive heart of the ACC won't regret a page of this book. Great writing from a fan in search of himself and an understanding of his loyalty to a team, a school, a region and a way of life that his recently deceased father taught him to love.
Most Recent Customer Reviews
3.0 out of 5 stars
More hype for a tired story
Yeah, Dukies hate Tar Heels and Tar Heels hate Dukies. I hadn't heard that one before.
This book is just a rehash of the same old story that the author is trying to... Read more
This book is just a rehash of the same old story that the author is trying to... Read more
Published 14 days ago by TruxtonSpangler
2.0 out of 5 stars
American Errorist
This is not so much a history of the Duke-North Carolina basketball rivalry as it is a reporter's journal of one particular season, interspersed with navel-gazing and an apologia... Read more
Published 16 months ago by cspan37421
4.0 out of 5 stars
Diametrically Opposed to All That I Believe
It has been a few years since I read this book. In a perverse way I must admit that I enjoyed it, although I believe the author suffers from a pathological behavioral health... Read more
Published on February 5, 2011 by Burgh2BlueDevil
5.0 out of 5 stars
Great enjoyable book
For college basketball fans , this is an enjoyable book. Particularly if you are a Carolina fan , you will enjoy this book. Even Dook fans will like it!
Published on January 25, 2011 by Charles N. Reed
5.0 out of 5 stars
Engrossing expose of inner turmoil stemming from sport's greatest...
Any decent review of a book touching on the Duke-Carolina rivalry has to be honest about where it's coming from, so by way of disclosure, here is the baggage I bring to the... Read more
Published on January 5, 2010 by Scott Schiefelbein
3.0 out of 5 stars
diagnosis: Carolina Fever
The book is more a diagnosis/autobiography of the author's anti-duke psychosis set in the back drop of the 2004-2005 championship season than a history of the rivalry itself. Read more
Published on June 24, 2009 by John Fonda
4.0 out of 5 stars
A great read
Obviously, UNC fans will love this book, but in truth, its much more about the importance of family and home -- spiritually and geographically -- than it is basketball. Read more
Published on May 11, 2009 by Leo J. Carmody
5.0 out of 5 stars
The Best Damn Sports Book - Ever
This is hands down the best book about a sports rivalry. It is absolutely hilarious from start to finish. Read more
Published on April 30, 2009 by Jeanne Gunn
4.0 out of 5 stars
Carolina Blues
Blythe's TO HATE LIKE THIS reads like an old-fashioned SI closing feature article. Entertaining, funny, informative and well-done. That's its strength. Read more
Published on September 25, 2008 by olingerstories
5.0 out of 5 stars
I was laughing out loud as my husband read...
My husband is from North Carolina (and grad) and like Will, he and his Dad shared their love for the Heels over the years... Read more
Published on July 27, 2008 by C. Tant
