What are your favorite running books?
I started with James Fixx's The Complete Book of Running. It's a great comprehensive guide to the world of running, it literally covers everything you want to know about the sport. The section on running shoes is dated, so take with a grain from a salt shaker, but most of the material is still relevant. A fun, inspirational read that can boost your confidence when you're just starting out or help maintain it if you're ever feeling less motivated somewhere down the line.
Born to Run is a big hit right now, it's very trendy I think, all the hip people are reading it. But I'll tell you that it's hyperbolic to the point of nausea. So you take this with a grain from the salt and pepper shaker, too. The line is disjointed and clumsy, I think, and some parts are so mushy and forced that they read more like a propaganda pamphlet than a book about running. But the parts that are worthwhile really shine, like the chapter on the evolution of man as a runner, and the chapter that totally demolishes the myth of the running shoe. Plus the race descriptions that are scattered throughout make ultramarathon running seem action packed and much more exciting than it really is, so that's fun reads.
Right now I'm attacking 'Why We Run', by Bernd Heinrich, and it seems like the best of the three. He drops tales about his love of insects, his childhood in post-war Germany, and his life in an orphanage in Maine, all while hanging tight to the main idea of the book, which is another look at the evolution of man as a runner. All this without the frat-boy exaggerations of Born to Run and told from the perspective of a scientist, at times philosophical and moving, and always honest and interesting, I think this will be one of my favorite books for a long time.
I think, you know, these three, they're very popular books about the sport, but I wonder if there are any lesser-known gems out there that you have come across.
