The Sweet Science

Grover Gardner is the perfect narrator for this collection of Liebling's New Yorker pieces about boxing, written in the '30s, '40s, and '50s. Featured are Joe Louis, Sugar Ray Robinson, Sandy Sadler, Archie Moore, Rocky Marciano, Jersey Joe Walcott--all fighters of America's "golden age" of pre-television boxing. No one else has ever written so well about this sport. Gardner captures the voices of "know-it-all" New York fight fans and the denizens of the Neutral Corner, a New York City bar owned, tended, and patronized by fighters and their retinue. Gardner's rendition of Tommy Farr, the Welsh heavyweight, alone is worth the purchase price. Those who love boxing, and even those who don't, will enjoy the Liebling-Gardner team. R.E.K. (c) AudioFile 2007, Portland, Maine