Friday Night Lights (gift): A Town, A Team And A Dream - Hardcover

Bissinger, H.G.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0306812827 ISBN 13: 9780306812828

Publisher: Da Capo Press, 2003

Synopsis

Return once again to the enduring account of life in the Mojo lane, to the Permian Panthers of Odessa--the winningest high school football team in Texas history. Odessa is not known to be a town big on dreams, but the Panthers help keep the hopes and dreams of this small, dusty town going. Socially and racially divided, its fragile economy follows the treacherous boom-bust path of the oil business. In bad times, the unemployment rate barrels out of control; in good times, its murder rate skyrockets. But every Friday night from September to December, when the Permian High School Panthers play football, this West Texas town becomes a place where dreams can come true. With frankness and compassion, Bissinger chronicles one of the Panthers' dramatic seasons and shows how single-minded devotion to the team shapes the community and inspires--and sometimes shatters--the teenagers who wear the Panthers' uniforms.

About this title

Review:

Secular religions are fascinating in the devotion and zealousness they breed, and in Texas, high school football has its own rabid hold over the faithful. H.G. Bissinger, a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, enters into the spirit of one of its most fervent shrines: Odessa, a city in decline in the desert of West Texas, where the Permian High School Panthers have managed to compile the winningest record in state annals. Indeed, as this breathtaking examination of the town, the team, its coaches, and its young players chronicles, the team, for better and for worse, is the town; the communal health and self-image of the latter is directly linked to the on-field success of the former. The 1988 season, the one Friday Night Lights recounts, was not one of the Panthers' best. The game's effect on the community--and the players--was explosive. Written with great style and passion, Friday Night Lights offers an American snapshot in deep focus; the picture is not always pretty, but the image is hard to forget.

About the Author:

H.G. Bissinger has won the Pulitzer Prize, the Livingston Award, the National Headliner Award, and the American Bar Association's Silver Gavel for his reporting. The author of the highly acclaimed A Prayer for the City, he has written for the television series NYPD Blue and is a contributing editor at Vanity Fair. He lives in Philadelphia.

About this edition

• Publisher: Da Capo Press
• Publication date: 2003
• ISBN 10: 0306812827
• ISBN 13: 9780306812828
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 416