My Losing Season

I've been a Pat Conroy fan since high school when I first read The Prince of Tides. Although I'd never been disappointed by any of Conroy's stories, I'd had more than one person warn me that his attempt at non-fiction in his autobiographical "My Losing Season" failed to fill the big shoes of his fiction. I had thus avoided the text many had warned was so depressingly real it failed to inspire anything other than disappointment; that is, of course, until I found myself without anything to read while the spine of this book mocked me from it's bookshelf. I broke down and read it and while I agree that the story pales in comparison to Conroy's fiction, the writing and style is classic Conroy and I believe any fan of his work would enjoy spending time with his words in the context of this novel. To be critical I would argue that Conroy's narrative is a bit difficult to follow as he weaves the reader in and out of his life's story as though we have an intuitive sense of when things happened to him and where. His love of basketball is both inspiring and exhausting as he discusses the play by play of each and every game his basketball team won and lost in his senior year of college. While the story is at times weighed down by a jargon familiar only to those who share an intimate relationship with the game, the insights and language Conroy uses in interpreting this time in his life makes wading through the details worth it. I also found it a treat to read about how an aspiring writer stumbled upon a love affair with words, while simultaneously trying to appease an abusive father and survive the plebe system of the Citadel. While this story is neither as exciting, nor endearing as the ones he pursues in his fiction, it is real and genuine and as such achieves something his former novels failed to accomplish - a story made grand by its simplicity. He reveals the humble and delicate details of a poet struggling to be anything other than what he was when what he was turned out to be one of the rarest and most precious voices in modern literature. Long story short (too late) if you like Conroy you'll like his Losing Season.

B+