Love A Franchise on the Rise? Readers share 97 books like A Franchise on the Rise...

By Dom Amore,

Here are 97 books that A Franchise on the Rise fans have personally recommended if you like A Franchise on the Rise. Shepherd is a community of 12,000+ authors and super readers sharing their favorite books with the world.

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Book cover of New York Yankees: The First 25 Years

W. Nikola-Lisa Author Of The Men Who Made the Yankees: The Odyssey of the World's Greatest Baseball Team from Baltimore to the Bronx

From my list on the early years of the New York Yankees.

Why am I passionate about this?

I grew up a Yankee fan during the Mickey Mantle era, traveling to the Bronx in my uncle’s canary-yellow Chrysler Imperial. Those early experiences set me on a trajectory to want to play baseball every chance I got, starting with Little League and ending up on my high school’s varsity squad. Fortunately, my high school was in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida, where my family had moved in 1962, the same year that the Yankees began playing their pre-season games in the city, which meant when I wasn’t playing baseball at school, I was hanging around Ft. Lauderdale Stadium watching the Yankees. Yes, the Pinstripe Nation was in my blood. 

W.'s book list on the early years of the New York Yankees

W. Nikola-Lisa Why did W. love this book?

Although Luisi’s history of the New York Yankees' first 25 years retraces some of the ground that I do in my book, Luisi’s pictorial history is a must-read for those interested in the Yankees early days. What distinguishes Luisi’s book from mine is that where Luisi begins the Yankee journey upon their arrival in upper Manhattan in 1903, two years after the founding of the American League, I go further back in time, connecting the origin of the Yankees with the formation of Ban Johnson’s upstart American League, which announced itself a major league contender in time for the 1901 season. 

By Vincent Luisi,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked New York Yankees as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.


Book cover of The 1923 New York Yankees: A History of Their First World Championship Season

W. Nikola-Lisa Author Of The Men Who Made the Yankees: The Odyssey of the World's Greatest Baseball Team from Baltimore to the Bronx

From my list on the early years of the New York Yankees.

Why am I passionate about this?

I grew up a Yankee fan during the Mickey Mantle era, traveling to the Bronx in my uncle’s canary-yellow Chrysler Imperial. Those early experiences set me on a trajectory to want to play baseball every chance I got, starting with Little League and ending up on my high school’s varsity squad. Fortunately, my high school was in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida, where my family had moved in 1962, the same year that the Yankees began playing their pre-season games in the city, which meant when I wasn’t playing baseball at school, I was hanging around Ft. Lauderdale Stadium watching the Yankees. Yes, the Pinstripe Nation was in my blood. 

W.'s book list on the early years of the New York Yankees

W. Nikola-Lisa Why did W. love this book?

After the Yankees emerged from their dismal days as the Hilltop Highlanders, officially becoming the New York Yankees in 1913, ten years after coming to the Washington Heights area in upper Manhattan, they made a run for the American League pennant, and, as such, for major league baseball’s largest prize—World Series Champs. But they had a very steep hill to climb: they had to claw their way over their arch-rival, the National League’s New York Giants, who defeated the Yankees in post-season play in 1921 and 1922 to claim major league baseball’s ultimate prize. Mayer tells the story of the Yankees’ third try in 1923 when they finally overcame their nemesis to stand atop the baseball world.

By Ronald A. Mayer,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The 1923 New York Yankees as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

The 1923 Yankees started the dynasty - with stars like Babe Ruth, Wally Pipp, Joe Dugan and Bob Meusel, they won the pennant by 16 games before claiming the franchise's first World Series title. Five Yankees pitchers won 16 games that year, led by Sam Jones (21-8), and the team finally defeated McGraw's Giants after losing to them in the Series two years in a row. This book covers that first Yankees championship team in great detail, taking the reader through the entire season, game-by-game.


Book cover of The Arrival of the American League: Ban Johnson and the 1901 Challenge to National League Monopoly

W. Nikola-Lisa Author Of The Men Who Made the Yankees: The Odyssey of the World's Greatest Baseball Team from Baltimore to the Bronx

From my list on the early years of the New York Yankees.

Why am I passionate about this?

I grew up a Yankee fan during the Mickey Mantle era, traveling to the Bronx in my uncle’s canary-yellow Chrysler Imperial. Those early experiences set me on a trajectory to want to play baseball every chance I got, starting with Little League and ending up on my high school’s varsity squad. Fortunately, my high school was in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida, where my family had moved in 1962, the same year that the Yankees began playing their pre-season games in the city, which meant when I wasn’t playing baseball at school, I was hanging around Ft. Lauderdale Stadium watching the Yankees. Yes, the Pinstripe Nation was in my blood. 

W.'s book list on the early years of the New York Yankees

W. Nikola-Lisa Why did W. love this book?

Bancroft “Ban” Johnson, the founder and first president of the American League, set his sights early on challenging the domination of the National Leauge, which came to power in the 1870s. Wilbert’s book adequately depicts Johnson’s rise to power and his subsequent challenge to National League teams, culminating in the AL’s first official season as a major league in 1901, two years before the strong-willed Johnson was able to muscle a team into Manhattan to challenge the NL’s dominant franchise, the New York Giants.

By Warren N. Wilbert,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Arrival of the American League as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

In 1901, Charles Comiskey and Ban Johnson launched a brazen challenge to the National League's supremacy. This book covers the American League's origins in the Western League, the decisions and planning that laid the groundwork for the American League (AL), and the 1901 season that established the AL as a new major league.


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Book cover of Tap Dancing on Everest: A Young Doctor's Unlikely Adventure

Tap Dancing on Everest by Mimi Zieman,

Tap Dancing on Everest, part coming-of-age memoir, part true-survival adventure story, is about a young medical student, the daughter of a Holocaust survivor raised in N.Y.C., who battles self-doubt to serve as the doctor—and only woman—on a remote Everest climb in Tibet.

The team attempts a new route up…

Book cover of Miracle Moments in New York Yankees History: The Turning Points, the Memorable Games, the Incredible Records

W. Nikola-Lisa Author Of The Men Who Made the Yankees: The Odyssey of the World's Greatest Baseball Team from Baltimore to the Bronx

From my list on the early years of the New York Yankees.

Why am I passionate about this?

I grew up a Yankee fan during the Mickey Mantle era, traveling to the Bronx in my uncle’s canary-yellow Chrysler Imperial. Those early experiences set me on a trajectory to want to play baseball every chance I got, starting with Little League and ending up on my high school’s varsity squad. Fortunately, my high school was in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida, where my family had moved in 1962, the same year that the Yankees began playing their pre-season games in the city, which meant when I wasn’t playing baseball at school, I was hanging around Ft. Lauderdale Stadium watching the Yankees. Yes, the Pinstripe Nation was in my blood. 

W.'s book list on the early years of the New York Yankees

W. Nikola-Lisa Why did W. love this book?

Fischer’s Miracle Moments in New York Yankees History is aptly divided into five parts, the first of which—“Birth of a Dynasty”—is the most relevant for the current topic. It covers the “Hilltop Highlander” years (1903-1913), the Yankees’ decade at the Polo Grounds as tenants of their arch-rival, the National League’s New York Giants (1913-1922), the sale of the Yankees to Ruppert and Huston (1914-1915), the acquisition of Babe Ruth (1919-1920), and their move to Yankee Stadium in the Bronx and their first World Series title (1923). But Fischer’s Miracle Moments has much more to offer than these early days as it provides a panoramic view of the entire Yankees’ franchise from 1903 to the present. 

By David Fischer,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Miracle Moments in New York Yankees History as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Throughout its illustrious history, the New York Yankees have produced some of the most memorable highlights in baseball annals. Babe Ruth's "called shot" home run, Joe DiMaggio's 56-game hitting streak, Derek Jeter's amazing "Flip Play." Most Yankees fans have seen newsreel footage of Lou Gehrig's farewell speech, watched highlights of a young Mickey Mantle, and have heard the story of Billy Martin's five managerial hirings and firings. But what makes the Yankees the world's most celebrated sports franchise goes beyond sheer headlines? it is the stories of the men behind the headlines who have thrilled and enchanted New York fans…


Book cover of The Echoing Green: The Untold Story of Bobby Thomson, Ralph Branca and the Shot Heard Round the World

John Rosengren Author Of The Greatest Summer in Baseball History: How the '73 Season Changed Us Forever

From my list on stories about a single baseball season.

Why am I passionate about this?

My father used to take me to watch the Twins play at Metropolitan Stadium in Bloomington, a twenty-minute drive from our house in suburban Minneapolis. As soon as the Twins announced their schedule each year, he would buy tickets for the doubleheaders. Our favorites were the twilight doubleheaders, when we watched one game by daylight, and the other under the night sky. Baseball was pure to me then: played outdoors on real grass. Seated beside my dad during those twin bills, I felt his love for the game seep into me and take root. All these years later, almost two decades after his death, that love remains strong.

John's book list on stories about a single baseball season

John Rosengren Why did John love this book?

I love the books that go behind the scenes and show us more of a story we thought we knew. This is one of those. Josh Prager pulls back the curtain on Bobby Thomsen’s "shot heard round the world" with startling revelations from his research.

I was left with mixed emotions and uncertainty about a feat that had initially appeared nothing but heroic.

By Joshua Prager,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked The Echoing Green as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

This is the untold story of the secret scandal behind baseball's most legendary moment:The Shot Heard Round the World. A Washington Post Best Book of the Year.

At 3:58 p.m. on October 3, 1951, Bobby Thomson hit a home run off Ralph Branca. The ball sailed over the left field wall and into history. The Giants won the pennant. That moment—the Shot Heard Round the World—reverberated from the West Wing of the White House to the Sing Sing death house to the Polo Grounds clubhouse, where hitter and pitcher forever turned into hero and goat. It was also in that…


Book cover of Tough Jews: Fathers, Sons, and Gangster Dreams

Paul M. Levitt Author Of Come with Me to Babylon

From my list on arresting gangsters.

Why am I passionate about this?

My father came from Ukraine, and every summer took the family to stay on a farm in an immigrant community in southern New Jersey, Carmel, a community begun by the Baron de Hirsch Foundation, which settled Jews from all over Europe. Italian immigrants also settled there. I lived in a family that spoke to their siblings in three languages, Yiddish, Russian, and Ukrainian. Hence, I was privy to the loves and losses of people who felt estranged from their language and often yearned to return to their country of origin.

Paul's book list on arresting gangsters

Paul M. Levitt Why did Paul love this book?

Tough Jews is a short history of Jewish-American gangsters and their Italian colleagues with whom they made common cause. It is here for the first time that we understand why Arnold Rothstein was the most important gangster in America.  Having introduced "organized" into organized crime, he promised underworld figures the help of the famous attorney William Fallon if they landed in trouble and agreed to look after their families if they got sent up the Hudson (to Sing Sing). I am struck by the fact that Cohen makes his history personal, by means of his own contacts with the people who know the inside story of how the Jewish gangsters thrived—or didn't. He sits down with them; he eats with them; and he gets them to remember how it once was in the days of Dutch Schultz, Legs Diamond, and Arnold Rothstein.

By Rich Cohen,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked Tough Jews as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Award-winning writer Rich Cohen excavates the real stories behind the legend of infamous criminal enforcers Murder, Inc. and contemplates the question: Where did the tough Jews go?

In 1930s Brooklyn, there lived a breed of men who now exist only in legend and in the memories of a few old-timers: Jewish gangsters, fearless thugs with nicknames like Kid Twist Reles and Pittsburgh Phil Strauss. Growing up in Brownsville, they made their way from street fights to underworld power, becoming the execution squad for a national crime syndicate. Murder Inc. did for organized crime what Henry Ford did for the automobile,…


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Book cover of The Coaching Habit: Say Less, Ask More & Change the Way You Lead Forever

The Coaching Habit by Michael Bungay Stanier,

The coaching book that's for all of us, not just coaches.

It's the best-selling book on coaching this century, with 15k+ online reviews. Brené Brown calls it "a classic". Dan Pink said it was "essential".

It is practical, funny, and short, and "unweirds" coaching. Whether you're a parent, a teacher,…

Book cover of The Mole People

Ali Smith Author Of The Ballad of Speedball Baby: A Memoir

From my list on New York City subcultures.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’m a native New Yorker whose recent move to the UK gives me both unique insight into a city I lived the hell out of for decades and space and time to look back and wonder what it was all about, like with a lover you still adore but are relieved you’re no longer with. I’ve partied in squats and walked red carpets. I can sniff out a fake-take on this city so many people feel they know long before ever visiting it, and that always offends/bores/turns me off. These books got it right, and I’m thrilled to point more people in their direction.

Ali's book list on New York City subcultures

Ali Smith Why did Ali love this book?

Growing up in New York City, I’ll never forget my first experience, at around the age of seven, with people literally living underground. Our subway stalled in a tunnel in front of an abandoned station. The lights went off in the car and the platform outside was cast in an eerie orange glow by a single bulb.

Suddenly, a figure emerged from the shadows, charged my subway car, and started banging wildly and laughing maniacally, just on the other side of the glass to me. This continued for what felt like a million years before the train came back to life, and we moved on.

Decades later, I discovered this book about a parallel city below mine where people like that man live an alternative existence in miles and miles of dark warrens underground. I’m obsessed with it.

By Jennifer Toth,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Mole People as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Thousands of people live in the subway, railroad, and sewage tunnels that form the bowels of New York City and this book is about them, the so-called mole people. They live alone and in communities, in subway tunnels and below subway platforms and this fascinating study presents how and why people move underground, who they are, and what they have to say about their lives and the “topside” world they’ve left behind.


Book cover of Up in the Old Hotel

Jonathan H. Rees Author Of The Fulton Fish Market: A History

From my list on the history of New York City.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’m Professor of History at Colorado State University Pueblo and have published eight books, mostly about the history of food. After encountering Up in the Old Hotel for the first time during the early 1990s, I started reading New York City history in my spare time. The Fulton Fish Market: A History is my way to blend my expertise with my hobby. Each of these books are beautifully written, informative, and fun. If you’re interested in the history of New York City and you’re looking for something else to read, I hope you’ll find my book to be the same.

Jonathan's book list on the history of New York City

Jonathan H. Rees Why did Jonathan love this book?

Joseph Mitchell was the city reporter for the New Yorker for about half a century. This is a collection of his magazine stories. Many of them involve the old Fulton Fish Market, but he also wrote about weird things like dime museums, gypsies, and stag banquets. 

To me, every story in this collection is like a time capsule. This is the book that made me want to write about New York City because it suggests there is a history on every block there worth recording. If you don’t like a chapter or two, then skip to the next one, but I’ll vouch for 80% of this book being the best non-fiction writing that I have ever read (and I practically read for a living).

By Joseph Mitchell,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked Up in the Old Hotel as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Saloon-keepers and street preachers, gypsies and steel-walking Mohawks, a bearded lady and a 93-year-old “seafoodetarian” who believes his specialized diet will keep him alive for another two decades. These are among the people that Joseph Mitchell immortalized in his reportage for The New Yorker and in four books—McSorley's Wonderful Saloon, Old Mr. Flood, The Bottom of the Harbor, and Joe Gould's Secret—that are still renowned for their precise, respectful observation, their graveyard humor, and their offhand perfection of style.

 

These masterpieces (along with several previously uncollected stories) are available in one volume, which presents an indelible collective portrait of an…


Book cover of The Collected Stories

Steven Sherrill Author Of The Minotaur Takes a Cigarette Break

From my list on short stories to send your mind into the sublime.

Why am I passionate about this?

Most of my public success has been as a novelist. My MFA, from the Iowa Writers Workshop, is in poetry. When I grow up, I want to be a short story writer. The dirty truth is, though, I’ve been making trouble with stories since I was a kid. During my first attempt in 10th grade, I wrote a story that got me suspended for two weeks. No explanation. No guidance. Just a conference between my parents, teachers, and principal (I wasn’t present), and they came out and banished me. I dropped out of school shortly after. I reckon that experience, both shameful and delicious, shaped my life and love of narrative.

Steven's book list on short stories to send your mind into the sublime

Steven Sherrill Why did Steven love this book?

The complexities of the human, the whole human. That’s what Paley explores. How we think, how we act and feel, how we play and fight, how we talk. And talk. Paley is a master of nuance, and often reveals her mastery through dialogue. There is always a convincing urgency in the way her characters speak, and a delicious talking-around a thing, an idea. Her worlds richly detailed and urban. I’d like to live in the apartment building of Grace Paley’s mind. 

By Grace Paley,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Collected Stories as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

This reissue of Grace Paley's classic collection—a finalist for the National Book Award—demonstrates her rich use of language as well as her extraordinary insight into and compassion for her characters, moving from the hilarious to the tragic and back again.

Whether writing about the love (and conflict) between parents and children or between husband and wife, or about the struggles of aging single mothers or disheartened political organizers to make sense of the world, she brings the same unerring ear for the rhythm of life as it is actually lived.

The Collected Stories is a 1994 National Book Award Finalist…


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Book cover of Norvel: An American Hero

Norvel by Kenneth F. Conklin,

NORVEL: An American Hero chronicles the remarkable life of Norvel Lee, a civil rights pioneer and Olympic athlete who challenged segregation in 1948 Virginia. Born in the Blue Ridge Mountains to working-class parents who valued education, Lee overcame Jim Crow laws and a speech impediment to achieve extraordinary success.

He…

Book cover of The Long-Winded Lady: Notes from the New Yorker

Alex Witchel Author Of All Gone: A Memoir of My Mother's Dementia. With Refreshments

From my list on to read in the waiting room.

Why am I passionate about this?

I am the oldest of four children and was always close to my mom. She was a trailblazer, earning her doctorate in educational psychology in 1963 and teaching at the college level. In her early 70’s her memory started to falter, and she lived with dementia for 10 years before she died. I was a reporter at The New York Times and had published three books by that point. My fourth became All Gone: A Memoir of My Mother’s Dementia. With Refreshments. I spent years in doctors’ and hospital’s waiting rooms and these are some of the books that helped make that time not only tolerable but sometimes, even joyful. 

Alex's book list on to read in the waiting room

Alex Witchel Why did Alex love this book?

“I saw a little boy on the street today, and he cried so eloquently that I will never forget him.” Maeve Brennan wrote for the New Yorker’s Talk of the Town section as ‘The Long-Winded Lady’ from 1954 to 1968. She roamed the city’s streets, bars, and restaurants, eyes wide open, weaving stories of vivid emotional detail from the most seemingly mundane moments. None of these are too long – in the waiting room concentration can be fleeting – but each sketch engages. Her story of the crying boy ends this way: “He might have been the last bird in the world, except that if he had been the last bird there would have been no one to hear him.”

By Maeve Brennan,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Long-Winded Lady as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

“Of all the incomparable stable of journalists who wrote for The New Yorker during its glory days in the Fifties and Sixties,” writes The Independent, “the most distinctive was Irish-born Maeve Brennan.” From 1954 to 1981, Maeve Brennan wrote for The New Yorker’s “Talk of the Town” column under the pen name “The Long-Winded Lady.” Her unforgettable sketches—prose snapshots of life in small restaurants, cheap hotels, and crowded streets of Times Square and the Village—together form a timeless, bittersweet tribute to what she called the “most reckless, most ambitious, most confused, most comical, the saddest and coldest and most human…


Book cover of New York Yankees: The First 25 Years
Book cover of The 1923 New York Yankees: A History of Their First World Championship Season
Book cover of The Arrival of the American League: Ban Johnson and the 1901 Challenge to National League Monopoly

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