Mary Pilon

This is the most powerful Audible I've listened to to date.

This audiobook was short but damn, it packed a punch. I found myself repulsed, angry and sad at the story and how all of this could have been stopped countless times. I remember the trial and the media coverage, but I learned so much more from this audiobook.

This Audible includes interviews by the authors with real victims, recordings from the court proceedings, and journalism from many sources. It was especially hard to listen to show more the victims and their parents but it brought me that much closer to the truth of the story. There were hundreds of victims who spoke about their assault but one victim in particular while testifying against Nassar said something that had me so choked up, I had to rewind and listen 4 times:

"You [the parents of victims] feel like you threw your kid to the wolf, but in reality you raised a kid strong enough to take down the wolf."

Thank you to the victims and their families, the coaches, and anyone else involved in holding Larry Nassar accountable. Thank you for holding out hope after years of your cries going ignored by those meant to protect you, so that future children and parents can identify assault and inappropriate behavior. Thank you for dismantling the belief that those in power cannot be touched. Thank you for being brave enough to share your story. show less

As a book, it's rather mediocre. Even with the assistance of a professional co-writer, the writing is amateurish, and while there's certainly value in hearing the author speak in her own voice, her delivery is awkward and would have been more impactful with a professional narrator.

But for a book like this, the content is what's important. Many athletes' memoirs are extremely boring, because all they do is train, sleep, and eat for a few decades. And a summary of their wins, diet, and show more training only takes up a few pages, not enough for a whole book. But this one adds another layer on top of that, how even top athletes are abused and exploited by powerful sponsors. A lot of the issues raised actually have nothing to do with athletics, namely gender discrimination and sexual harassment in the workplace, the lack of healthcare and reproductive freedom, the virtually unlimited power of large corporations.

Ultimately, what makes this an interesting read is the degree to which we believe the author's side of the story. Not just the alleged sexual assault, which seems to be fairly well corroborated, but her accusations that everyone else on the team was engaged in doping except for her and her husband. If we accept the premise that her coach Alberto Salazar was willing to cross the line in order to "win at all costs" with Nike's blessings, why would only those two be spared the treatment?

She also admits that she was a big fan of Nike, and loved having Salazar as a coach until he became abusive. But Nike already had a dismal record on exploiting its workforce and customers dating back to the 1980's. And even at his most successful Salazar was notorious for being erratic, and killing his own career by relentlessly overtraining, hardly attributes that one would look for in a mentor. Of course it's hard to criticize too much when they were offering millions of dollars to shut up and smile, and the moral dilemma is what makes it interesting. Many people have certainly done a lot worse for a lot less, but the cynical side of me observes that she seems to have been complicit for a long time while it benefited her, and only changed her tune once she didn't get what she wanted in the negotiations to renew her contract, and now sounds like just another disgruntled former employee. show less

From the time it hit stores in the 1930’s, Parker Brothers sold Monopoly with the encouraging backstory of being invented by a Pennsylvania father struggling through the Great Depression. However, many Americans who had played versions of the game before knew the story wasn’t exactly true. Mary Pilon’s upcoming book follows a professor in the 1970’s as he digs back through Monopoly’s past in an effort to sell his own game and set history straight.

At the start of The Monopolists show more it’s not clear how the story of a modern professor who invented a game called Anti-Monopoly, a creative feminist in the early 20th century and a group of Quakers in Atlantic City would come together, but Mary Pilon weaves their narratives together brilliantly. What could easily be a dry history of a game almost all Americans have played reads like a fresh, page-turning mystery. The Monopolists is every bit as fun as it looks.

More at rivercityreading.com show less

Probably most players of the game Monopoly don't think much about its origins; however, there is a quite a long and interesting one behind the famous game. The 'official' story from Parker Brothers talks about a down-on-his-luck fellow during the Depression Era creating the game while unemployed and gaining fame and fortune as a result; a true rags-to-riches tale that appeals to many. However, Pilon here traces how the game was originally conceived as early as 1904 by a woman who wanted to show more use it as a teaching tool to further the theories of her favorite economist/social activist. It then coursed through many hands and multiple changes before it made its way to the so-called "inventor" who presented it to Parker Brothers for publication.

This was a riveting historical record that brought up all kinds of things previously unknown. Beyond just talking about the specifics of the Monopoly game, Pilon also researches and presents politics of the 1800s/early 1900s, a brief history of the founding of Atlantic City, and much more. I learned many a fascinating fact, which I then shared with others. Along the way, photographs show how the game board changed over the years as well as portraits of key players in the Monopoly story.

The only reason I don't give this book a full 5 stars is that it felt a little bit jumpy in the narrative, especially within the first few chapters. However, I definitely recommend it to others who like history, gaming, or both. show less