Fast Girls

Fast Girls by Elise Hooper, 484 pages

If you ask anyone what they know about the 1936 Berlin Olympics, most likely, they'll say something about African-American runner Jesse Owens winning gold. But that was also just the third Olympics that allowed women to compete in track and field events. Hooper's book follows three U.S. female runners — 1928 gold medalist Betty Robinson, African American runner Louise Stokes (who attended, but didn't get to run in, the 1932 Games in L.A.), and the poor, young, and super-fast Helen Stephens — who made up part of the American contingent to the controversial 1936 Games. All three faced monumental challenges to make it to the Olympics, and once they were there, faced even more problems because of misogyny, racism, and, oh yeah, the Nazi party.

As interesting as these young women's lives were, I didn't think that Hooper's book was quite the best way to present it; I would have loved to see her focus on just one of the women, or take it beyond the final race of the 1936 Games. That said, it's a good introduction to this little-told story of female athletes in the early days of the modern Olympics, and worth reading for that alone.