Olympic library goes for gold.
In 1986, I bought a remaindered copy of David Wallechinsky's Complete Book of the Olympics. Wallechinsky was a co-author of three versions of The Book of Lists and three of The People's Almanac, which demonstrated his quirky point of view. His current titles, The Complete Book of the Summer Olympics and The Complete Book of the Winter Olympics, updated just before the celebration of the quadrennial summer and winter versions of the games, are more straightforward reference books in that they present the top eight finishers of every event of every Olympics, along with their times or distances or scores. Ever with an eye for the dramatic and unusual, however, Wallechinsky also tells some fascinating stories about the competitions in addition to the raw numbers and facts. His stories held great interest for me and inspired me to read other histories of the Olympics in addition to following them avidly on television, in printed media, and, eventually, on the Internet.