On the Court With... Shaquille O' Neal

by Matt Christopher, Glenn Stout

Describes the life and career of the basketball superstar and center for the Los Angeles Lakers.

128 pages, Paperback

First published October 1, 2003

About the author

Matt Christopher is the writer young readers turn to when they're looking for fast-paced, action-packed sports novels. He is the best-selling author of more than one hundred sports books for young readers.

Matt Christopher is America's bestselling sports writer for children, with more than 100 books and sales approaching six million copies. In 1992, Matt Christopher talked about being a children's book author.

"I became interested in writing when I was 14, a freshman in high school. I was selling magazines such as the Saturday Evening Post, Country Gentleman, and Liberty, and I would read the stories, particularly the adventure and mystery stories, and think how wonderful it would be to be able to write stories and make a living at it. I also read detective, horror, aviation, and sports stories and decided I would try writing them myself.

Determined to sell, I wrote a detective story a week for 40 weeks, finding the time to marry, work, and play baseball and basketball before I sold my first story in 1941, "The Missing Finger Points," for $50 to Detective Story magazine.

After writing and selling children's sports stories to magazines, I decided to write a baseball book for children. I was living in Syracuse, New York at the time, working at General Electric. I spoke about my idea to the branch librarian. She was immediately interested and told me that they needed sports stories badly. So I came up with my first children's book, The Lucky Baseball Bat. I submitted it to Little, Brown, and the book was published in 1954.

I'm sure that playing sandlot baseball and then semiprofessional baseball with a Class C club in the Canadian-American League influenced my writing. I had my own personal experiences, and I saw how other players reacted to plays, to teammates' and fans' remarks and innuendoes, to managers' orders, etc. All these had a great influence on my writing. My love of the game helped a lot, too, of course.

Out of all the books I've written, my favorite is The Kid Who Only Hit Homers. It's a fantasy, but the main character in it could be real. There are a lot of boys who would love to play baseball but, for some reason, cannot. The only difference between a real-life boy and Sylvester Coddmyer III is the appearance of a character named George Baruth, whom only Sylvester can see and who helps Sylvester become a good ballplayer.

I've written many short stories and books for both children and adults, and find that writing for children is really my niche. Being the eldest of nine children (seven boys and two girls), I've lived through a lot of problems many children live through, and I find these problems excellent examples to include in my books.

Sports have made it possible for me to meet many people with all sorts of life stories, on and off the field, and these are grist for this writer's mill. I'm far beyond playing age now, but I manage to go to both kids' and adult games just to keep up with them, and keep them fresh in my mind.Very few things make me happier than receiving fan letters from boys and girls who write that they had never cared for reading until they started to read my books. That is just about the ultimate in writing for children. I would never trade it for another profession."

Matt Christopher died on September 27, 1997. His legacy is now being carried on by his sons, Duane and Dale Christopher.

Reviews

[Tyler]

Although I'm on up to the 2nd chapter I learned ALOT from Shaquille.
He was a really fast growing kid and his doctors knew that from when he was born.
A lot people said he was really slow by he was really good for basketball.
So one day he contacted his dad which was in the army and his father told he don't worry about it and just to work hard and work out everyday and that is what he did.
Also when he got to high school he wanted to play football but the coaches already discussed that they did not want him to ruin his basketball career playing football.

[Nicholas Walters · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read “On the Court with Shaquille O’Neal” by Matt Christopher. This was a good book. I told me so much about Shaq’s life and how he lived. This book was all about him and how he grew up. When he was just a boy, he was already very big for his age and everyone picked on him for it. Shaq moved a lot, coming from a military family. With moving all the time, Shaq got into a lot of trouble early in his life. One day, a college coach from LSU saw him and decided to give him words of encouragement and it changed his life. He did well enough in high school to get into LSU to play basketball. At LSU he worked really hard in class and on the court, but after two years the other teams would just foul him because he couldn’t shoot free throws. Shaquille entered himself into the NBA Draft where he was picked first by the Orlando Magic. He was there for two years and didn’t like the people he was around, because they were all about themselves. The following year he went back to school, but got signed by the Los Angeles Lakers. He got his degree and in his second year with the Lakers he won his first NBA Championship. He won three more the next couple years. He played a couple more seasons, but then retired and now is a Hall of Famer in the NBA, and works on sportscenter.


Shaquille is the main character whose life is always on the move. His dad was in the military and was transferring a lot. He goes from being a very good kid to a troublemaker and back again. His mom struggled through early parts of her life because her boyfriend left her when he found out she was pregnant. Now Shaquille's dad is in the picture. Shaquille inspired his mom by doing all the great things he did.


Shaquille grew up in many places. He was born in New Jersey and then moved to Europe with his dad during his service in the military. He finally moved back to Texas his junior year of high school where he then went on to play at LSU before being drafted in the NBA. In the NBA he was always on the move going to game after game in different cities around the country. Shaquille played basketball during the winter and summer months. He did not play any other sport. Most of the story took place in the winter months.


The message in this book is no matter what people do wrong or right in their life anyone can get on track if they really work at it. No one can stop you from succeeding but yourself. It’s all up to you to decide how you want to be remembered. It’s all heart and will everything in our lives have to be done with all of our abilities.


I would recommend this book to people who love sports and who think Shaquille is an inspiration. This book is good for all ages and very easy to understand. If people want a good message, this book gives one. If they know basketball enough and want to learn what happen in a great basketball players life this is the book for them.

[Ayden · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was about Shaquille O'Neal. It talks about the struggles he went through. When he was young his family moved to Bayonne, New Jersey because it was close to his Step dads army base. He soon started making bad decisions, with the trouble makers of the town, Doing drugs, drinking alcohol, and stealing cars. One day one of Shaq's friends dared him to steal a car but he refused. Later on his friends got caught. He didn't make his 9th grade basketball team. But he participated in his coaches summer camps, and his 10 grade year he went back and made the team. Shaq was drafted by the Orlando Magic with the 1st overall pick in round 1 of the 1992 NBA Draft. Shaquille has made 11,196 career baskets. Read the book to find out more.

[Carlos · Rating 5 out of 5]

It's an advantage when your tall ,but some people don't take it. Shaq took it and tried really hard because ever since he was like goof ball following his friends every time he would move. I think it was when he was 13 years old, he was doing what he was supposed to do. Until his step dad told him about basketball, and he started liking it. He was growing and growing working and working until he was in college so he can do the NBA next. Thinking of getting his degree and all that but accomplished that years after he was playing NBA since it was hard for him in college than the NBA. He is now an NBA legend.

[Jadyn Rojas · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was about how Shaquille lived a lot of places because his step-dad was in the military. As a kid Shaquille was always getting in trouble and getting in trouble. I liked this book because I like reading about how he became an NBA player and worked hard to do that. I recommend this book to people that like auto biography's.

[Vaughn]

This was a good book about what Shaquille O' Neal went through in his life. From going to a kid that struggled in life from a kid that went to a basketball superstar. From moving from the USA to Germany then back to USA then ending up at LSU. This is a great book for anyone that likes reading about professional careers.

[Thomas C · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this book because I was interested into learning about basketball stars. And I knew Shaq was one of basketbals greatest forwards. I had also heard stories about Shaqs rough childlife. So I wanted to read to find more about it.

[Steven Romero · Rating 4 out of 5]

good book to read

[Alex Mason · Rating 5 out of 5]

I enjoy reading biographies. It was interesting finding out how Shaq grew up and how he made it to the NBA.