{"product_id":"the-penalty-kick-the-story-of-a-gamechanger-9781912559572","title":"The Penalty Kick: The Story of a Gamechanger","description":"\u003cb\u003eA rousing history of the penalty kick and its introduction in English football by a famed British writer \u0026amp; editor.\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eFootball, in the 1880s, was a rough and dangerous game. To address the abhorrent state of the sport, William McCrum, an amateur Irish goalkeeper and the author's great-grandfather, proposed the penalty kick, a new and drastic sanction introduced to the game in 1891. For over a hundred years, this extraordinary phenomenon has not only regulated the conduct of football (also known as soccer) but has also inspired game theories and infiltrated classics of contemporary literature. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eAn enthralling portrait of a lost age, \u003ci\u003eThe Penalty Kick: The Story of a Gamechanger \u003c\/i\u003eis a family history, a social history, and a history of the world's most popular sport. It considers an extraordinary phenomenon as it examines the penalty kick's psychological--even philosophical--grip on our imaginations, with its distillation of risk and chance into the penalty shoot-out, an all-or-nothing moment.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAbout the Author\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eRobert McCrum\u003c\/b\u003e is a writer and editor whose most recent book, \u003ci\u003eShakespearean\u003c\/i\u003e, was published to great acclaim in 2021. Formerly the editor-in-chief of Faber \u0026amp; Faber, he published Kazuo Ishiguro, Hanif Kureishi, Milan Kundera, Peter Carey, Danilo Kis, Paul Auster, Marilynne Robinson, Lorrie Moore, Adam Phillips, Mario Vargas Llosa, Jayne Anne Phillips, Orhan Pamuk, and Adam Mars-Jones, among many others. He also served as literary editor of the \u003ci\u003eObserver\u003c\/i\u003e for more than ten years. He is the author of several books of fiction and nonfiction, including \u003ci\u003eWodehouse: A Life\u003c\/i\u003e and a memoir, \u003ci\u003eMy Year Off: Recovering Life After a Stroke\u003c\/i\u003e.\u003cbr\u003e","brand":"Notting Hill Editions","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":50892698976530,"sku":"9781912559572","price":15.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0831\/4771\/8930\/files\/img_5c7266ac-1ba2-4124-af52-17eefecea9b6.jpg?v=1738202681","url":"https:\/\/surprise-castle.myshopify.com\/products\/the-penalty-kick-the-story-of-a-gamechanger-9781912559572","provider":"Surprise Castle","version":"1.0","type":"link"}