Watching the Australian Open this week makes me miss Andre Agassi. Not that there hasn’t been some great tennis – Roger Federer as elegant as ever, Andy Murray on a tear – but Agassi was always so fun to watch. Sure, there was the personal flamboyance, but also such skill, especially those amazing returns against 130 mph serves. His comeback to world No. 1 at age 33 was indeed a sight to behold. It’s even more spectacular if you read his take on it in Open: An Autobiography.
Before I picked up 
the book, I already had heard about the crystal meth, the mullet mane covering the premature baldness, the tidbits about Babs and Brooke – all the headline-making dishy bits. Figured I could wait and borrow it from my brother; my Mom was giving him a copy for Christmas. I knew because I ordered it for her. Then I opened Open before she wrapped it and started reading about Agassi hating tennis and why, and I just kept on turning pages all afternoon.
“Open’’ is the perfect title as Agassi lays it all out, good and bad, with remarkable candor and immediacy. The play-by-plays may appeal mostly to us diehard fans that remember those matches – the first thrilling win at Wimbledon, the back-and-forths with Sampras, eight Grand Slams in all. But his lost childhood as he was trained as a toddler by his driven father, the relationships with his brother, trainer, coach and other insiders, his persistent wooing of now-wife Steffi Graf – all this and more is served with insight and style. Agassi acknowledges his debt to his ghostwriter, who declined to be named, but it’s Agassi’s voice, matter-of-fact to occasionally eloquent, that propels the narrative.
This book has game. It also has heart.
(Open Book: I “borrowed” Open: An Autobiography (Knopf) from my brother.)
On a Clear Day I Can Read Forever 
Welcome back, Nancy Pate. It’s good to be reading books with you and through you again.
I was thinking about picking this up at the library.Now I know I will. Thanks, Nancy!
i devoured about half of this book while standing in the chilly basement book dungeon at the strib. i agree that it was captivating–and i’m not even much of a tennis fan. the hair thing was just too much!
I, too, have missed Andre’. I was not aware he had written an autobiography. I, too, have been MIA for a bit. I will read “Open.” Thanks for your comments, they intrigued me enough to want to explore Aggasi’s book.
Nancy, this comment comes way late, but I just stumbled across this review when I was sending the link to your blog to someone else . . .
I loved this book, too, and was surprised I did because I don’t read many autobiographies. But I felt like he really did “open” himself to the reader, and I liked what I saw on the inside. He seems like a good person, one you’d want to have a beer with. And I love how he’s used his celebrity to help disadvantaged kids.
I was also struck by how the book pulled me forward, almost the way a novel does. It wasn’t simply an account of “here’s what happened in my life.”
Finally, I wanted to mention that the ghostwriter was the author of The Tender Bar — J.R. Moehringer. Another wonderful read, by the way.
Thanks for a great blog.