Doug Merlino’s “The Crossover”: The first B/R-related ebook

Doug Merlino has re-shaped his nine-part Bleacher Report guest column series on race and basketball into an ebook, “The Crossover: A Brief History of Basketball and Race.”

As far as we at Bleacher Report can tell, this is the first time B/R content has been turned into an ebook, or any kind of book.

And we feel like proud parents. Check out this review on Amazon.com:

Doug Merlino crosses many sociocultural boundaries to offer casual and hardcore fans alike a glimpse into the racial and economic divide that spans more than a century of American basketball. From Springfield to Harlem to Miami (with many stops in between), “The Crossover” beautifully ties together the pioneers who have forever altered both the game and the business of basketball. – Alan Brown, University of Alabama, College of Education

“The Crossover” is available for $2.99 at Amazon and Smashwords.

Just last month I wrote a post here about how ebooks are an exciting format for writers, giving them a chance to publish long-form work that’s too long to be considered an article, but not long enough to justify publishing as a traditional print book.

Merlino, the author of the basketball memoir The Hustle: One Team and Ten Lives in Black and White,” offers a brief primer on self-publishing an ebook in the blog post How to publish a Kindle e-book in 7 easy steps.

He writes, “If it helps writers reach new readers and maybe make a few bucks, it seems like a good thing.”