The Whore of Akron, by Scott Raab (Harper; $25.99)
In the end, what truly matters is this: Cleveland fans love the city, cherish the teams more deeply, and pull for them with far more passion than fans anywhere else. Other Rust Belt cities have been stripped of a middle class over the past fifty years by the same socioeconomic Katrina, but only Cleveland became the armpit of a nation. Detroit is a sinkhole of permanent despair, Pittsburgh’s a human sewer, but fans in those cities know at least what victory looks, sounds, and feels like, and they limp a little taller and stink slightly less for that knowledge.
