Kile, a young point guard for the Cleveland Calipers of the International Basketball Organization, meets a pretty white coed, Ashley, at an Akron Mall and they become involved in an interracial relationship. His team plays in the Richfield Coliseum, 22 miles south of Cleveland, but only 13 miles north of Akron. It begins happily but ends tragically. He is also friends with the controversial superstar of the IBO, LaDodge Jones, who likes to be known as LSD because he thinks he's a real trip.
About the Author: I'm a retired sportswriter and substitute teacher. The book was inspired by the 2013 NBA play-offs and my conversations about them with a 20-year-old co-ed at the University of Akron. Her name's Kelly, and she's an undergraduate nursing major who's form Mentor, a suburb of Cleveland, in Lake County to the east of there. She works at Spencer Gifts in the Chapel Hill Mall. I used to live, 18 years ago, in the Summit Lake neighborhood of Akron, three-and-a-half miles from Rolling Acres Mall which is now closed. I worked at the North Canton Sun Journal from 1997-2001 covering high school sports. Kelly played basketball and softball at Mentor High School, which is the biggest high school in Ohio, she was also involved in Sports Medicine at the university while working with the football team two years ago. Ialso worked at Deluxe Checks in Streetsboro as a shredder and employee newsletter columnist form 2002-02 with Ryan Gahagan who also worked with the Cleveland Cavaliers and knew LeBron James even before he played for the Cavs. As a substitute teacher in the Akron Public Schools from 2005-06 I became aware of the possible relationship between Riedinger Middle School, St. Mary's Elemntary, and St. Vincent-Mary High School and the possible illegal recruitment of James by the high school involving his AAU coach, Keith Dambrot, who is now the Head Coach at the University of Akron. Dambrot had been banished form coaching at public high schools and state universities because of a racial incident at Central Michigan University. Miss Gahagan also told myself and others she had been sexually harassed by James when he was 16 and threatened with termination before he joined the Cavs. I was also once frieds with David Lee Morgan, Jr. of the Akron Beacon Journal who may have given him a shooting tip from me in 2003 rthrough Bud Shaw and Tim Rogers at the Cleveland Plain Dealer. I have also subbed in Kent, Stow-Munroe Falls, and Tallmadge. I graduated from the University of Akron in 1994. I am currently getting SSI for a diabetic foot condition. I also worked at papers in Medina, Wadsworth, as well as the University of Akron.