Welcome to the Machine

by Glen Hines

Overview

Football is facing an existential crisis, whether the game and its culture want to admit it or not. In Welcome to the Machine, author, war veteran, and former Division 1 football player Glen Hines explores how various forces in American society and culture try to salvage football despite the growing evidence of its destructive effects. Part memoir, part cultural analysis, part chronicle of the biggest medical crisis facing American sport in over 100 years, this story is mandatory reading for parents with sons and a cautionary tale for thinking people who continue to fuel America's gladiatorial spectacle.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9798855628470
Publisher:	Barnes & Noble Press
Publication date:	09/01/2023
Pages:	330
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.69(d)

About the Author

The author of six books - Document, Cloudbreak, Crossroads, Cathedrals in the Twilight, Of Time and Rivers, and the creator, producer, and author of the highly-acclaimed podcast Welcome to the Machine and the book on which it is based, Glen Hines was born and raised in Houston, Texas, and graduated from George Washington University School of Law in Washington, DC. His writing on military service, sports, current events, the outdoors, and the bright and dark sides of American culture has been published in various outlets, such as Sports Illustrated, SI-The Cauldron, Task and Purpose, the Human Development Project and elsewhere. The Welcome to the Machine podcast was featured on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Audible, and most other popular podcast platforms.

The son of a professional athlete and a career high school English teacher, he began his writing career as a lawyer, working for a few years in a corporate legal department and law firm. Needing a greater challenge and seeking a higher calling, in 1997, he entered the United States Marine Corps as an officer and judge advocate. For over two decades, he has served in various roles as a prosecutor, appellate government counsel, terrorism prosecutor in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and a military trial and appellate judge five different times. He is a veteran of Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom, having served overseas in Kuwait, Iraq, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Naval Station Bahrain, and elsewhere. From 2000-2002 and 2012-2014, he also served two stints as a federal prosecutor with the U.S. Department of Justice.

He has taught at the Naval Justice School, the Army Judge Advocate General’s School, the University of Arkansas School of Law, and Texas A&M University Law School.

A former NCAA Division 1 letterman in football and baseball at two different schools, he is the only University of Arkansas two-sport athlete to have played on conference championship football and baseball teams (1989). His military service and athletic career have provided the ideas and basis for countless stories in his books and elsewhere. He is also a member of the Family Advisory Board at the Boston University CTE Center's Concussion Legacy Foundation and a member of the Surfrider Foundation. He was inducted into the Authors Guild in 2022.

Editorial Reviews

"Hines attempts to diagnose not only his own disillusionment with football—which has much deeper roots than his father's CTE—and the waning position of the sport in the American imagination. Hines writes with precision and a palpable dislike for the things he sees as corrupting the game." "The book does effectively articulate a comprehensive critique of the ethics of modern football."

"An often-compelling examination of a sport's sins from a man with an insider's view."

"Our verdict: Get it."

Kirkus - Kirkus Reviews

"At times poignant, searing, and eventually uplifting, this story is about American football culture as much as the sport of American football, perhaps even more so."

Spotify - Podcast Reviewer