Dan Fogelman

I write things.

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Book Recommendations:

DF

Recommended by Dan Fogelman

The #Steelers and #ThisIsUs have been linked from go... Jim Rooney was kind enough to send me the book he wrote about his father, Dan. A fascinating read (and great holiday gift!) #ADifferentWayToWin https://t.co/nx9HfZK3Uv (from X)

Dan Rooney was one of the most influential sports executives of his generation, the man who transformed the Pittsburgh Steelers into one of the National Football League's great dynasties and premiere franchises. Some of his most important achievements, however, took place off the playing field as he sought to bring about equity in the league's hiring practices and peace in his ancestral homeland of Ireland. As a business leader, a philanthropist, a diplomat and the author of the famous Rooney Rule, Dan Rooney was known for his core values, his quiet strength, his effectiveness, and his willingness to talk to and hear from those who disagreed with him. In this poignant account of his father's life, Jim Rooney takes readers behind the scenes to share stories from his hundreds of hours of interviews with business and political leaders; sports and celebrity influencers; and family members. Part memoir, part business biography, part history book, A Different Way to Win underscores the importance of focusing on the long game and the effectiveness in building consensus in a way that is meaningful and sustainable for decades to come.

DF

Recommended by Dan Fogelman

Tim O’Brien is one of our great modern American authors (he also wrote multiple episodes of the @MiloVentimiglia This Is Us Vietnam storyline last season). His new book “Dad’s Maybe Book” is for sale now and it’s a total knockout. Do not wait. #ThisIsUs https://t.co/WAgUEJRYRW (from X)

Dad's Maybe Book book cover

by Tim O'Brien·You?

Best-selling author Tim O’Brien shares wisdom from a life in letters, lessons learned in wartime, and the challenges, humor, and rewards of raising two sons. “We are all writing our maybe books full of maybe tomorrows, and each maybe tomorrow brings another maybe tomorrow, and then another, until the last line of the last page receives its period.” In 2003, already an older father, National Book Award–winning novelist Tim O’Brien resolved to give his young sons what he wished his own father had given to him—a few scraps of paper signed “Love, Dad.” Maybe a word of advice. Maybe a sentence or two about some long-ago Christmas Eve. Maybe some scattered glimpses of their rapidly aging father, a man they might never really know. For the next fifteen years, the author talked to his sons on paper, as if they were adults, imagining what they might want to hear from a father who was no longer among the living. O’Brien traverses the great variety of human experience and emotion, moving from soccer games to warfare to risqué lullabies, from alcoholism to magic shows to history lessons to bittersweet bedtime stories, but always returning to a father’s soul-saving love for his sons. The result is Dad’s Maybe Book, a funny, tender, wise, and enduring literary achievement that will squeeze the reader’s heart with joy and recognition.