"Strides" by Benjamin Cheever

Ben Cheever, son of famous author John Cheever, has been running for almost 30 years.  This book is a collection of sketches of his running life over those years, from starting out as an overweight smoking copywriter at Readers Digest to becoming fast enough to qualify for the Boston Marathon.  The chapters are short, punchy, entertaining and witty.  He is not a lazy writer and knows how to turn a phrase.  For example, his comment on how weight loss is one of the red-herring incentives to run:

" Weight loss is right up there with a full head of hair and a lottery fortune as the object most frequently sold for cash and most infrequently taken home."

All the chapters are filtered through the lens of Ben Cheever, and you can hear his voice throughout.  His self-deprecation and willingness to share unflattering private thoughts drew me into the stories and had me laughing out loud.  Another example, in which he is traveling to Greece to meet a running group led by Jeff Galloway and is concerned over pickpockets:

"So now I was on the plane and in my "Anything Goes" blazer and in my TravelSmith turtleneck and in my Travel Smith jeans, which had elastic in the fabric, a hidden inner zippered compartment in the right rear pocket.  You could have murdered me , and it would still have taken an hour to find my money. 
I liked the jacket, and it really does not wrinkle, but I found that I needed to travel with at least three pairs of eyeglasses, because I kept forgetting which secret pockets concealed them."

The most entertaining marathon account was of the Modoc Marathon, which is held in the vineyards of France, and features glasses of wine at the rest stops.  The pre-race dinner is hilarious, as Ben is held hostage by his driver and forced to stay up late, drinking red wine and smoking cigarettes.  Now that sounds like my kind of marathon.