This is Jessi Wakefield with the Sioux City Public Library and you are listening to Check It Out. May is an exciting time with its warm weather, end of school, looking forward to long summer nights sort of feel. But, if you were like over 6 million other people in America, May also means the excitement that revolves around the running of the Indy 500. There have been many books written about racing and even the 500, but today I would like to single one out and recommend the nonfiction book Black Noon: The Year They Stopped the Indy 500 by Art Garner. Considered by many in the industry as one of the best books ever written about racing, this book is a page turner for both enthusiasts of the sport, as well as anyone interested in a fast paced, accurate account of a corner of history of which they may be unaware. It is the telling of the tragic events of May 30, 1964 where seven cars crashed in a fiery accident, killing two drivers, and threatening the very future of the 500. This accident caused the Indy 500 to stop for the first time in its already long history. This book does an excellent job of looking at the Indianapolis 500 through the eyes of all those who participated in it. Art Garner takes you inside what it was like to be a driver during that era in stunning detail since he interviewed the surviving drivers including racing legends like A.J. Foyt and Bobby Unser. Garner also chronicles what it is like to be a car owner, a spouse of a driver, a family member, and a fan of auto racing in 1964. So many things are going on simultaneously that he builds the tension so well that you as a reader have no choice but to keep turning the pages to find out what’s going to happen next. I used to live in Indy, in fact, I lived in Speedway and was so close to the track that in May all I had to do was open my back door and I could hear the engines of the cars as they zoomed around the oval. Visit the Sioux City Public Library for Black Noon by Art Garner, as well as many of our other motorsports books to get you geared up for the weekend’s big race.
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