Tim Tebow: Football success equals book sales
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Tim Tebow, who led the Denver Broncos to a six-game winning streak that baffled experts, has seen his success on the field migrate to shelves. Tebow, who is 24, published the memoir ‘Through My Eyes,’ this spring; like his wins, its late-in-the-game success has come as a surprise.
His memoir, ‘Through My Eyes: A Quarterback’s Journey,’ debuted on May 31 and stayed on the best-seller list for 13 weeks. But it returned to the nonfiction hardcover best-seller list three weeks ago and recently snapped to No. 8. The book had its highest sales last week. ‘We have to go back to reprint practically every day,’ HarperCollins Senior Vice President Lisa Sharkey said. ‘We didn’t anticipate this kind of a season.’
That season took a turn Sunday when the Patriots defeated the Denver Broncos, 41-23, ending Tebow’s winning streak. But will that take the wind out of his book sales?
If the book itself is any indication, maybe not. It begins with the inspirational dedication ‘To all those who have been told that they couldn’t achieve their dreams’ and soon turns to matters of achievement, striving and faith. After opening with a scene where the much-heralded college player Tebow fails to be awarded the Heisman Trophy, it harks back to his beginnings.
‘My dad was preaching in a remote village in the Philippines in 1986,’ Tebow writes. ‘As ‘The Jesus Film’ played on a large, homemade screen hanging between two coconut trees, he became heavily burdened by the millions of babies being aborted in America. While weeping over the gigantic loss of human life, my dad began to pray, ‘Father, if you want another preacher in this world, you give him to me. You give me Timmy, and I will raise him to be a preacher.’’
And in 1987, Timmy Tebow, future football star, was born. Nathan Whitaker, who co-wrote the book with Tebow, describes the Denver Broncos quarterback as ‘just one of the guys.’
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-- Carolyn Kellogg
