Ringside Books

FROM BOY TO MAN, ONE PUNCH AT A TIME

For the lucky ones, the road to a responsible life
passes through the neighborhood gym.

Author Peter Wood knows. From anger, self-loathing
and insecurity can come miraculous transformations. Troubled, frustrated boys
lace on gloves and vent their rage in grueling workouts. Sculpted into warriors,
they fight for a champion’s glory...as men.

Peter’s coming-of-age
autobiography, Confessions of a Fighter Battling
Through the New York Golden Gloves

relates how, as a tormented teenager, his protective shell cracked, forcing him to face someone he’d been avoiding for years: himself.

Confessions reaches for an audience far beyond fight fans. Written in realistic, tough-as-nails prose,
it explores the painful issues of being an abused stepchild; the anxiety,
introspection and self-doubts of all teenagers; and the lessons only one-on-one
challenges can teach.

“This book explains the psychological makeup of a
boxer,” he says. “Why does a fighter fight? Is he scared? How does he deal with
that fear? Why is he different from all other athletes and, most of the time,
from all other people?”

A former Golden Gloves title contender, Peter also dispels some myths of the
“sweet science.”

“The real goal in boxing is not to injure your
opponent,” he writes. “The real goal is to reach for, and tap into, your higher
self: your courage, willpower, tenacity, skill and intelligence.”

Peter also notes that his book is based on his actual experiences while training and
competing in the Golden Gloves. It differs from other novels for young adults,
such as The Contender by Robert Lipsyth.

RAVE REVIEWS FOR
CONFESSIONS OF A FIGHTER

Without doubt the finest exposition (and explanation) of boxing this reviewer has ever read…This is a 201-page cry of
pain from a young man’s soul.” -Gene Smith

Topeka (KS)Capital Journal’s Midway Sunday Magazin

“Wood lets the reader know what it feels like to
walk into a gym alone for the first time, what it is like to gasp for breath, to
be powerless in your own home, confused in school and wanting to be anywhere
else but a boxing ring…He has surprising strengths as a narrator—his minor
characters are unique and believable, and the dialogue is sharp and revealing…an
honest voice…”

—Chris Mead,
The Washington Post

“A powerful autobiography about a confused young
man who finds himself in the boxing ring…written in a tough-as-nails, realistic
prose style by Wood, who is a former Golden Gloves finalist. There are classic
descriptions of fights, boxing characters and the gymnasium where Wood
trains…this is a compelling first effort…”

—Kirkus Reviews

“Confessions of a Fighter’sstrength lies in its ability to explain the psychological makeup of a
fighter. Why does a fighter fight? Is he scared? How does he deal with that
fear? How does he control the rage that burns within him? Why is he different
from all other athletes and, most of the time, from other people? Those who read

Confessions of a Fighter will come away with an
understanding of not the beauty of boxing, but the beauty of boxers.”

—Steve Farhood,
KO Magazine

Peter Wood was a New York Golden Gloves middleweight finalist in 1971. He later was asked to represent the U.S. in international competition in Montreal, and was America’s 1^st alternate in the Maccabiah Games (the Jewish Olympics) in Tel Aviv. His other works include the memoir A Clenched Fist: The Making of a Golden Gloves Champion; the plays Candy Bars and Our Similarities Are Different; and columns in The New York Times, Commonweal, The Ring and Boxing Illustrated. He teaches >English in suburban New York, where he resides with his wife and daughter.

Confessions of a Fighter—Battling Through the New York Golden Gloves by Peter
Wood; ISBN 0-9789683-1-X; $19.95; soft cover; 5½ x 8½;
224 pages; RINGSIDE BOOKS)