This is a great book that will be appreciated by all sports fans. The author is an expert on Scottish athletics, and devotes much of the book to Liddell’s rapid progress to becoming an internationally successful athlete and record holder, as well as a star of Scotland’s Rugby Union team.
However, there is also significant Christian content in the book. All his contemporaries found him not only to be a great sportsman but also a person of exemplary character and conduct. The author (who is also the minister of a church in Scotland) shows us something of the depth of Liddell’s faith in Christ. This he does in a way that will encourage believers, and will prompt many non-Christians to ask questions.
Drawing on numerous source documents - both sporting and Christian - John Keddie skilfully blends them all together to produce a very readable, fast-moving account of a truly remarkable life.
Shortly after his success at the Olympics, Liddell left the sporting arena to become a missionary in China, and died there aged just 43 in an internment camp in 1945. It is therefore strangely fitting that a new biography of this great Olympian should be available in 2008 - the year the Olympics are being held in China.