Morning Edition interviews writer and journalist David Giffels about his new book, The Hard Way on Purpose: Essays and Dispatches from the Rust Belt. Giffels writes about his choice to remain in Akron, Ohio when everyone around him seemed to be leaving, including LeBron James. From the NPR interview:

LeBron James and I are, I think, the only two people in the entire world who went straight from St. Vincent-St. Mary High School in Akron, Ohio, to the Cleveland Cavaliers… He was the first pick in the draft lottery, and I was an entry-level ball boy… I think there’s a lot of understanding nationally about how he left in that really, sort of devastating and disappointing kind of way. But I think only here can we really understand what he represented.

Maybe the midwest really is the future of American literature.