Tom Coughlin has a bone to pick with Leo Durocher.  

Coughlin, the head coach of the New York Giants, should have been wildly successful in New York if Durocher’s famous “Nice Guys Finish Last” philosophy had any merit.  But Coughlin had the worst of both worlds: he was perceived by most as a grumpy old stickler for discipline and military-like order,  AND his team was quickly turning into perennial underachievers - a brutal combo in this town, where impatient fans like to chew up and spit out head coaches when they don’t bring home Vince Lombardi Trophies every now and then.   Incurring the wrath of the fans is one thing, but Coughlin wasn’t winning any popularity contests with his players either.  Many of them viewed their head coach as a humorless drill sargeant who imposed gratuitously strict team rules punishable with stiff fines.  

Give Tom credit.  He acknowledged that if he maintained the status quo his days in New York would be numbered.  Just about everyone in the organization urged him to soften his ways, from the Mara’s and Tisch’s (franchise owners) on down.  The implication was pretty obvious: you change as a head coach, or we’ll change head coaches.  No more twisted grimaces from the sidelines or screaming at players coming off the field fresh from a blunder.  No more hostile combative exchanges with the media, who didn’t have to work very hard at getting under Tom’s skin to the point where he would show it.

So Coughlin embarked on a quest more challenging than a 3rd and 25 deep in your own end: he decided to change his personality.  Part of that process involved a session with yours truly.  In May of 2007 I huddled with Coughlin deep within Giants Stadium in a room where players study game films.  The man I worked with that day was a class act, a real gentleman, who through his own fault was coming across as anything but.  Coughlin’s biggest character flaw was that he didn’t suffer fools gladly, so if you acted like a jerk or buffoon he wasn’t shy about letting you know it.  When that dynamic exists with a member of the media it usually makes for unfavorable press. 

Granted, Coughlin’s media coaching session with me was just one piece of the puzzle, but by training camp in July article’s started springing up in the papers about Coughlin’s softer side.  Gone was his adversarial tone with reporters and they rewarded him with some genuinely positive pieces.  The rest, as they say, is history.  Coughlin led his team to a magical championship season against steep odds.  He has now written a book about how a positive mindset and key adjustments in one’s management style can create more effective leadership.  I’m not sure if I’m mentioned in the book - it doesn’t really matter.  My advice to him was so basic it’s almost embarrassing: the media sometimes can act like a swarm of flies, so stock up on the honey and chuck the vinegar.

This is the time of year when everyone is in search of the perfect book to take along to the beach or read in a slow-swinging hammock.   Typically August is a month for trashy, quick-read novels, or at the very least, nothing too cerebral.

But when you media train authors for a living, your reading list is pretty much dictated by your clients.  That’s not always a good thing.  We’ve certainly had our share of books that weren’t released - but escaped.  But this summer we are on one heck of a hot streak with the authors we’ve coached.  Never in our seven years can I remember an all-star line up of authors and books like this.  It’s been an absolute pleasure to read their fine work and get them ready for their grueling media book tours.

First, Jane Mayer’s exhaustively researched The Dark Side.  Jane, an author and writer for The New Yorker, examines how the Bush Administration’s war on terror turned into a war on American ideals.  We were thrilled to see that she was the front page focus of this week’s New York Times Book Review - attention that is incredibly well deserved.

Also doing extremely well on the Amazon rankings is Christopher Ciccone’s Life with My Sister Madonna.  To meet this man is to understand that he is incapable of producing a hatchet job on his sister.  It is an intimately revealing book about how an extroverted girl from Michigan became the most well known female pop icon of the past half century.  If the goal of celebrity coverage is exclusive access, Christopher has everyone beat.  He was there for virtually all of it.  This may be the most deliciously naughty beach read of the summer.

On the other end of the literary spectrum is Mary Ellen Geist’s touching and poignant memoir Measure of the Heart.  In beautifully written prose, Mary Ellen tells the life-changing and life-affirming story of leaving the fast-paced, high-powered world of broadcast journalism to go home and care for her father suffering from Alzheimer’s.  With a delicate balance of humor and unspeakable sadness, Mary Ellen gives voice to the heart-wrenching challenges hundreds of thousands of baby boomers now face in caring for an ailing or aging parent.

But of all of our authors, Curtis Sittenfeld and her novel American Wife has easily received the greatest amount of pre-pub date publicity. Of course when you write fiction that is admittedly based on First Lady Laura Bush and includes descriptive sex scenes, you’re likely to get a little attention.  But of all the books to come out this year, this one might easily be the most misunderstood.  The anecdotal buzz swirling is that it’s disrespectful and negative about Mrs. Bush.  Only those who have not read the book would be inclined to say that.  In truth, it’s a fairly flattering portrayal created by a self-professed Laura Bush fan.  It is a great read, and no, it does not threaten to undermine the leader of the free world or his marriage.

Now if only this parade of great books could continue into the fall.  But we all know it’s just a matter of time before some publishing house asks us to gear for working with the author of The La Jolla Makeover Handbook.