Written in a different style in that most of the book were comments by family and friends about different aspects of Walter Payton's life. Most of these comments appeared to be unedited and thus relayed in a conversational style that seemed more real. The book gave me a better appreciation for organ donation. Also, what seems to be true of great people, is hard work.

A nice autobiography of Sweetness, one of my childhood heroes. Walter Payton is certainly worthy of admiration for his tenacity and his worldview, among a great many other attributes. Written unlike your average autobiography, this weaves stories and quotes from Walter and his family, friends and teammates to create the story of his life and death.

this book accurately projects the struggle Walter Payton went through to become a all-star. the book talks from the views of him, his family, and his friends. if you like football you will be able to connect to this book very well.

Makes me appreciate WP even more than I did-and his insight on sports today is interesting. I bawled my eyes out at the end, he was just a fantastic athlete & there are not many like him anymore. An inspirational read!

tNever Die Easy is a great book that tells the different stories of the great Walter Payton. This book is written by Walter’s friends, family, coaches, teammates, and people that were close to one of the greatest football players ever. One story tells about how walter was never looking for the sidelines and how he would rather run over a linebacker, than take the open sideline. Another story tells about how Walter had to run nearly three miles to and from practice every day and how he never touched a weight until his senior year in high school. Some of the interesting sections of this book are written by walters teammates and coaches. They said Walter was always entertaining the team with his childhood stories and his great personality. The parts written by Walter were unbelievable. He talks about how his talent was a gift and not working his hardest would be wasting a gift from god.
tThis is a very good book and I would strongly recommend it to anyone who likes football (especially Walter Payton fans). This book was very inspirational and taugh me a lot. This is a book that can be read several times and I can see myself reading it again in the future. (209)

I preferred the 2011 biography, a fuller picture of his life, good and bad

1. Never Die Easy: The Autobiography of Walter Payton
2. Walter Payton and Dan Yaeger
3. Autobiography
4. Never Die Easy is the Autobiography of Walter Payton's life. It talks about Walter growing up in the poor town of Columbia, Mississippi, where he started playing football to gain girls attention. When Walter graduated from high school he took his talents to a tiny all black college, called Jackson State. Walter quickly became one of the best football players in the country, and in 1975 the Bears drafted him with the 4th overall pick in the NFL draft. Walter went on to not only be one of the greatest football players of all time, but one of the greatest human beings of all time until he lost his battle with a rare liver disease called primary sclerosing cholangitis in 1999.
5. a. The first theme in this book is the title, Never Die Easy. It means to go 100% in everything you do, and don't quit something without trying. I think this is a very important theme because it is really important to give your best in everything you do.
b. The second theme is the fact that it is better to give then receive. This theme really stood out to me because Walter Payton was such a big time athlete, but he still made sure he could impact his fans life in someway. Walter wouldn't leave until he signed every fans thing they wanted autographed, or until he at least had a conversation with them. I thought this was really cool because Walter did not form a huge ego. He did everything he could to make a positive impact on someones life, and if more people in the world had as big of a heart as Walter Payton the world would be such a better place.
6. a. "Never die easy. Why run out of bounds and die easy? Make that linebacker pay. It carries into all facets of your life. It's okay to lose, to die, but don't die without trying, without giving it your best." (pg. 54).
b. " I remember people wanting his autograph after practice, crowds of people. Most of the time he'd stay out there and sign every autograph request. He didn't care how long it would take. The coaches would have just finished running us to death, and he would stay out there and sign autographs, joke around, play around with the fans. He was that kind of guy." (pg. 88 said by Mike Singletary)
7.The first quote I used taught me to always give it my all. No matter what I am doing i should always give my best effort. I think this is really important because to go far in life you need to work really hard. The second quote taught me that no matter how big you get to not forget where you came from. Even though Walter Payton was a huge superstar he would still try to impact the life of his fans, and i think that is really cool.
8. The population that would enjoy this book the most is males who enjoy football because this book is the story of a football players life.

Walter Payton was a good man and the best football player to ever live. This book was repetitive at times and kind of a struggle to get through.

very interesting, i think that the story behind his life was very different then people think and I beleive that is what made it so interesting. I also think that he wrote the book made it so much better because you got to hear about him helping children in need and him telling about his family. The best part of the book is when he got sick because that is when he realized what a great person he had been and he was talking to family telling them about things they had never heard about. Then they knew how devoted he was to helping children, poor families, and just people in general.

Very good, many great lines and a view of growing up as a black man in the South. Truth and dedication to a cause.

Somewhat disappointing. Spent too much time talking about his death when he had such an amazing life to talk about. Wanted to hear more about that.

I do not usually give five stars for a review but this book deserves it. I did not know a lot about Walter Payton except for his time on the Bears but this book walks through his life from different people in his life. Walter Payton is a tremendous human being and this book illustrates that to a T! Great read!