Quick Take
- Narration: Hillary Huber delivers a biography-appropriate performance, clear, engaged, and respectful of the material without being reverential to the point of distance.
- Themes: Women in sport, athletic dominance across multiple disciplines, public illness and dignity
- Mood: Energetic and admiring in the early sections, moving and quietly devastating toward the end
- Verdict: A richly researched biography of one of the most extraordinary athletes of the twentieth century, whose story deserves far more recognition than it currently receives.
I was maybe forty minutes into Wonder Girl when I stopped my morning walk to look something up. Don Van Natta Jr. had just described Babe Didrikson’s performance at the 1932 Los Angeles Olympics, where she won gold in the 80-meter hurdles and the javelin and silver in the high jump, and would have won that too if officials had not retroactively ruled her jumping style illegal. I knew Babe was famous in a vague historical sense, but I had not understood the scale of what she actually accomplished. I kept the audiobook going and went home for more of it.
The subtitle of the biography is about a Texas girl who never tried a sport too tough. What Van Natta gives you is something larger: a sustained argument that Babe Didrikson Zaharias was probably the greatest multi-sport athlete of the twentieth century, and that her relative obscurity today says something specific about how sports history has treated women.
Our Take on Wonder Girl
The research is genuinely impressive. Van Natta does not write a hagiography, he contextualizes Babe’s career within the systems that both enabled and constrained her, including the Amateur Athletic Union regulations that stripped her of amateur status after she appeared in advertisements, and the golf establishment’s complicated relationship with a woman who dominated a sport it considered male territory. One reviewer noted that the book also functions as a history of how amateur and professional athletes were treated by sports governing bodies in the first half of the twentieth century, which is accurate. Babe’s individual story illuminates a structural history.
The early sections, covering her childhood in Beaumont, Texas, and her emergence as a multi-sport prodigy in basketball, track, and field, have the propulsive quality of someone whose talent seems almost implausible. Multiple reviewers noted that one feat after another accumulates to a point where you genuinely struggle to believe the record is accurate.
Why Listen to the Final Chapter of Her Life
Van Natta’s treatment of Babe’s cancer diagnosis and public battle is where the biography earns its full weight. She went public with her illness at a time when cancer was often treated as something shameful or private, and she used her remaining years, including a return to competitive golf that produced victories, as an explicit act of encouragement for others facing the disease. One reviewer described being brought to tears even knowing how the story ends, which is the mark of a biography that makes you feel the particulars of a life rather than simply recording its milestones.
The Babe Ruth comparison that one reviewer made is not casual. By any objective measure of cross-sport achievement at the highest level, Babe Didrikson Zaharias belongs in that conversation, and the book makes that case without hyperbole.
What to Watch For in the Narrative Structure
One reviewer found the chronological movement occasionally confusing, the book at times feels like it is reading from the present looking back while at other moments places you directly in the era. Van Natta also includes photographs in the print edition, which obviously do not translate to audio. Listeners who would benefit from visual context for Babe’s physical presence and the historical period she inhabited may want to supplement with the print or ebook version.
Hillary Huber’s narration holds the biographical sweep together well across the book’s nearly twelve-hour runtime. She does not sentimentalize, which is the right choice, the material is powerful enough without added emotional signaling.
Who Should Listen to Wonder Girl
Sports biography listeners, readers interested in women’s history, and anyone who wants a well-researched account of an American life that genuinely earned the word extraordinary will find this rewarding. Those who came up knowing Tiger Woods as the benchmark for athletic dominance will have that benchmark usefully challenged. The final sections require emotional readiness, this is a story that ends in illness and death even as it refuses to become merely sad. Van Natta gives Babe Didrikson Zaharias the full treatment her story deserves.
Frequently Asked Questions
Do I need any prior knowledge of Babe Didrikson to enjoy this biography?
None at all. Van Natta builds her story from her Beaumont, Texas childhood and provides full context for every athletic and personal chapter of her life. Many reviewers came in knowing very little about her and found that made the revelations more striking.
How does the audiobook handle the emotional weight of Babe’s cancer battle and death?
Van Natta and narrator Hillary Huber treat the final chapter with restraint rather than sentimentality, which reviewers found more powerful than a more emotionally overt approach. Multiple listeners were moved to tears despite knowing the ending, which speaks to the quality of the biographical writing.
Is this biography only about golf, or does it cover Babe’s earlier athletic career equally?
The book gives substantial coverage to Babe’s basketball career and her 1932 Olympic track and field dominance before turning to golf. One reviewer described it as a complete portrait of someone who was all-American in basketball, an Olympic champion, and then a golf legend, the full picture, not just one phase.
Are the print edition photos available in any way for audiobook listeners?
The photographs included in the print edition do not transfer to audio format. Listeners who want visual context for Babe’s era or physical presence may want to keep a print or ebook copy accessible alongside the audio.
