Books like The Abysmal Brute

Of course I knew Jack London wrote about the North.And I also knew he had written about the South Seas, and at least one hilarious play, a journal of his own ocean voyage with his wife, a science fiction novella, and many social commentaries disguised as entertaining stories. But when I was looking for a London piece to add to my Spinner's Wheel reading list and saw this title, I was surprised to see that the subject was the sport of boxing.Boxing?! Jack London wrote about boxing?! And here I thought I knew all about this author!A manager receives a letter from an old-time boxer, asking him to come see the young son who the old-timer had trained and knew for certain could knockout anyone at any time. Old Pat Glendon had raised his boy in the wild woods, kept him innocent of nearly everything, but also trained him in his own sport, perhaps hoping to change the hard-luck legacy of his own career.Old Pat and the manager make a deal, signed a contract, and Young Pat gets taken to San Francisco; with the manager's assurances to Old Pat that the youngster will be completely protected and insulated from the dirty, corrupted underbelly of the sport. Would that be possible in a sport as crooked as boxing was at the time? (On a side note, I wonder how much of what is told about here still goes on today?)Meanwhile, how will Young Pat deal with his new life's work? Will he ever realize what is going on around him? Or will he remain the almost ridiculously naive country bumpkin who never speaks to reporters, is too shy to talk to women, and at first glance seems to be nothing more than an overgrown country boy with nothing but cotton wool between his ears? Did the nickname the reporters tacked onto him describe him accurately? Was he "The Abysmal Brute", or was he actually much much more?This 1913 story started swinging in the first chapter and ended with a knockout punch that was slightly unbelievable and yet fit the plot and the character completely. Great stuff, and I think I will go explore London's author pages at Gutenberg and make a list of the other titles where he writes about topics that I don't usually associate with him. I can see now that I still have a lot to learn about one of my favorite authors!