I'm a writer based in New York City.
My first book is Changeover: A Young Rivalry and a New Era of Men's Tennis, which documents the rise of Carlos Alcaraz and Jannik Sinner. It's out August 19, 2025. It was very fun to write about two superstars in their embryotic phase. Below are some nice things that have been said about the book.
I'm a staff writer/cofounder at Defector, and a senior correpondent at tennis outlet The Second Serve. I've also written for places like New York Magazine, The New York Times Book Review, The Believer, and National Geographic. My writing is included in the 2025 editions of The Year's Best Sports Writing and The Best American Food & Travel Writing.
Some recent pieces explore: a plant with a hideous odor; a Thai restaurant that inflicted pain; grief and Rafael Nadal; moving homes.
I am represented by Jim Rutman at Sterling Lord Literistic.
Email: giri at defector dot com
Some early thoughts on my book, which can be ordered here:
What strikes and delights me about Changeover, and what I believe will strike and delight you, is not just the nuances of the game, and rivalry, and relationships. But the tenderness with which Giri Nathan speaks on the page. This is a book by someone who loves a sport enough to not want to be some lone authority, dictating dry knowledge. It is warm, inviting, curious, and also rigorous and abundantly caring.
— HANIF ABDURRAQIB, author of There's Always This Year: On Basketball & Ascension
For my money, Giri Nathan is the best tennis writer in America. At a moment when too many of us are busy looking back at the era that's ending, he's written a book that looks forward, with optimism and insight, to the era that lies ahead. Changeover is an absolute joy.
— BRIAN PHILLIPS, author of Impossible Owls, staff writer at The Ringer
Giri Nathan has written a tour de force, a book that is as dazzling as any Sinner-Alcaraz match. It is stylish, smart, funny, and humane, and a book I'll return to, again and again.
— LOUISA THOMAS, author of Mind and Matter, staff writer at The New Yorker
Giri Nathan is our best young tennis writer: Avid, shrewd, droll, culturally attuned, searching. Changeover is Nathan in full flight, feverishly absorbed in the budding rivalry of Alcaraz and Sinner and the dawning of a new era in the men's game — a rousing storyteller on the most captivating story just now in tennis.
— GERALD MARZORATI, author of Late to the Ball
Giri Nathan brings to the page a rare gift of his own — some writerly blend of Alcaraz's creativity and Sinner's precision. Changeover is a triumph.
— BEN TAUB, staff writer at The New Yorker
Deftly weaving between awestruck wonderment and playful irreverence, Giri Nathan breathes fresh life into tennis prose — just as Sinner and Alcaraz have done on court, and with just as many jaw-dropping highlights.
— BEN ROTHENBERG, author of Naomi Osaka, writer at Bounces
A scintillating account ... Nathan compellingly chronicles how Alcaraz and Sinner began to flourish as the previous era of tennis’s "Big Three" (Novak Djokovic, Roger Federer, and Rafael Nadal) receded ... Throughout, Nathan provides exceptional commentary on how the pair operates as foils in both style of play and temperament. This gripping chronicle of a new frontier in the game aces it.
— PUBLISHERS WEEKLY (starred review)
Tennis players, fans of the sport, and anyone who enjoyed Netflix’s Break Point will love this lovingly written, humorous, and well-researched exploration of the end of an era in tennis ... Nathan’s prose has the same energy as the players profiled in this debut ... a valuable primer for readers about the future of men’s tennis.
— LIBRARY JOURNAL (starred review)