MEAN BUSINESS: THE CREATION OF SHAWN O'SULLIVAN. Brunt, Stephen. Markham (Ont.), Viking Canada, 1987. 256pp. cloth, $22.95, ISBN 0-670-81679-5. Distributed by Penguin Books Canada. CIP Grades 11 and up Reviewed by Michael Freeman Volume 16 Number 4 1988 July Biographies of young athletes still in mid-career always leave the reader with a vaguely unsatisfied feeling somewhat akin to getting up from the table before the final course has been served. This unauthorized biography of Canada's most recent "white hope" is no exception. The story begins and ends with O'Sullivan's unexpected, devastating loss in his first major professional fight. To fill the two hundred pages in between, Brunt moves, somewhat jerkily, from lengthy episodes detailing O'Sullivan's amateur career to the corrupt but lucrative world of modern professional boxing, and finally on to the depressing history of Canadian professional boxers from Tommy Burns to Willie de Wit. Although the author's accounts are undoubtedly well researched, the adolescent reader, sports fan or not, will soon tire of this rather dreary story with no happy ending. Michael Freeman, Bathurst Heights S.S., North York, Ont.