Damn Yankees

The New York Yankees have come to symbolize "everything good and strong and true about baseball and America and the human race in general. Either that, or avarice and unrepentant evil," writes Rob Fleder (former Executive Editor of Sports Illustrated) in the introduction to Damn Yankees: Twenty-Four Major League Writers on the World's Most Loved (and Hated) Team. In this collection of diverse, original essays, an all-star lineup of writers from the fields of sports (Tom Verducci, Sally Jenkins from Sports Illustrated), literature (Nathaniel Rich, novelist) and  finance (James Surowiecki, The New Yorker) share their own unique feelings and experiences about this quintessential sports dynasty.

The array of pieces resonate with immortals, legacies and personal stories. Some are crafted with lyricism and sensitivity and a select few showcase conflicted feelings by blending a mixture of back-handed compliments with tongue-in-cheek and a bone-to-pick tone. Passion and insight fuel each essay and shed light into the historical Yankees from the Babe, Mantle and DiMaggio to Derek Jeter; the price of wearing the pinstripes and winning at all costs; rivalries and the grueling duels between teams, players and fans; and the foibles and scandals that have rocked the team. Other essays explore the more human side of the game including a visit with Catfish Hunter in his final days; the story of Jim Abbott (Rick Telander, Chicago Sun-Times), a one-handed pitcher whose rise to fame was snuffed out by the 1994 Baseball Strike; and how rooting for or against the Yankees can transcend generations (J.R. Moehringer, memoirist) and continents (Colum McCann, novelist).

The essays, as a whole, render a multi-faceted portrait of the New York Yankees and why the team evokes such strong, often polarized, feelings. The book is capped by a section that offers facts, figures and statistics which support the many reasons why the Yanks--whether revered or loathed--are considered an American institution and a symbol of greatness.

Damn Yankees: Twenty-Four Major League Writers on the World's Most Loved (and Hated) Team edited by Rob Fleder

Ecco Press (A Division of Harper Collins Publishers), $27.99, Hardcover, 9780062059628, 304 pp

Publication Date: April 3, 2012

To order this book via INDIEBOUND link HERE

Please note: This review is a reprint and is being posted (in a slightly different form) with the permission of Shelf Awareness. To read this review on Shelf Awareness: Reader's Edition (4/13/12), click HERE.

Where'd You Go, Bernadette

If she aces her report card, precocious Bee Branch, the 15-year-old narrator of Maria Semple's Where'd You Go, Bernadette, is promised a trip by her over-the-top, over-achieving parents. But when Bee--an only child, born with heart problems--makes perfect grades and picks Antarctica as the family destination, all hell breaks loose.

Bee's mother, Bernadette Fox, a once-renowned architect, has been in an anxious, emotional funk for years that has forced her to outsource the minutiae of her life (at a rate of 75 cents per hour) to a woman in India. It doesn't help matters that Bee's father, Elgin Branch, a workaholic bigwig at Microsoft, uprooted the family from Los Angeles to Seattle, a city Bernadette feels has "zero architectural integrity," is filled with "the slowest drivers you ever saw" and has become overrun with tourists and overly compassionate do-gooders. Add a meddling, Seattle-born secretary at Microsoft and a neighbor obsessed with destroying Bernadette because she views her as rude and antisocial, and what emerges is an acerbic, dark, satirical comedy. The day before the family's departure, Bernadette, who is dreading the South Pole vacation, disappears. Amid the search, surprising discoveries are made and bombshells are dropped. 

Semple (This One Is Mine) was once a writer for the TV programs, Arrested Development and Mad About You.  She stitches together this funny, inventive story via e-mails, letters, FBI reports, magazine articles and interspersed narrative passages told in Bee's voice. This fresh, original dramatic structure brings levity to harrowing and complex domestic issues.

Where'd You Go, Bernadette: A Novel by Maria Semple

Little, Brown and Company, $25.99, Hardcover, 9780316204279, 352 pp

Publication Date: August 14, 2012

To order this book via INDIEBOUND link HERE

Please note: This review is a reprint and is being posted (in a slightly different form) with the permission of Shelf Awareness. To read this review on Shelf Awareness: Reader's Edition (8/17/12), click HERE.

A Fistful of Collars

"Find what's original about you and put it into words..." That writing advice is from Spencer Quinn (aka Peter Abrahams), author of the clever and winning Chet and Bernie mystery series. 

When once asked how his first book in the series, Dog On It, came about, Quinn offered, "My wife said, 'How about doing something with dogs?' The basic building blocks came to me right there at the kitchen table: two detective pals; narration by the four-legged one; and all in the first person, which I'd never tried before in a novel. Plus the most important thing - Chet would not be a talking dog (or be undoggy in any way) but would be a narrating dog. Anything that thinks and has memory must have a narrative going on inside. I went to the office--over the garage, commuting distance fifteen feet--and wrote the first page. Then I wanted to know what happened next."

Thus emerged the creation of Chet, a dog who flunked out of K-9 School, and Bernie, his human private eye companion--a wounded war vet and ex-cop, who wears flashy Hawaiian shirts and is clueless about woman and money-matters--who join forces to find missing persons, bad guys and solve crimes.

In A Fistful of Collars, the fifth installment in the series, Chet and Bernie are paid to "babysit" Thad Perry, an often volatile, Hollywood heartthrob who is in the "Valley," an unnamed state in the Western U.S., to film a blockbuster movie. The town swirls with excitement, even anticipating an economic boom.  But after a few days on the job, both Chet and Bernie sense there is more to their detail than meets the eye. After a little sniffing around and digging, they discover that Thad might be keeping dark secrets about his past and his connection to the Valley. Was he involved in some sort of crime?  Was there a cover-up? Why does it appear as though the mayor's office is involved? The more Chet and Bernie learn, the more the suspense escalates until they find themselves in danger. 

Quinn has written another entertaining read with surprising plot twists. As in the other adventures of Chet and Bernie, what makes these novels even more endearing is how Quinn fortifies the mystery, weaving it with engaging, often very funny, subplots. In A Fistful of Collars, they include stories about Bernie's rocky romantic relationships and how his six-year old son longs to be a movie star. Adding to the appeal is the lovable, perceptive narrative voice of Chet - his loathing of Thad Perry's cat, Brando, his fondness for food and the great affection and loyalty that bonds him with his owner/companion.

Spencer Quinn discusses how he showed signs of a burgeoning author even in childhood

A Fistful of Collars by Spencer Quinn

Atria Books, $25, Hardcover, 9781451665161, 320 pp

Publication Date: September 11, 2012

To order this book via INDIEBOUND link HERE

Summer Family Sagas

The summer months may turn up the heat, but nowhere as profoundly as within extended families that come together to share vacation time. No matter the idyllic setting or good intentions, when loved ones gather, fireworks often ensue--making for some great drama on the page.

In The Red House by Mark Haddon, estranged British siblings Richard and Angela reunite at their mother's funeral. Afterward, Richard, a wealthy physician with a new wife and a wretched teenage daughter, invites Angela, her feckless husband and their three teenage children to his big country home in Hay-on-Wye on the Welsh border. As the polyphonic narrative unfolds, the reader comes to realize that these eight people--with vastly different personalities, operating systems and agendas--have brought a lot more baggage with them than meets the eye.

Fourth of July weekend in the Berkshire Mountains of Massachusetts is the backdrop for The World Without You by Joshua Henkin. Shared grief and mourning unite the Frankels--a large, mostly nonobservant Jewish-American family--as they gather for a weekend at their parents' vacation home to unveil the gravestone for their brother Leo, a journalist and adventurer killed in Iraq a year earlier. But once everyone is settled beneath the same roof, the memorial becomes shrouded by sibling rivalries and marital feuds in this story of love, loss and the true meaning of family in the aftermath of tragedy.

Catholic guilt, alcoholism and bad choices are the undercurrents that propel J. Courtney Sullivan's Maine. The story is told via the distinct viewpoints of three generations of women from the Irish-American Kelleher clan who assemble, with their respective families and significant others, for their annual summer retreat at a cottage set on three acres of Maine beachfront property. Over the course of a month, family secrets are gradually unveiled that probe the relationships between the women, blurring the line between love and anger. 

Note: This article is a reprint and is being posted with the permission of Shelf Awareness. To read this piece as published on Shelf Awareness for Readers (8/3/12), link HERE

Happy 100th Birthday, Julia Child!

Julia Child was 49 years old when she co-published her first book, the revolutionary Mastering the Art of French Cooking. The 734-page cookbook simplified haute cuisine, making it accessible for the American home kitchen. The book became a bestseller and transformed Julia Child into a culinary and cultural icon.

Over the next four decades, as the French Chef, Child became a much-beloved television personality and she authored and co-authored stockpiles of books. She lived to the ripe old age of 92, defying the perils of indulging in butter, sugar and cream.

Blogger Julie Powell sought inspiration for her life by channeling Julia Child in her own home kitchen in Julie & Julia. The book documents Powell's year-long quest to cook all 524 recipes found in Mastering the Art of French Cooking.

August 15, 2012 marks the centennial of Julia Child's birth, and a host of titles continue to explore Julia's life and reinvigorate her indelible legacy:

Nancy Verde Barr, an executive chef who worked as Julia's Child personal assistant for 18 years, penned Backstage with Julia: My Years with Julia Child, a rare behind-the-scenes glimpse of America's most revered chef.

Before she died, Child gave her blessing to author Bob Spitz to write Dearie: The Remarkable Life of Julia Child, a comprehensive bio that delves into the years when the independent, rebellious late bloomer finally discovered her true calling in life.

The union of Paul and Julia Child is the cornerstone of Child's posthumously published memoir, My Life in France, and of A Covert Affair: Julia Child and Paul Child in the OSS by Jennet Conant, which details the couple's turbulent years as members of the Office of Strategic Services during World War II and how they became caught up in the McCarthy spy hunt of the 1950s.

Julia's Cats: Julia Child's Life in the Company of Cats by Patricia Barey and Therese Burson gives us an unusual montage of the chef via her feline companions. This compact, entertaining read is filled with personal photos and letters that document the role cats played in Julia's life as she moved from Paris to Provence, Cambridge to California.

And for kids ages four and up, Minette's Feast: The Delicious Story of Julia Child and Her Cat by Susanna Reich, illustrated by Amy Bates, dramatizes Julia Child's culinary beginnings through the eyes of her very first feline, Minette.  

Note: This article is a reprint and is being posted with the permission of Shelf Awareness. To read this piece as published on Shelf Awareness for Readers (8/14/12), link HERE

Poem for a Summer Day

As a writer, I try to read a poem-a-day...So admiring of the form - the rich choice of words/imagery, the cadence, the compression of ideas.  It's not easy to write a great poem, but this one reads perfect!

Want to read a poem a day?  Check out THE WRITER'S ALMANAC with Garrison Keillor

In the Moment by Maxine Kumin

Some days the pond

wears a glaze of yellow pollen.

Some days it is clean-swept.
The trout leap up, feasting on insects.

A modest size, it sits
like a soup tureen in a surround of white

pine where Rosie, 14 lbs., some sort
of rescued terrier, part bat

(the ears), part anteater (the nose),
shyly paddles in the shallows

for salamanders, frogs
and little painted turtles. She logged                              

ten years down south in a kennel, secured
in a crate at night. Her heart murmur

will carry her off, no one can say when.
Meanwhile she is rapt in

the moment, our hearts leap up observing.
Dogs live in the moment, pursuing

that brilliant dragonfly called pleasure.
Only we, sunstruck in this azure

day, must drag along the backpacks
of our past, must peer into the bottom muck

of what's to come, scanning the plot
for words that say another year, or not.

"In the Moment" by Maxine Kumin, from Where I Live. © Norton, 2012. Reprinted with permission. (buy now) 

Jerome Charyn and BACK TO BATAAN

Author Michael Chabon (The Wonder Boys, The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay) has called him, "one of the most important writers in American Literature."  Newsday has hailed him as "a contemporary American Balzac."  And the LA Times has described him as "absolutely unique among American writers."

Who is he? He's Jerome Charyn, an incredibly prolific, award-winning author who writes across genres and has published 30 novels, three memoirs, eight graphic novels...so far.

His latest undertaking is a novel of historical fiction, BACK TO BATAAN, an eBook (re-issued by Tribute Books) for middle grade readers (Grades 7-9): It's 1943 in New York City. Eleven year-old Jack Dalton is depressed and restless following the death of his father at Bataan (in the Philippines) during World War II.  Jack's mother is trying to keep body and soul together by working in a parachute factory and Jack, tossed aside by his girlfriend and left to his own devices, wants to enlist in the army.  When Jack finally runs away, he falls in with a gang of criminals.  This compact YA novel is filled with action, adventure and suspense.  To learn more, link HERE

Jerome Charyn was kind enough to chat about the book and share some of his ideas about the craft of writing.

Kathleen Gerard:  Thanks for joining us, Jerome.  You write across a realm of different genres, what excites you about connecting with different audiences? 

Jerome Charyn:  I’m not so sure that these are different audiences, I think we all love stories, whether we’re children or great-grandfathers and when you move from genre to genre you are still telling a story like Scheherazade and the king is always waiting for the next tale.

KG:  BACK TO BATAAN is a reissue of a print book, now being offered for the first time as an eBook.  Being a published author for nearly 50 years, what's your impression of digital books? 

JC: I think that this is a kind of logical step as we move from the internet into eBooks. Publishing is changing even as we speak. I think there now will be a more complicated dance between the eBook and the printed book, and as we’ve seen recently, successes in eBooks allow the author to move into print.

KG:  How much of your own life is embroiled in BACK TO BATAAN? Did you personally experience New York during World War II?
JC:  I think so much of the source of my writing comes from my childhood, I grew up during the War - so many of the terrors and the magic of certain films have remained with me.  And all of this appears in the character of Jack.

KG:  In reading the story behind this book, I understand that your brother was a detective. Did your experiences with him influence the plot of BACK TO BATAAN?

JC:  Not really, I think all writing is crime writing. And Back to Bataan is a crime novel with a very original twist.

KG:  In the book, why did you decide to include a fascination with famous people - Gary Cooper, Eleanor Roosevelt, etc. - as an underurrent?

JC:  These people were heroes to me as a child, particularly Eleanor Roosevelt, who was one of the most extraordinary women who ever lived, and of course as a child I fell in love with Gary Cooper’s face and with his very slow drawl, that seemed so exotic to me.

KG:  Jack, the main character of the novel, finds acclaim through his writing, yet he feels guilty for exploiting the lives of other people on the page. How does a writer bridge this gap?

JC:  You’re always cannibalizing other people and writers when you start to write, so it’s natural that Jack should be a young cannibal.

KG:  The New York Times plays a significant role in this novel. How important is New York Times in your own life and is there any special reason why you decided to make it a form of connection in the life of Jack, the main character?
JC:  As a child, I didn’t even know that the Times existed – I grew up in a neighborhood without newspapers and books, so that when I first fell upon the New York Times, I was very very greedy, and wanted to include it in Jack’s middle-class life.

KG:  Your writing is so precise, yet evocative - how do you work at crafting your unique style of prose?
JC:  Everything begins and ends with the word, with the music of the sentence and as Tolstoy once said, “I’m always composing.”

KG: What are your thoughts on the recent explosion and popularity of the YA genre?

JC: I think it might very well be that it started with Harry Potter, that young adult writers are trying to tell good stories and adults have moved into that kind of dream.

KG:  What advice would you give to young people who aspire to a literary career?

JC: It’s not worth the money – only write if you’re absolutely in love with it.

Well, there you have it, thoughts from Jerome Charyn, an acclaimed, dedicated writer who has made significant contributions to the literary community.  Reading Between the Lines thanks him for visiting and wishes him much continued success!  

Back to Bataan by Jerome Charyn
Tribute Books, $2.99, eBook, ASIN #B008DYK6C2, 101 pp
Publication Date: June 21, 2012
To order this book via AMAZON link HERE

The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry

The world was made up of people putting one foot in front of the other; and a life might appear ordinary simply because the person living it had been doing so for a long time. Harold could no longer pass a stranger without acknowledging the truth that everyone was the same, and also unique; and that this was the dilemma of being human. -- from The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry by Rachel Joyce

Harold Fry, a sixty-five year old British retiree receives a letter from Queenie Hennessy, a long lost friend and former coworker who once did Harold a big favor. The letter reveals that Queenie is in a hospice center, dying.  

Shaken by the news, Harold pens a response. But when he sets off to mail his reply at the corner post box, he is suddenly inspired to deliver the letter in person - 500 miles away. Leaving behind his stale, stagnant life, including a wife, Maureen, who is bothered by practically everything Harold says and does, he impulsively leaves his small English village--on foot, without a map or his mobile phone; he's wearing shoddy sneakers--and begins the journey to reach his dying friend. He comes to believe that as long as he keeps walking, Queenie will wait for him and continue to live.

Harold isn't the only pilgrim in this story. Queenie is taking her own solitary pilgrimage through a fatal illness. In Harold's absence, Maureen begins to sort through the past in order to discover the real reason why she and Harold have grown apart. And the people Harold meets along the way, those with stories of their own hardships and struggles, encourage Harold to reflect and delve deeper into the meaning of his existence and as a result, reconcile the deeply repressed regrets of his own life. 

Pretty soon, Harold is no longer walking the length of England alone. When the press gets wind of his quest, other people join the pilgrimage and Harold begins to feel crowded out by all the fuss. Can Harold maintain his focus on what he originally set out to do? Does he have the physical stamina? And can his walking, an act of faith, save Queenie Hennessy?

Rachel Joyce has written a moving, compulsively readable novel infused with a well-balanced combination of humor and pathos. By exposing the emotional wounds of a host of ordinary people who are all trying to navigate through the challenges of life, Joyce taps into universal themes about the moral and spiritual ways in which we atone and seek to save ourselves...insights that stretch far beyond the ultimate 87 days and 627 miles of Harold's journey.

The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry by Rachel Joyce

Random House, $25, Hardcover, 978081299395, 336 pp

Publication Date: July 24, 2012

To order this book via INDIEBOUND link HERE

A Gift for My Sister

Take two, fatherless half-sisters. Make one sister, Sky, an obedient, play-it-safe type. Portray the other, Tara, as a reckless, no-holds-barred younger sister rebel. Reinforce their differences by designating different typeface fonts that reflect the distinct voice of each sister as they narrate this story via alternating, first person points of view and what emerges is A Gift for My Sister by Ann Pearlman (The Christmas Cookie Club), a moving, deeply resonant novel.

The story begins with Sky, a happily married lawyer with a young daughter who resides in a California beachfront condo. Beyond her seemingly idyllic life, 30-something Sky is riddled with bitterness and worry incurred from a past marred by challenges and loss--the death of her father when she was a teenager, miscarriages and the passing of her best friend. Tara, on the other hand, is a free spirit whose father abandoned her. In high school, she entered into an interracial romance with an ex-juvenile prison inmate and became pregnant. With beau and baby in tow, Troy took off to pursue her dreams of becoming a musician and is now on the verge rap music superstardom.

When tragedy strikes, Sky and Tara are forced to reunite. By rendering shared experiences via their opposing personalities and viewpoints, Pearlman skillfully evokes empathy on both sides. Resentment, rivalry, fear of love and loss and the idea of forgiveness infuse what ultimately becomes a road-trip novel--from California to Michigan--where the sisters try to understand each other, the complications of their own lives and the larger ramifications of family.

A Gift for My Sister by Ann Pearlman

Atria/Emily Bestler Books, $24.99, Hardcover, 9781439159491, 288 pp

Publication Date: May 1, 2012

To order this book via INDIEBOUND link HERE

Please note: This review is a reprint and is being posted (in a slightly different form) with the permission of Shelf Awareness. To read this review on Shelf Awareness: Reader's Edition (5/29/12), click HERE.

Heading Out to Wonderful

Secrets are buried in a small town in 1948. In Heading Out to Wonderful by Robert Goolrick (A Reliable Wife), Charlie Beale, an attractive, athletic 39 year-old loner and veteran of WWII wanders into a quiet community in the Shenandoah Valley of the Blue Ridge Mountains. Charlie is in search of a new life when he arrives in Brownsburg, Virginia carrying only two suitcases - one is packed with all of his worldly possessions, including a set of butcher knives; the other is stuffed with money. Offered a job by the local butcher, Charlie is befriended by the shop owner's family, including his precocious five year-old son, Sam. Charlie and the boy instantly bond, but when Charlie's path intersects with Sylvan Glass, a hillbilly turned stunning teenaged bride of the richest man in town, life for the three main characters will be forever changed by the ache and storm of love.

Goolrick is masterful in ratcheting up the tension in this unforgettable story of lost and displaced souls in search of identity, acceptance and belonging. Charlie longs to put down roots. Sylvan, in a loveless marriage, tries to carve out a persona for herself via images of captivating Hollywood starlets from the Silver Screen. While Sam, drawn away from his safe and secure familial environment, bears witness, many years later, to the all-consuming relationship of the star-crossed lovers. Evocative sensory detail and spiritual overtones infuse the emotional landscape of this powerful, climactic narrative that seeks to define and explore the meaning of love and goodness.

Heading Out to Wonderful by Robert Goolrick

Algonquin Books, $24.95, Hardcover, 978156129238, 296 pp

Publication Date: June 12, 2012

To order this book via INDIEBOUND link HERE

Please note: This review is a reprint and is being posted (in a slightly different form) with the permission of Shelf Awareness. To read this review on Shelf Awareness: Reader's Edition (6/15/12), click HERE.