BOOKS THREAD

You mean it's got Beans Reardon anecdotes?

 

Just finished Michael Lewis' The Blind Side. Very good book, if a bit disjointed-feeling in spots. He pulled his usual analyze-a-sports-trend-like-you'd-analyze-an-underappreciated-financial-market trick, plus wove in a very interesting narrative. Anyone else here read it?


I liked how he traced the cause and effect from the brutal hit on Theismann to LT to Tom Lemming to Michael Oher... and how the family manipulated the academic system to get his grades high enough for Ole Miss. High enough for Ole Miss-- I can't believe I just wrote that.

 

My view of BIAFG is colored by my active dislike for Joe G.

 

After reading the Hitchcock thread with comments about Cary Grant, I was wondering if anyone had read any great books on him. Thanks.

 

Explain. How can anyone not like Joe G??

 

Just finished Junot Diaz's "The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao." The end wasn't totally convincing, but what a voice Diaz has. He captures the street, the nerd, the literary all in one. What ambience he gives to the Dominican Republic, and all of his characters are compelling, some more than even Oscar.

 

There is one book I do recommend, and that is The Transall Saga by Paul Dawson. I remember reading that in fifth, sixth, and seventh grade. That's right, I read it three times. I would probably of read it four or five teams if I hadn't lost it. It was a really good book, but judging from what I thought was a fairly 'long' book might not be that long to me now, so it might not be a long book, but still very well written.

 

For openers? He was one of the guys who failed the Jackie Robinson treatment test in '47 . . . failed it, badly.

I don't like that middle-of-the-road Today-show type jive, but that's just personal taste.

The other proved to be a fairly-reliable litmus test separating a number of major-league jerks from everyone else . . . and Yogi's buddy blew it.

 

Just finished Custer's Brother's Horse by Edwin "Bud" Shrake. Best thing I've read since Lonesome Dove. Guy writes like McMurtry, with a touch of Carl Hiaasen.

 

Sirs, Madames,

Need further Joe G hate? Try his testimony in Curt Flood vs MLB. (Granted, Garagiola later helped him out, but that was much, much later ... he was on death's door.)

YD&OHS, etc

 

Not to mention that Uecker's twenty times funnier, and I'm no huge Uecker fanboy.

 

I'd like to read that one. I quite enjoyed "Love and Hydrogen." Shepard really has a knack for being quirky in a good way.