The stories throughout the novel are wonderfully written. The cover is absolutely gorgeous, with the sillouette of a ball player imposed over a sun rise/set. I had no need to fear, and should have picked this book up sooner. So when I had this book recommended to me by a coworker (who is a huge baseball fan), I was a little hesitant. She also will ask anyone who will listen why there are quarterbacks, half-backs, and fullbacks, but not three-quarter backs. This lack of sports excitement comes from my mother, who taught me how to play baseball with three bases when I was younger, claiming you played at home with first, second, and third base. I don’t go to games regularly, I have little if any real athletic ability, and I’m one of those people who consider bowling a sport just so I can claim to play something. I’ll be quite honest that I am not a sports person.
There’s a little something for all baseball fans here. We have Louis Schneider who plays baseball between Civil War scrimishes, Walter Snider who tries to sneak a black pitcher onto a segregated major league team, and Kat Flint who plays for the All-American Girls League during World War II. In between these characters are short stories relating family members and their baseball exploits. Snider Flint has no idea that he has found a piece of family history when he discovers an old baseball in a box of discarded items in his uncle’s antique shop.
Alan Gratz ends the collection of short stories in The Brooklyn Nine eight generations later. When ten-year-old Felix Schneider snuck aboard a ship headed to America, he had no idea what he would set into motion. Now he stood on first base, waiting to run. He was so fast, in fact, the ship that had brought him to America arrived a day early. Now he was the fastest boy in Manhattan, New York.
Nine months ag, Felix Schneider was the fastest boy in Bremen, Germany. Title: The Brooklyn Nine: A Novel in Nine Innings
0 kommentar(er)
