A Tale of Two Cities: The 2004 Yankees-Red Sox Rivalry and the War for the Pennant Review

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A Tale of Two Cities: The 2004 Yankees-Red Sox Rivalry and the War for the Pennant ReviewAs a baseball fan, I was glued to this book and could not put it down, even though I knew who won in the end... Tony Mazz and John Harper did a great job giving the reader a feel for what each city was experiencing during the 2004 season. The behind the scenes stories and quotes added a critical element to the book and made the reading fun. If you want some inside information on Pedro, A-Rod, Schilling and others, this book is for you. The off-the-record quotes are stunning. I really enjoyed this book... and I've read a lot of baseball books over the years. This is one of the best.A Tale of Two Cities: The 2004 Yankees-Red Sox Rivalry and the War for the Pennant OverviewWhen the Boston Red Sox faced the New York Yankees in the historic 2003 American League Championship Series, the meeting seemed to serve as the climax to perhaps the greatest rivalry in professional sports. Yet, following New York's comeback victory in scintillating Game 7, both the Red Sox and Yankees entered the off-season without a world title--and with renewed conviction to finish the job in 2004.In A Tale of Two Cities, respected baseball writers John Harper (New York Daily News) and Tony Massarotti (Boston Herald) chronicle the Yankees and Red Sox in parallel story lines through the summer of 2004. The authors take you behind the scenes with the teams, cities, and media during one of the most intense baseball seasons in history.

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Take me out to the ballgame Review

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Take me out to the ballgame ReviewThe best praise I can give Gary Morgenstein's Take Me Out to the Ballgame is not insignificant. With approximately 50 pages left to read, I put the book down in order to go out to dinner. While at dinner, I found myself distracted, thinking about the book, wondering how it would end. I actually found myself anxious to get home, so I could finish reading.
That being said, Take Me Out to the Ballgame is definitely a book for people who love baseball, like baseball, or, at the very least, tolerate baseball. If you would sooner get a colonoscopy than watch a baseball game, then this is probably not for you. If you count yourself among the legion of baseball fans, you will enjoy this novel. Don't misunderstand, however. This is not some heart-warming, apple pie tale of America's pastime.
I didn't get anything that I expected from Morgy in this novel, which is a good -- if not great -- thing for readers. While I thoroughly enjoyed two of his other books (How to Find a Woman...or Not and Loving Rabbi Thalia Kleinman), which were replete with Jewish humor and a good dose of New York living, this book strays far from that style. The plot revolves around a fictional -- but very believable -- baseball team, the Buffalo Matadors. There are actually two storylines, but ones that are inextricably woven together. One focuses on Cal, the Matadors' number one fan, whose love of baseball can't really be called an obsession -- because obsession is far too weak a word. The other storyline is behind-the-scenes of the Matadors' ball club; the owner, the manager, the PR guy who figures out how to transform a failing ball club into a national sensation. Cal grows increasingly irritated by the newfound popularity of the Matadors, especially the bandwagon-jumpers. And again, irritated is far too weak a word.
You won't believe what happens in this story, but it's not preposterous, which is possibly the scariest part. This is hard to put down...and when you finally do, it'll be because you've reached the end.Take me out to the ballgame OverviewBaseball and bailouts, as American as apple pie. Weaving today's economic malaise with the powerful magic of a Cinderella baseball team, Take Me Out to the Ballgame is a political baseball novel for our times.The Buffalo Matadors haven't won a world championship in 37 years, a dying franchise. Until flamboyant Harry Witowsky, a 21st Century George Steinbrenner, buys them, vowing to do whatever is necessary to change the fortunes of the "Door Mats."Victories and attendance climb as Witowsky creates an Us versus Them mentality at the Stadium. The rally cry of "Where's My Bailout" replaces "Let's Go Mats." Buffalo's surprising surge resonates with a nation afraid of losing jobs and homes, shaken by terrorist threats, frightened for the future. The Matadors become America's Team.

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Munson: The Life and Death of a Yankee Captain Review

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Munson: The Life and Death of a Yankee Captain ReviewWhen I was a youngster, I was a huge fan of Thurman Munson.
To this day, if I close my eyes, I can quickly remember the feeling of sitting in Yankee Stadium, as a 13-year old, with my father, watching the Yankees play with Munson at bat and runners on base.
During these moments, my heart would race - where it felt like it was about to jump out of my chest (because it was beating so hard and fast). Why? Because I wanted Thurman to come through...as he was "my guy."
And, more times than not, Munson did the job.
It's been so many years, but, in this memory, I can still see Munson slapping a line drive into right field, as if he was picking the ball out of opposing catcher's mitt with his bat, waiting until the last minute to go the other way with the pitch, with Yankees runners rounding third and coming home to score...man, talk about pure exhilaration...that was it.
Being such a Munson fan, I was (and still am) very interested in learning more about him. And, for the last three decades or so, I've been waiting for the ultimate book covering the entire story of Thurman Munson.
Now, thanks to Marty Appel, with his new book "Munson: The Life and Death of a Yankee Captain," we have what I have been waiting for...all these years. With this book Appel provides us with the complete account of Thurman Munson's life and untimely passing...with no holds barred.
With this work, we get to see the many facets of Munson's life: Thurman as a ball player, a friend, the family man and a real estate entrepreneur. And, we get to see the good and the bad sides of the man. This includes getting to see Thurman as the everyday likeable guy who eats Oreos and milk for breakfast, watches the Three Stooges, sings commercial jingles to himself, has a terrible sense of fashion, and who would go out of his way to help people (with no fanfare whatsoever). But, we also get to see Thurman as someone who was somewhat insecure at times, cursed at sportswriters, gave the fans "the finger" during a game, cut many of the dysfunctional family members out of his life, and who once fired a gun in the Yankee Stadium parking lot.
Also, with this biography, Appel provides a superior account of the complete Thurman Munson timeline - bringing us from Munson's youth, through his time with the Yankees, to covering his tragic death in terms of the event itself and the impact it had on many (both inside and outside the Munson circle).
But, what I enjoyed most about "Munson: The Life and Death of a Yankee Captain" is how the story is told. In the book, Appel uses his own voice as well as those of many others who knew Thurman - including his teammates and friends. And, many of these sources are people who most were never aware (until now) as being a big part of Munson's life or parties that you would not expect to have some insight on the Munson story.
In summary, I would offer that "Munson: The Life and Death of a Yankee Captain" is a must read for any Yankees fan over the age of forty, a highly recommended read for Yankees fans of any age, and a recommended read for anyone interested in baseball and a very well-done story about one of more notable players from the last half-century of the game's history.
This book will engross, entertain, enlighten and "touch" you all at the same time. It's too bad that we had to wait 30 years for a book like this on Thurman Munson. But, now that its here, I cannot imagine a better one ever being done compared to the job Marty Appel did with "Munson: The Life and Death of a Yankee Captain."Munson: The Life and Death of a Yankee Captain Overview

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Ben Shahn's New York: The Photography of Modern Times Review

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Ben Shahn's New York: The Photography of Modern Times ReviewWonderful images and excellent catalogue of Ben Shahn's 1930s photographs.
Exhibition currently on display at the Phillips Collection in Washington DC.Ben Shahn's New York: The Photography of Modern Times Overview

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Inventing Times Square: Commerce and Culture at the Crossroads of the World Review

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Inventing Times Square: Commerce and Culture at the Crossroads of the World ReviewAnyone who has actually lived in New York City and not simply "visited" it as the person in the previous review did, would know that New York has a soul and a character all its own. When you take such as the time square area and change it through gentrification, making it Disney shows, overpriced stores, and tourist traps you are basically forcing it to become something its not.
Its soul which was naturally created and maintained by the people that lived and thrived there, has been destroyed. It was destroyed in order to essentially superimpose a giant disneyland where the very new yorkers who made times square attain its status as the most recognizable American landmark can no longer afford to buy anything there much less live in or around it.
So I'm sure its just peachy one weekend if you wanna blow a little cash at some chain restaurant and see the little mermaid on ice, its the place to go. But for those of us who have grown up in and around times square, we have lost a lil piece of our souls so that people from around the world can see the little mermaid on ice. Compare it to when they closed down your favorite childhood ice cream shoppe in Poughkeepsie, just instead of sprinkles we had hookers; Ya yuppie.
-The EndInventing Times Square: Commerce and Culture at the Crossroads of the World Overview

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Five Points: The 19th-Century New York City Neighborhood That Invented Tap Dance, Stole Elections, and Became the World's Most Notorious Slum Review

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Five Points: The 19th-Century New York City Neighborhood That Invented Tap Dance, Stole Elections, and Became the World's Most Notorious Slum ReviewFirst off, I must point out that I work about eight blocks away from the infamous Five Points intersection in New York City. Also, I am very familiar with American history. With these two points mentioned, I will say that I thoroughly enjoyed and learned alot from this book. If you are considering reading "Five Points", it is very important that you assess beforehand what you hope to get out of this book. It has the potential to be either VERY rewarding and informative to you OR, to bore the life out of you and make you want to fling it in the trash! This book is certainly NOT for the casual reader. It is remarkably detailed and meticulous in research chock full of 66 pages of footnotes and a small font, select bibliography of five pages. I had the great advantage of being able to walk over on my lunch hour and follow the included maps around the neighborhood to see where these locations were and, in some cases, see the still standing buildings mentioned in the text. If you are not from New York City or familiar with it's history, this book can be painfully tedious. If this book was a college course, I would estimate it to be either of the 300 or 400 level.
Some may take issue with the way the material is arranged. Trying to write about a whole neighborhood with so many layers of diverse history is no easy task. I personally enjoyed the format once I got used to it. Anbinder starts each chapter with a prologue vignette of a few pages describing an event or person who well exemplifies the topic following in the main chapter. I found myself going back at the end of each chapter and re-reading the prologue with the new information just gleaned in mind. The chapters cover the historical making of the Five Points neighborhood, why the neighborhood inhabitants originally (mostly the Irish before the Civil War) came there, how and where the residents lived there, how they worked and what they did, the politics the neighborhood was involved in over the years, the diversions and entertainment found in the neighborhood, types of vice and crime seen there, religion and reform issues (including extensive accounts of the activities of the Five Points Mission and the House of Industry), the infamous riots the neighborhood was a part or cause of (mostly in the 1850s), the neighborhood changes underway during the Civil War and the rise of Tammany Hall, the remaking of Five Points after the Civil War as Italians became more prevalent, the life and activities of the Italian majority in the 1870s and 1880s, the influx of Chinese to the neighborhood and the making of Chinatown, and the activities of Jacob Riis and other reformers towards the eventual demolition of much of Five Points in the 1890s. The author fills in some background information on discussed topics, but it helps greatly to be already familiar with the era's history. Examples would be needing to know the basics of Andrew Jackson and his "Democrats" before fully understanding the causes and issues relating to the rioting so common in Five Points before the Civil War or, familiarity with what Boss Tweed and Tammany Hall was. Some may also quarrel with the need for extensive statistics about the nationality makeup of individual Five Points tenements or the amount of money in residents bank accounts over the years, but extreme details such as those give insights to how New York City has become what it is today. Causes of the rise of the modern fire and police departments, some unions, gangs, and building code details are just some of the contemporary NYC realities that can trace a significant portion of their origins to Five Points.
With the previously mentioned warnings in mind, I highly recommend "Five Points" to the ravenous history student. This is no beach read or intro to Five Points. It is thick and heavy like cheesecake, but make sure you know that you love cheesecake before trying this supreme example!Five Points: The 19th-Century New York City Neighborhood That Invented Tap Dance, Stole Elections, and Became the World's Most Notorious Slum OverviewAll but forgotten today, the Five Points neighborhood in lower Manhattan was once renowned the world over. It housed America's most impoverished immigrants-the Irish, Jews, Germans, Italians, and African-Americans. Located in today's Chinatown and Little Italy, Five Points played host to more riots, scams, prostitution, and drunkenness than any other neighborhood in America. But it was also crammed full of cheap theaters, dance halls, prizefighting venues, and political arenas that would one day dominate the national scene. From Jacob Riis to Abraham Lincoln, Davy Crockett to Charles Dickens, Five Points horrified and enthralled everyone who saw it. Drawing from letters, diaries, newspapers, bank records, police reports, and archeological digs, award-winning historian Tyler Anbinder has written the first history of this remarkable neighborhood. Beginning with the Irish potato famine influx in 1840 and ending with the rise of Chinatown in the early 20th century, the story of Five Points serves as a microcosm of the American immigrant experience.

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Typhoid Mary: Captive to the Public's Health Review

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Typhoid Mary: Captive to the Public's Health ReviewLeavitt's book, Typhoid Mary, attempts to reconstruct the life and times of Mary Mallon, the first identified typhoid carrier in the United States. Mary Mallon was an Irish immigrant, and worked as a cook among the elite families of New York city. She is also the centerpiece of one of the scientific advances of the twentieth century: the understanding that some illnesses are caused by germs, rather than vague miasmas, and that apparently healthy individuals can spread these germs to others. An understanding of this scientific truth, however, raises an even more puzzling question: how can the public address these individuals who, through no bad acts on their part, are able to risk the public's health? Leavitt analyzes Mary's story with the use of seven different perspectives: that of medicine, public policy, the law, social expectations, newspaper accounts, her own, and the story's modern retelling. These seven accounts combine to provide the reader a full account of the medical and social conditions of the day, and how they combined to account for Mary's lifelong isolation. The research on this book is well-done and the writing interesting. My biggest complaint was that some of the material is repetitive, as the different perspectives do overlap at times.Typhoid Mary: Captive to the Public's Health Overview

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Basketball History in Syracuse: Hoops Roots (NY) Review

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Basketball History in Syracuse: Hoops Roots (NY) ReviewWhen I purchased a book called Basketball History in Syracuse, I was expecting a history of the Syracuse Orangemen. Unfortunately for me, this is a history of the Syracuse Nationals, not the Orangemen. Whether intentional or not I think the title of the book is a little misleading but also shame on me for not doing a deeper dive into the book before purchasing. Despite only having a passing interest in the Nats, I did read the book. It's very well written and clearly well researched with a number of cool photos and profiles of "Syracuse Hardwood Heroes" that look like the backs of basketball cards. You get a season by season history of the Nats from their inception into the NBL in 1946 to their transition into the NBA's Philadelphia Warriors in 1963.
To summarize, if you're looking for a book on the history of Syracuse University basketball this is not the book you're looking for. If you're interested in the Syracuse Nationals or you're a basketball history junkie this will make a nice addition to your library.
Basketball History in Syracuse: Hoops Roots (NY) OverviewAnyone who has spent time in Syracuse, New York, knows that basketball season is the most wonderful time of the year. And while the local popularity of the sport is known nationwide, the region also has a long and rich basketball history. Sports historian Mark Baker traces the evolution of Syracuse's "hoops roots," beginning in the early days, when local, national and college basketball organizations were primitive institutions. It was during this time that one of the first teams to gain a national following was founded here by an Italian immigrant, Danny Biasone, and it was in Syracuse that the 24 second clock was invented. From the outset, Syracuse residents and fans were hooked, and this love of the game has endured, feeding the fanaticism that sustains the sport today.

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Joy In Mudville: The Big Book of Baseball Humor Review

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Joy In Mudville: The Big Book of Baseball Humor ReviewJoy in Mudville is an excellent book that takes humorous articles from varioius authors and joins them to create one book. The selections are hilarious(especially one using Abbot and Costello's classic Who's on First routine with real names and players) and include comic strips, poems, magazine articles and excerpts from books all joined together by comments from editor Dick Schaap. The book is an easy read that can be enjoyed by sports fans of all ages, it should be in any sports fans collection.Joy In Mudville: The Big Book of Baseball Humor OverviewA comic lineup of stories, essays, cartoons, and more, from Lardner and Runyon to Philip Roth, Charles Addams to Charles Schulz, plus dozens of other funny fans. "The best baseball book of the season." -- Los Angeles Times Book Review.B & W photographs and illustrations throughout.

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The House That Ruth Built: A New Stadium, the First Yankees Championship, and the Redemption of 1923 Review

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The House That Ruth Built: A New Stadium, the First Yankees Championship, and the Redemption of 1923 ReviewI love great writing, and author Robert Weintraub has treated us to a rousing rendition of a story in his new book entitled The House That Ruth Built. It is an account of the 1923 baseball season with a concentration on the feud between the New York Giants and their across-the-Harlem River rivals the New York Yankees. We have had recent books devoted to the seasons of 1920 and 1921, but this book surpasses both of those. Weintraub avoids the day-by-day summaries of games that all too often make up books devoted to particular seasons. Instead the featured players in this story such as owners, managers, players, and writers are all brought back to life with anecdotes that greatly enrich this wonderful book. Examples would be a story you may well not have heard regarding the Lou Gehrig and Wally Pipp incident. How did Bullet Joe Bush get his nickname? The train ride that took the life of "Wild Bill" Donovan and spared the life of George Weiss who went on to become the general manager of the New York Yankees. The Odd Couple ownership duo of prim and proper Jacob Ruppert and slovenly Til Huston and their accompanying feud over who should manage the Yankees. Ruppert had the audacity to insist on being called Colonel when Huston is over in France fighting in The Great War to End All Wars. Giant Manager John McGraw's inconsiderate treatment of Lou Gehrig at a tryout. Bomber boss Ed Barrow telling Eleanor Gehrig, "Well, I guess he'll have to find another line of work," when told Lou would no longer be able to play baseball.
This book is loaded with anecdotes regarding individuals such as those listed above along with others such as Bob Shawkey, Herb Pennock, Carl Mays, Art Nehf, Miller Huggins, Casey Stengel, along with numerous others, not the least of which is the Prince of Pounders, the Behemoth of Biff, the Sultan of Swat, the Colossus of Clout, the Maharajah of Mash, Babe Ruth himself. You may think you have read all you need to know about the individuals in this book, but author Robert Weintraub has provided each of us with stories galore and written in a very humorous way that will keep you entertained with laughs throughout the book.
Baseball was blessed with great writers during this time period such as Grantland Rice, Damon Runyon, Joe Vila, Ring Lardner, Westbrook Pegler, John Kieran, Paul Gallico, Bozeman Bulger, and Dan Daniel. All of those names should be familiar to most any baseball fan who has done any reading on the game's history. Anecdotes along with examples of their writing are also provided.
This book is about The Battle of Broadway, the scientific baseball of John McGraw verses the long ball being ushered into baseball by Babe Ruth. McGraw berating his team into trying to win a third consecutive championship against his hated rival Babe Ruth and the Yankees. This book is social history at its best. It also amply illustrates there is more to history than wars, treaties, and presidents. I bought both the hard cover and the Kindle edition. You're a baseball fan, you say? Then buy the book. It is that good.The House That Ruth Built: A New Stadium, the First Yankees Championship, and the Redemption of 1923 Overview

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