Bits and pieces, Nov. 18, 2015

Been a bit busy lately with the two author events, so I know I’ve fallen behind.

You never know where inspiration will come from. According to this public radio story, Haruki Murakami came up with the idea for his first novel, Hear the Wind Sing, as the result of a 1978 pro game in Japan, specifically after seeing former Major Leaguer Dave Hilton hit a double for the Yakult Swallows.

Baseball titles accounted for one-third of Entertainment Weekly’s article, “12 sports books in a league of their own,” including Jim Bouton‘s Ball Four; Jimmy Breslin‘s Can’t Anybody Here Play This Game?; Roger Angell‘s Late Innings; and David Halberstam‘s October 1964.

Who knew there was still a Brooklyn Daily Eagle? Good thing for author Alan Lelchuck; they published a review of his new book, Breaking Ground: How Jackie Robinson Changed Brooklyn. Upshot: “It is a hymn to baseball and its legendary hero, a lyrical narrative that will beckon to all readers and listeners who were ever called by the sirens of youth, Jackie, baseball and Brooklyn.”

Redbird Rants, a Cardinals-centric site, suggest three 2015 titles to read. As did the Huffington Post.

The Washington Times posted this double review, incorporating The Grind: Inside Baseball’s Endless Season by Barry Svrluga with Filip Bondy‘s The Pine Tar Game: The Kansas City Royals, the New York Yankees, and Baseball’s Most Absurd and Entertaining Controversy. Svrluga was also interviewed on Boise State Public Radio.

Hail, the local hero. The Iowa City Press-Citizen published this profile of Steve Bratkovich, author of a book about a native son: Bob Oldis: A Baseball Life.

I hesitated to include this piece because it besmirches a couple of generally-acceted good guys, but it’s so nuts. From the (web) pages of Esquire… “A Former Yankees Employee Is Spreading Gay Sex Rumors About Derek Jeter and Jorge Posada” (facepalm). Please. There’s a reason this probably had to be self-published. (Speaking of semi-fiction, how about this piece on Tom Swyers’s “novel based on a true story,” Saving Babe Ruth?)

Also from Esquire: You can certainly understand how Art Howe might not like how he was depicted in the screen version of Moneyball. But Buck Showalter also had no love for the movie.

MyCentralNewJersey focused on the pertinent pages about Sparky Lyle, “manager emeritus” of the indy league Somerset Patriots, from Fritz Peterson‘s latest memoir, When the Yankees Were on the Fritz: Revisiting the Horace Clarke Years.. This comes from a Sept. 11 article after Peterson made a book-signing appearance at the Patriots’ ballpark. I told you I was behind.

Not sure what the deal is behind this blog/website named 1482 Elm. Given the topic — “Scariest Books You’ve (Probably) Never Read: ‘Blockade Billy’” — I’m guessing it has to do with the horror genre. Actually, I have read it, and originally thought the title was about books you’ll probably never read. Because to me this Stephen King offering was a bit of a clunker, as I wrote for Bookreporter when it came out in 2010.

Should Giants’ skipper Bruce Bochy give up his day job? You decide after reading this review of his “hybrid” project, A Book of Walks. Upshot? “The publisher, Steve Kettman, clearly wanted to leverage a Bay Area celebrity to bring attention to his indie publishing company (Wellstone Center in the Redwoods, which will also be using proceeds from book sales to fund a Bruce Bochy Writing Fellowship) and that’s okay to me because it seems like Bochy provided them with something that’s very ‘on brand’: a non-fiction spiritual and pro-environmental travelogue of sorts.”