The years since have brought fundamental changes to the economics of the game, changes that are immediately apparent in the architecture and demographics of the new ballparks. Before you vote to fund a new stadium for your city, I highly recommend reading this book, a sobering reflection on the politics of pro sports in the nineties. Reading this book is like taking a course in baseball with a friendly, experienced professor. Her history is a personal account, a memoir of a loving American family amid greater forces, offering a refreshing, female perspective on growing up with baseball. This collection contains his invaluable, eloquent essays on the game.
Serious books are great.
Underworld , DeLillo's most recent novel, is bigger and more comprehensive in scope and purpose than White Noise , but I'm not sure it's better, and it's certainly nowhere near as funny. The best scenes in White Noise take place in supermarkets. And though some might say the book is about death and obsession and the fear of open spaces, mostly I remember the long, sociological explanations of produce. I read an essay somewhere in which a critic compared Antrim to David Foster Wallace. A few days later, I found this book at Powell's and got hooked immediately.