I stumbled across this book while looking up other Steve Kluger titles, after reading some good things about another book of his in the BC forums. This book features major-league pitcher Scotty MacKay, who's losing his fastball and generally struggling in his career and his love life. And then he's teamed up with catcher Jason Cornell, and as the rear-cover blurb puts it: "Jason is twenty-eight, has lots of teeth, and poses for underwear ads. He's blond and has blue eyes. Scotty's favorite color is blue... By August, Scotty's got a major league problem on his hands."

The plot sounds very much like that of The Dreyfus Affair by Peter Lefcourt, although "Changing Pitches" predates "Dreyfus" by almost a decade. Will be interesting to compare and contrast...

[Yet another of my backlogged journal entries; I read this in mid-October of 2004.]

The main plot of the book did not go where I'd expected given the cover-blurb, but it was a very enjoyable tale nonetheless - a charming and funny look at life from the viewpoint of an increasingly stressed-out and nervous major league pitcher. The format is cute, a mix of conversation, diary entries, bulletin-board snippets from the locker room, and newspaper clippings. Scotty's troubles, which begin with a hint of self-doubt when in bed with his girlfriend and escalate as he tries to work with - and ignore his growing attraction to - the hunky new catcher. [How that all pans out surprised me quite a bit, but worked very well in context.] There are philosophical discussions pretending to be sports-magazine interviews, and practical jokes appear among the "letters from fans" - along with a few letters that must have been copied from actual ones, as they're too strange not to be true: "Dear Mr. MacKay, A couple of years ago, you autographed a baseball for me, but when you started losing all those games, I got mad and threw it at you during a doubleheader with Texas. Can I have it back?" And some hilarious side trips into literature, as when Scotty tries to teach Jason the finer points:

"I don't get it," he said, pointing to page one. "'Call me Ishmael.' Is that like 'asshole,' Scotty?"

"Ishmael was his name," I sighed.

Jason frowned. "Why?"

This led to a discussion of Herman Melville, the likes of which I have never encountered before. We took the story apart, piece by piece, then put it back together Jason-style. By the time we were through, the novel began, "Call me Arthur," and promptly went downhill from there. The Pequod was a nuclear submarine, Moby Dick was now a great white shark, and Captain Ahab was portrayed by Robert Shaw.

"See?" He smiled. "If you look under the surface, Scotty, you'll find a lot you never thought was there before."

I'd be fascinated to see what he could do with John Steinbeck.

And just wait 'til they tackle Oliver Twist. Very sweet, very funny - recommended.

Controlled release:

Changing Pitches is on its way to BCer rangerfan in Oklahoma (who's agreed to offer it for a bookring/ray after reading it); hope you enjoy it!

Came in the mail today from GoryDetails, looking forward to reading this.

I really enjoyed this! Going to have to find some more by the author to read.I will set up a Bookring for this very soon.

BookRing order

1 labmomnm
2 irishajo
3 ds3233
4 tobysrus
5 Secretariat
6 rangerfan

ended

Rules
1. Keep for 1 month only please!!!
2. Journal the book when you get :-)
3. PM the person after you for their address
4. Enjoy the book!

This book ring is still open! PM me to join, you will be added to the end.

RELEASE NOTES: mailed to labmomnm

Arrived in the mail - thanks, rangerfan! Nothing ahead of this in the ring/ray line, so I should be able to move it along quickly. How perfect is it to have a baseball book to read during the All Star break?!

19 July '05 - I LOVED this book! It wasn't at all what I expected when I signed up for this ring....more BCing serendipity! I'm going to my friendly neighborhood independent bookstore tonight to either buy or order a copy to keep, and probably snag whatever other Kluger's I can. So much for whittling away at Mt. TBR.

I was going to post a favorite section, like Gory did, but I keep changing my mind about what my fave would be. Hmmmm....Maybe the letter from the kid who had to write a paper on his choice for the greatest American and decided to write about Scotty; his teacher was upset (she wanted something along the lines of Abraham Lincoln) so the kid asks Scotty to come to school and hit the teacher.

Do you think real baseball locker room bulletin boards are like the one in the book? Conferences on the mound? (Very "Bull Durham", by the way)

Thanks so much for sharing this one!

Mailed 23 July '05

I received this today, will get started on it asap!

I enjoyed this book. I'm a baseball fan anyway. Was perhaps a tad disappointed in the outcome, but thought the way the entire subject was handled was funny and light-hearted. I really appreciated the variety of newspaper columns, statistics, journal entries, and mound conferences that worked together to tell the story.

Sending on to ds3233 today.

Received in the mail today. Will start it today.

I'm not much of a baseball fan, but I enjoyed this book very much. As labmomnm said, "Very Bull Durham." Well written and funny. Thanks, rangerfan.

RELEASE NOTES:

Mailed to tobysrus.

Actually received it yesterday. Looking forward to reading it. GoryDetails looking forward to meeting you tomorrow at mini-Boston meet-up in Beacon Hill!

Great book! I really enjoyed it. Started a little slow, but picked up. Interesting to see the protagonist wrestle with his issues. Really recommend it to others.

RELEASE NOTES:

Dropped in the mail today to Secretariat while on vacation. Finished it on plane ride to California. Enjoy!

This book arrived on Saturday, but I forgot to journal it. I'm near the end of another book so should get to this quickly.

RELEASE NOTES:

I don't believe I liked this book as much as others did. It was a nice, light, amusing read, but not nearly the quality of Kluger's "The Last Days of Summer."

Although this book had me laughing out loud, it also had me mumbling "It's not always about YOU, Scotty." In addition found it very predictable, and I'm not a fan of predictable.

However, on the good side, I must say that while the story was on the "I'm in love with Jase" angle I was very impressed that Kluger managed to make it very amusing and very fair. That's something incredibly hard to do in 2005, but in 1988 it was a master feat. I also loved that J.J. and Jase were both kind of bubbleheaded, so that at least Scotty was staying true to form. Jase's Oliver Twist version had me laughing my head off. Jase's plots and Buddy's singing where obviously on a par.

The characters were pretty well fleshed out, which is hard to do give the style the book is written in--clearly the sign of a good writer.

I'll put this in the mail to rangerfan as soon as I get an addres. Thanks, rangerfan, for the laughs.

My first ever Bookring made it home safe! I like to thank everyone who joined and enjoyed the book :)

This went so well, I will be doing more Rings/Rays!

sent on to ScrappyCat58

LOVELY, sweetie, thanks so much! I've been wanting to read this book for a long time. Might start it tonight in fact! THANK YOU BABE!!!

Hmmm, what to say. I had a problem with this book, and the problem is {cringe}...I don't like baseball. I expected something more. I expected it to be more about this player's life than about the game. But it was SO much about the game, the game, the game. I didn't want to read about the game. *sigh* But bear in mind that that's MY problem! It did seem like it might be funny, with the bulletin board postings and such...but I regret to say that I did not make it through this book. I won't give it a rating because I think in light of my issues about ALL ball games...that shouldn't apply. I apologize to those who read it and enjoyed it before me, and I think others will enjoy it after me. It's just not my cup of coffee!

RELEASE NOTES:

Donated.