The Man Who Once Played
Catch with Nellie Fox
Academy Chicago Publishers, 1998

Category: Fiction
Format: Hardcover. 264 pp. 5 1/2 x 7 1/2
ISBN: 0-89733-448-5

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About the Book
At forty, Hank has decided he’s through with baseball-a routine pop-up fell on his head and he got the message. Trouble is, baseball is the one thing that’s given any meaning to his life. This is the painfully funny story of a man who decides to get a life, but isn’t sure how. It’s about fathers and sons, heroes and whiners, the wheel of fortune (and Vanna White), baseball and the decline of Western civilization-and why Nellie Fox always spat in his glove.

        Bronze award winner of Foreword Magazine’s 2001 Book of the Year for humor.

 

From Publishers Weekly
“…winsome, workaday novel… like the hapless Chicago Cubs, Manderino’s characters possess miles and miles of heart.”

From Kirkus Reviews
” Loopy, bittersweet send-up of a boozing, over-the-hill suburban Chicago baseball team… Manderino’s sunny second novel will have aging baseball fans believing that sandlot fellowship and a woman’s tender love really can save men from cynicism, bad marriages, and dead-end dreams.”

From Roger Kahn, author of The Boys of Summer
” …a delight for enthusiasts of that small gritty gifted Hall of Famer and a fine read for ball fans everywhere.”

From Aethlon
“…pitch perfect narrative…”

From Bill Gleason, at the Daily Southtown
“…it’s hilarious.”