by David B. Stinson (Huntington Park Publications, 2011).
They did build it, and they did come.
The “build” part are dozens of old baseball parks and stadiums, now long gone. The “they” are the hundreds of athletes who played for various teams in the late 19th and early 20th century. Such is the focus of David Stinson‘s engaging novel Deadball
As in other works of baseball fiction, the protagonist is a former player, in this case Byron “Bitty” Bennett, a minor leaguer who never was considered a prospect and only got as far as AAA. He manages to stay in the game, working for a minor league team but his real love is not the baseball present (perhaps since he is on the periphery), but the baseball past. Bennett is a student of the game, specifically the art and architecture of those old fields.
Deadball is set in 1999, Tiger Stadium’s last season. Bennett travels there and to other cities on a quest that begins in his hometown of Baltimore where encounters some mysterious old men who have connections with the game. When he starts seeing people and things that shouldn’t be there, he begins to question his sanity and beliefs, as do several of his friends.
There are numerous similarities to Shoeless Joe/Field of Dreams here; not everyone can see what Bennett experiences. His faith is sorely tested. What is reality? How do we know what we know (hence the “Metaphysical” aspects)? The author does not delve heavily into philosophy aspects, but Deadball is more thoughtful than most baseball novels and it does require one to pay attention.
At times, Stinson’s eye for detail can be a bit much when he discusses the history of the ballparks, especially the geography; at times it feels like reading a GPS, with its street directions and neighborhood information. In addition, certain aspects of the characters’ dialogue seem a bit forced or otherwise ring a bit untrue at times. But these are minor considerations given the overall nature of this entertaining and bittersweet story.
The author posted this entry on his blog describing the process of creating the cover for his novel.
is available on Amazon.com,
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