Or maybe they did. Or maybe nobody ever thought of it before. If you had a contest of either the most unlikely types of books or ideas that you just didn't think would work, this would probably top the list. Baseball and Gothic horror? Taking place in WWII-era South? In the summer? But oh man is it good, in large part to Bishop's attention to period detail and his creation of a unique and feisty narrator in the young (and old) Danny Boles. The premise is that a young reporter has tracked down Mr Boles in an attempt to write a book about his life (he's a well known baseball scout) and Danny agrees, only if the first book the reporter does is a story of his only season playing in a professional fashion, with the Hellbenders. Thus the story begins, winding along, following Danny and his attempts to fit in with his team. The team consists of some of the most interesting characters, nay, people to come by in a long time. There is no one there that you can either straight out love or hate, the worst person has an endearing trait, the best of them hides a secret of some sort. Towering over it all literally is Jumbo Hank Clerval, the man who winds up being Danny's roommate (partway through the book he loses the ability to speak, which makes it even more interesting because Danny is forced to watch without acting more often than not) and the focus of the book itself. If you don't know how Mr Clerval is, well I won't spoil it for you, but that's where the unlikely concept comes in. The rest of the book is pitch perfect summer baseball, I don't even like sports that much and I loved this book. You sweat with the team as they win and lose game after game, fighting for the pennnant, trying to get some dignity and recognition in a country where everyone else is focused on the war effort and using baseball just as reason to forget their worries. Against this backdrop the summer falls and you are immersed into the South, warts and all, racism and truimph, tragedy and heroism. It's all there, this book breaks genres and it's a book you can recommend to most anyone. And I suggest you do.

A fabulous combination of the horror genre and sports writing. To top it off, Bishop is strong writer. His characters are well-developed and likable (I hate reading a book where I don't like anyone) and he's excellent at turning a phrase. He's even able to provide a highly believable re-creation of 18th century writing. Some of the events are disturbing, some humorous, and it all comes together beautifully.

BRITTLE INNINGS is a gem of a story -- a World War II Southern Gothic fantasy baseball novel (and I think I may have left out one of the other genres), as comfortable as an old glove.

I especially enjoyed the idiom in Bishop's dialogue (when a girl calls a soldier "sojer," it's spelled that way) and the terrific baseball sequences, especially an extended account of a spellbinding matchup between the Hellbenders and a talented Negro League team. The casual racism by the white characters is painful to read, but unfortunately rings true.

I didn't want this moving story to end. Save it for summer and savor this true find.

Two final notes: I'm dismayed with all the spoilers that give away Jumbo's identity -- it really ought to be saved for the reader to think out. And for those who enjoyed BRITTLE INNINGS, look for a novel called IF I NEVER GET BACK by a guy named Daryl Brock. It's a time-travel novel set in the very early days of baseball, and has some of the same winsome qualities as BRITTLE.

La editorial Pathfinder y los lectores fieles siempre sostienen que lo que más le molesta al imperio de una revolución es el ejemplo que pone. En el caso de Granada admitió tal tesis. Los asesores de Reagan dijeron lo peor de la revolución granadiense no fue tanto de porque es una isla de negros, sino que son anglohablantes: podrían comunicar directamente con estadounidenses inconformes y rebeldes.

Los conocedores de Pathfinder a veces la llamamos "la editorial de los mártires" porque sus libros más populares dan voz a generaciones pasadas; ésta es un ejemplar glorioso. A Bishop era el primer ministro de la revolución, y le hicieron mártir en el momento que literalmente encabezó la resistencia a la contrarrevolución.

This is the story of a big revolution in a very small country.In 1979 the movement led by Maurice Bishop overthrew the local dictator of Greneda, one E.Gairy.Land reform,free education and health care, new forms of working people's power to replace outdated parliamentary "democracy" which led to the dictator in the first place, development of agriculture and tourism as national industries to benefit the workers and farmers instead of superrich foreign bosses : all this inevitablely infuriated Washington D.C. But most of all they feared and loathed the fact that Grenada marched alongside the other anti-capitalist revolutions in the region : in Cuba and Nicaragua.Read this book and find out why Fidel Castro said "Cuba, Nicaragua and Grenada are three giants rising up in the Carribean."Perhaps most interesting for fighters against the profit system in this country is the story of the evolution of Bishop and his comrades : from Carribean followers of Malcolm X to socialist revolutionaries.The Stalinist coup that assasinated Bishop and opened the door to Reagan and the Democrats' bipartisan brutal invasion in 1983 is also well covered here.Others in the Carribean will take the same road during the new Great Depression looming in our ( workers' and farmers' ) future.

Advertisements for cruises and holidays to Grenada describe this Caribbean island as a place where "nothing much ever happens". The truth could not be more different. Less than 20 years ago Maurice Bishop led a popular revolution there that lasted for three and a half years and involved Grenada's working people of town and countryside in transforming their society and lives. The Grenada Revolution's giant strides in popular education, economic production, slashing unemployment, and developing national pride and internationalism, are graphically detailed in this outstanding book of Bishop's speeches that were made in the course of the revlutionary years. Bishop and the people of Grenada wrote an imperishable chapter in world history. The speeches address not just the situation of one small island, but the entire world faced with the crisis of capitalism that has sharpened greatly in the past two decades. This book is also valuable for the introductory analysis by Steve Clark of how the revolution was overthrown from within with the murder of Bishop and other revolutionary leaders in October 1983, plus indispensable documents from the Cuban government and speeches by Fidel Castro on Cuba's role in supporting the revolution.

It's difficult to easily categorize these dark works of fantasy: they are short stories written by such notables as Ray Bradbury, Michael Bishop, Nina Kiriki Hoffman and others, blending literature and art and all based on the strange kinetic sculpture Crowded After Hours by Lisa Snellings. Dark carnival stories probe the limits of humanity.

Strange Attraction is a fascinating anthology that combines quality writing, art and binding into a unique synthesis. This showcase volume presents memorable and highly recommended work by Michael Bishop, Ray Bradbury, Ed Bryant, Richard lee Byers, Nancy A. Collins, Jack Dann & Janeen Webb, Charles de Lint, James Dorr, Harlan Ellison, Neil Gaiman, Nina Kiriki Hoffman, Alexandra Elizabeth Honigsberg, Caitlin R. Kiernan, Brad Linaweaver, Jason Miller, Fred Olin Ray, Robert J. Sawyer, Darrell Schweitzer, John Shirley, S.P. Somtow, Chet Williamson, David N. Wilson, and Gene Wolfe.

Strange Attraction is a fascinating anthology that combines quality writing, art and binding into a unique synthesis. This showcase volume presents memorable and highly recommended work by Michael Bishop, Ray Bradbury, Ed Bryant, Richard lee Byers, Nancy A. Collins, Jack Dann & Janeen Webb, Charles de Lint, James Dorr, Harlan Ellison, Neil Gaiman, Nina Kiriki Hoffman, Alexandra Elizabeth Honigsberg, Caitlin R. Kiernan, Brad Linaweaver, Jason Miller, Fred Olin Ray, Robert J. Sawyer, Darrell Schweitzer, John Shirley, S.P. Somtow, Chet Williamson, David N. Wilson, and Gene Wolfe.

ALTHOUGH KAPLAN'S BOOK CLINICAL CHEMISTRY IS MORE EXTENSE, AND COVERS THE SUBJECTS QUITE DEEPLY, THIS BOOK IS A CONCISE, AND GOOD, ALTERNATIVE. IT'S MAIN ADVANTAGE IS THAT ALL SUBJECTS ARE NEWLY REVISED AND TRIES TO OFFER THE CLASSICAL AND NEWEST METHODS IN USE IN CLINICAL LABORATORIES.

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When I first opened the Crayon Kingdom, I thought it was a beautiful book full of interesting characters like the Veggie Tales but as I started to get into the story, I found it to be much more. Teaching our children about different cultures and how we all work together to make a beautiful world so is important and this author does a wonderful job of doing just that! The book is easy to read and is suitable for the child to read by himself or for a parent to read to the child. The working parent will like the appreciate this book as it can easily be read in just a short period of time and teach values that will last a lifetime! Recommend you pick up a copy soon!

I thought the book was easy to read and understand. I liked how the author used crayons as her subject. Crayons are something all kids love! I liked how she showed how the crayons can get along even tho they are different colors. Just like how people can get along no matter what color we are! I would recommend this book!

I feel a certain closeness to this tome, for I live in this little Georgia town and operate the Restaurant featured in the tale. Michael and his wife have been my land persons for over 10 years . . . This gifted writer has the ability to take an impossibility and build it into a charming character. His habaline grew so believibly in every aspect that I felt a kinship to him and echoed his emotional experiences as they occured. If this is his statement of personal philosophy, Michael Bishop is a very strong and admirable person! Treat yourself to a well-written story that will leave a lasting impression with you.

Pamela Sargent very very rarely lets me down with her science fiction. I was luckily enough to just find this collection of her short stories and read it through in only two days. The vast majority of the stories are excellent -- well written and populated by enticing characters. Well worth the time and money if you like strong but realistic female characters.

We already owned a copy of this book when I decided to order another one as a gift. The book is designed to help children see that God made all people of all colors and it takes all of us to make up this world. It shows how dull the pictures would be if only one color is used. The only problem I had was that the description of the item # I ordered from Amazon.com didn't specify that I wasn't ordering another copy of the book - I was ordering a 5 pack of Crayon Kingdom Coloring Books??

This book is introspective without being maudlin, and I find
myself struggling for a better word than "wistful", but alas,
no cross-referenced OED at my fingertips.

Therefore: I can promise you this, there's not a happy ending in the book, and I found myself at first very disappointed in this growing trend. At some point in the third short story, I realized that he would supply no easy answers, and the converse might prove true: nothing but hard questions from here on.

Stories wrapped up neatly, even with the bad guy winning, aren't a possibility for Shepard. Life is like that sometimes, and the choices that lead you to a place you wish you hadn't visited. But, since you're there, take in the scenery and try to pass on a warning to others...

This is my first formal introduction to Lucius Shepard; it won't be my last meeting with his work, for sure.

The Jaguar Hunter is still the best introduction to the frustratingly inconsistent work of Lucius Shephard. Shephard is at his best in short stories and some of those in this collection show a real mastery of the form, telling often quite simple moral tales in settings packed dense with strange underpinning imagery and meaning.

The collection divides into several different overlapping types: traveller's tales, New England horror, Latin American magic realism, those dealing with the ongoing shadow cast by Nazism, fantasy etc. It is really a matter of taste which you prefer: my own favourites are the title story, which tingles with atmosphere and magical possibility; the two treatments of the legacy of the Third Reich - the terrifying 'Mengele', and the bizarre, menacing 'A Spanish Lesson'; and the magnificent 'R&R'. I like the New England-set tales less, but even they far outdo Stephen King.

Shephard's writing has never been better than is these early stories (and also in the underrated novel 'Life During Wartime'); lush but never bloated and often ironic but always moral. I just wish he would find his form again and stop writing yet more vampire novels!

Fourteen short stories, including a novella new to print, provide a fine collection of Lucius Shepard's skills in Jaguar Hunter, and outstanding anthology headed by a Nebula-winning title story. From a war of the future and wind spirits to a woman's end of life, this is filled with diverse plots.