Center fielder, Harvey Blissberg, wasn't happy about the move. After five good seasons with the Boston Red Sox, they left him unprotected in the expansion draft, and before he knew it, he was on his way to play for the Providence Jewels. But that's baseball, and the season wasn't a total loss. This was his best year, yet. He was really in the groove, hitting above 300, leading the Jewels in batting, doubles and stolen bases, and dating the very beautiful and talented sportscaster, Mickey Slavin. But all that good fortune came crashing down around him when his friend and roommate, relief pitcher, Rudy Furth, was found murdered in the club house whirlpool. What kind of trouble could Rudy have been into that would get his head bashed in with a baseball bat? As the days drag on with the police investigation going nowhere, a frustrated Harvey decides to take matters into his own hands and find the truth..... It's easy to see why Richard Rosen's, Strike Three You're Dead, won the Edgar Award for best first novel. This is a very intelligent and entertaining mystery, full of subtle twists and red herrings, vivid scenes, marvelous, engaging characters, and witty and irreverent writing and dialogue. Mr Rosen's indepth knowledge and expertise in the world of baseball adds real credibility to the story and once you meet Harvey Blissberg, and the rest of the gang, you'll be hooked. So sit down and get comfortable; Strike Three You're Dead is about to grab you on page one and I can guarantee this mystery won't let you go until you've read the very last page.

Being a mystery writer with my debut novel in its initial release, I genuinely enjoyed Richard Rosen's STRIKE THREE, YOU'RE DEAD. Having written, early in my career, a series of mystery short stories set against a bush league baseball backrop, I know well the territory Mr. Rosen is exploring. Harvey Blissberg is a star player on the expansion Providence Jewels. He was once a star for the Boston Red Sox. His best friend is murdered, and Harvey finds himself forced to solve the crime. This book won an Edgar in its initial release. FADEAWAY, STURDAY NIGHT DEAD, and WORLD OF HURT followed it. Now a decade later, Mr. Rosen is resurrecting his series in a few months with DEAD BALL. Mr. Rosen's series is a fine one, mixing equal parts of mystery and baseball ( and as Robert Parker once wrote about Troy Soos's excellent baseball mystery series,"Equal parts of baseball and mystery are the perfect combination.") Read this book as soon as you can.

If you're a baseball fan and a murder mystery fan then you will enjoy this work from R.D. Rosen. Harvey Blissburg, star player on a hapless expansion team, is suddenly involved in a sensational mystery as his best friend and star reliver Rudy Furth is found murdered in the whirlpool. With the help of Mickey, his sportscaster girifriend, Harvey doggedly puts together the pieces of the puzzle trying to find out who murdered his best friend. One red herring after another intervenes - a love struck fan, an inept and unscrupulous cop, the team manager's amourous wife who has a story of her own to tell and a small time hood. But Harvey presses on, all the while trying to hang on to his fading career and reach a .300 batting average.

The book gives an amzingly detailed portrait of a baseball season as a backdrop for the murder. This will appeal to baseball fans (such as me). But the author does not spare any detail in providing the reader with clues as to who the murderer is. He balances the drama of a baseball season with the drama of a murder mystery and does it very well. I read this book in a day because I did not want to put it down.

Strike Three You're Dead has alot to offer for baseball fans and murder myatery fans. It is very entertaining and spellbinding.

While some of the methods described have faded out of sight (primal scream therapy, est, etc) this book is still a useful (and entertaining) tool in analyzing the continuing flim-flammery of popular psychology. While expressing sensitivity towards those seeking help with real emotional and mental difficulties, Rosen questions the power and effectiveness of pop psychologists and their painful, expensive, and often humiliating methods.

This review originally appeared on my Weblog:...

While Providence may not have had a major league team since 1884, in R.D. Rosen's world, Providence is a major league team, home to the Providence Jewels, along with an architectural treasure of a ball park located somewhere around India Point park.

Rosen has written a series of mysteries featuring Harvey Blissberg, a former Providence Jewel player turned detective turned motivational speaker. Blissberg is a great detective character- by turns blustery, unsure of himself, and self-effacing. He's a very likable character, flaws and all. And of course, seeing places like Wayland Square, Haven Brothers, and the Industrial National Bank Building is very interesting for the Rhode Island savvy among us.

Rosen's geography is a little off (in Dead Ball, he has Routes 95 and 195 confused at points-- 195 passes over Richmond Street, not 95!) but that's a tiny niggle. He gets lots of geographical things right too!

The books are great fun if you like mysteries. The plots move along relatively quickly, and reading about Providence and the mythical Providence Jewels makes you wish we did have a ball club (forget about the headaches of traffic, parking, and corruption for a minute.)

Read the books, you'll be glad you did!

It looks like Providence Jewel outfielder, Moss Cooley, may be ready to do the impossible. His bat is red hot; he's hit in 46 consecutive games, and he's zeroing in on DiMaggio's 56-game hitting streak record...the record, experts said, that would never be broken. But not everyone is thrilled by the possibility, and with all his success and notoriety, comes hate mail. When Moss receives a headless lawn jockey with a death threat attached, team management decides to call in the big guns, former Jewel's center fielder, turned private detective, Harvey Blissberg, to protect their star player. But "babysitting" isn't enough for Harvey, and once he sinks his teeth into the case and starts digging, he can't let go until he gets to the truth..... Mystery lovers and baseball enthusiasts will be glad to know that Richard Rosen is finally back, after a long hiatus, with another Harvey Blissberg mystery. Dead Ball is a well paced, intriguing, page turner, full of great characters, vivid scenes, and subtle plot twists that keep you off balance and guessing to the end. But it's Mr Rosen's smart, crisp, intelligent writing, and witty and irreverent dialogue that really makes this novel stand out, and his obvious love of the game, and knowledge of baseball history adds real credibility to the story. With its stunning conclusion, and very satisfying ending, Dead Ball is a novel that should definitely be placed at the top of every mystery fan's "Must Read" list. If you're new to the Harvey Blissberg series, start at the beginning with Strike Three, You're Dead, and read them all. If you're already a groupie, Harvey's back, and better than ever!

Harvey Blisberg was once a good outfielder for the Providence Jewels. After retiring he became a private investigator until all the evil he witnessed threatened to turn him into a madman. He quit to become a motivational speaker, but gave up on that too because he did not believe his own words.

Harvey accepts a job as bodyguard to Jewel's superstar Moss Cooley, a black man closing in on Joe DiMaggio's once unbreakable hitting record. The excellent baseball player has (not surprisingly) begun receiving hate mail but there is one death threat that worries team officials because they think that someone is very serious about harming Moss. As he watches over his client, Harvey realizes that this is not about breaking a record by a black man, but is about Moss and someone connected to him. Harvey places himself in peril by following the serpentine trail from Moss to his tormentor.

Baseball fans are going to love this exciting sports mystery that stars an endearing curmudgeon as a hero. The action is fast-paced and the characters, especially Harvey and Moss, feel genuine. With MEAN STREET, RD Rosen hits a home run to rival that of Maz.

Harriet Klausner

Due to its close, albneit fictitious, association with the show and its producer (Lorne Michaels), the plot of Saturday Night Dead kept me involved in the story moreso than it would have if it was a straight mystery centered around a made-up TV show. However, while the story holds your interest, it is somewhat contrived and the believabilty of some of the characters requires a big stretch of the imagination -- especially, the main character, Harvey Blissberg, who shortly after retiring as a professional baseball player becomes such an adept private-eye that he's able to solve a murder case that the NYC police department can't begin to get close to solving. All this aside, if you're in the mood for a very fast read and a mystery that holds your attention, you could do a lot worse than reading Saturday Night Dead.

I loved it! I couldn't stop reading because I wasn't bored by it.