100 Books Like Chance

I was overwhelmed by this crazy, lovable, frightening novel. It fit right in with my paranormal/horror bend when I read it many years ago, and it provoked my interest in writing a few titles in the genre.

It fits the unique, quirky character theme perfectly with a first person narrative by a young, charismatic fry cook-writer-memoirist named Odd (real name) Thomas with a sixth sense, able to see demons when they arrive just before tragedy occurs. Yowza. His accomplice is his girlfriend and love interest, aptly named Stormy, who is not similarly gifted and seems to have more common sense than Odd.

According to the story, a certain “double whammy” fishing lure is guaranteed to produce outlandish success in pro bass fishing tournaments. The characters in this water-logged action/murder mystery were wonderful and outlandish, and there were many of them, part of Hiaasen’s appeal as an author.

This is an ensemble of crazy “Florida” people before “Florida man” became a thing. I loved the delivery, the slick prose, the humor, and the plot, and it made me read other novels by Hiaasen. It introduced me to one of the most memorable fictional characters I have ever read: Skink, no last name, a half-blind hermit, a roadkill delicacy aficionado, and an eco-terrorist. He perseveres through a lot on the way to becoming a great character in seven novels in the series.

This book is so freakin’ clever. Its realistic near-future aspects are outstanding, and it fits with my concerns about climate contamination and what the Earth might experience in just a few generations because of it. “In a world (read this in your deepest male announcer movie trailer voice) where sea level has risen enough to obsolete the first five or so floors of all the world’s skyscrapers—and there is no internet, so all business is done in cash—and no one trusts anyone…”

I liked the post-apocalyptic feel of it, the action, and the unique protagonist: a courier whose attaché case is grafted to the bones of his wrist via a titanium handcuff; an incredible visual. Also, a love story. But whose side is the courier’s love interest on?

This plot slayed me. One aspect of the plot, its lynchpin, was pure genius: What happens if a brain-damaged killer who’s been programmed to follow orders loses his handler/programmer to a freak accident in the middle of a terrorist plot in DC before a ransom can be delivered?

This thriller is what happens. Great use of a ticking clock and a machine-like, unstoppable antagonist. The protagonist is an everyman type but with a way-cool, oddball handwriting/document analysis background. Shades of Dan Brown’s Robert Langdon (on one of his better days) and Nicolas Cage’s character Benjamin Franklin Gates from National Treasure, the movie.

In Georgie Radbourn’s America, baseball (even the mention of it) is illegal, Winter is eternal and everyone over the age of eight must work in factories. All this because of dictator and embittered former baseball player Boss Swaggart. The people fear Swaggart and his Factory Police too much to resist. Georgie is born into this world, so he knows nothing else. Still, something in him rebels.

Shannon’s Orwellian tale is about baseball, yes, but it’s more than it appears (as is true of the best books). It’s about how we often don’t grasp how much we love something until it’s taken away. It’s about how, without the things that give us hope, spring never comes. It’s about how one brave person can triumph and inspire courage in others.

I was looking forward to this one and read it as soon as it came out, early on in these pandemic times. It’s not really a baseball novel, except it kinda, sorta is. Mostly, it’s a subversive look at a dystopian future that turns on the redemptive power of baseball. It made a lot of noise on publication, but the focus of most of the reviews leaned away from the baseball bits and into the dystopian bits. Gish Jen writes gloriously about the game – but also about life and love, longing and belonging, hope and hopelessness. 

Baseball fans of today, watching Shohei Ohtani and other players of Japanese heritage, might find it difficult to imagine how during World War Two, thousands of Japanese Americans were sent to internment camps after the bombing of Pearl Harbor, but that’s the world as it was.

Shorty and his father’s efforts to build a baseball diamond and form a league while imprisoned is the story of determination, overcoming adversity, and gaining self-respect, told simply and heartfully. 

A lifelong fan of a baseball team makes the best chronicler of its ballpark, and long-time Cubs sufferer (are there any other kind?) George Will explains the charms of Wrigley Field that endure in the face of a century (save for one glorious year) of near-misses, by-a-mile misses, and general misery. Ironically, Will composed this love letter to his Field of Despair just before the Cubs ended a 108-year drought by winning the 2016 World Series. But this may not really matter. For Will, and for all Cubs fans, Wrigley Field is more than the sum of its wins and losses. It transcends them.

This non-fiction book tells the story of professional scout Tony Lucadello, who spent more than forty years traveling the country watching thousands of high school, college, semi-pro and even sandlot baseball games. Winegardner’s writing is superb as he tells of his travels with Tony on his scouting trips. Again, this book is more about human nature and what is now a bygone time than it is about baseball—are you noticing a theme here in my recommendations?—though hardcore baseball fans will be enthralled by this book.

Both for sheer inspiration and for studying the craft of biography, I read this book at least five times while researching and writing Spitter. Absorbing, controversial, and courageous, this book offers a deeply disturbing look into the rise and fall of the most famous baseball icon of the twentieth century—and ‘the loneliest hero we ever had.” DiMaggio is rendered so vividly you almost want to look away. The book taught me the supreme importance of building the character, starting on page one, and of sustaining and expanding central and supplementary themes, chapter by chapter. It is also, simply put, a romping good read. If Spitter lives up to even one-tenth of this book’s brilliance, I would die a happy biographer.