Beisbol is spoken here
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Baseball haunts me. It has followed me throughout my adult life, and I'm not sure why. I have never been a particularly ardent fan, although growing up in Houston, what was not to like about Dome Foam and peanuts? The baseball thing has been purely mental. And it's grown on me, as any good national pastime should.
When I interviewed for my first job in adult trade publishing (that just means general interest grown up books, not anything Heidi Fleiss would hawk), even though my company carried the same name as the perhaps mythic inventor of baseball, I insisted that I would never work on "sports bios." I was in it to pursue High Literature. How else would I become Maxwell Perkins? The Editor who hired me assured me that there were no worries on that front. The first book we worked on together was Nails: The Autobiography of Lenny Dykstra.
I would like to say that this low brow turn of events was disillusioning, but it actually began the wonderful clandestine relationship that I have with baseball. After Nails, I got to work on Throwing Heat, Nolan Ryan's autobiography, and Noel Hynd's The Giants of the Polo Grounds. Then I got to publish Jane Leavy's touching, funny Squeeze Play. The number of words I have read about baseball is exponentially higher than the number of lifetime games I have attended.
But I love baseball. It has been bery, bery good to me, and I find it bery symbolic and inspirational. Being married to a lacrosse coach, I can't often admit that. Lacrosse and baseball...well, let's just say they're like the Mets and the Yankees. You're supposed to be true to one, and caring for both is a little like being a bigamist. So I get my baseball at the office. And I love it.
Last fall, I had the honor of working on a book about Craig Biggio. I did the usual editorial shaping, flap-copy writing, book thing, but working with Larry Dierker and Richard Justice on their Introduction and Foreword and spending quality time with photographer Michael Hart's gorgeous, emotionally intense pictures took the whole experience to the next level. With no sports cred, I got to talk shop with some of the most knowledgeable people in the industry. And they were so gracious. No question I had was treated as dumb, and all were answered. Once again, without even going near a stadium, I was deep in the heart of baseball, back with my illicit love. Don't tell my husband.
What's better, not only did Michael's touching book about Craig Biggio's final game turn out to be a book that we are all proud to have been a part of, now it's gotten legs of its own. A gift store here in Houston called Events--the kind of store that carries everything from your dream china to exotic perfume bottles, Godiva chocolate and clever holiday presents--had a signing for The Final Game that raised thousands and thousands of dollars for Chloe's Wish. Chloe was a little girl with Ewing's sarcoma whom Craig befriended through the Sunshine Kids. She didn't make it, but her wish was to raise $100,000.00 so that other kids would not have to suffer as she had. He promised her he would help, and now this book about him is helping, too.
Baseball definitely haunts me, in moving and beautiful ways. The sport and the players who epitomize everything that is good and noble and true about it make such good copy. Good news in a bad news bear market. Nolan, Larry, Craig: it feels funny to think of these powerful hometown heroes by their first name, but through their books, they have become men of my dreams. Bery good dreams about bery talented, giving men and the intriguing game that brought us together.
Just get it down on paper, and then we'll see what to do with it.
-Maxwell Perkins
