Book review: Baseball’s longest game

There’s something magical about a trip to the ballpark – the cry of the hotdog vendors, the plop of the ball, the leisurely parry-and-thrust rhythm of the game. Ever since my father took me to Shea Stadium long ago to watch the N.Y. Mets play, I’ve been a lover of the game.

So, I was delighted to read “The Bottom of the 33rd: Hope, Redemption and Baseball’s Longest Game,” a book by Dan Barry that captures the sensations, devotion, and sweep of the sport. Here’s the review of the book that I did for the Associated Press:

Dan Barry writes of pro baseball’s longest game

By MONICA RHOR, For The Associated Press

For the faithful, baseball is a receptacle of memories, dreams, history. And a trip to a ball game is a visit to the cathedral, a ritual brimming with sounds and sights and stories.

So, it follows that the longest game ever recorded in professional baseball would be rife with untold tales of triumph and tragedy, sorrow and struggle, comedy and competition. Untold, that is, until now.

In “Bottom of the 33rd: Hope, Redemption, and Baseball’s Longest Game,” Dan Barry, the gifted New York Times national columnist, has crafted a meticulously reported, finely embroidered account of the infamous minor league face-off between the Pawtucket Red Sox and the Rochester Red Wings …

To read the entire review, click here.