Blog Archives
Military Kids
Seasons in Manana follows a boy growing up in a military family in the early 1970s, with a passion for baseball, who, after moving to Oahu, is kidnapped by a radical organization, leading to a lifelong trauma. What was the inspiration for the setup of your story?
My co-author, Scott, and I are brothers—only an 18-month age gap—and we actually did spend the better part of 1971 to 1974 as military dependent kids on the island of Oahu. And, as in the book, we actually were baseball-obsessed. So while the overall story is definitely fiction, there was very little of our baseball experiences that we had to make up. The counter-culture elements we experienced during our time in Hawaii were also very much the inspiration for what happens in the story—again, some of it fictional, some very much taken from real life. Also, it is my brother, Scott, who is the real-life counterpart of the main character, Alan. I would be closer to the Eric character.
Are there any emotions or memories from your own life that you put into your character’s life?
As mentioned above, both Scott and I made liberal use of our own experiences as military kids living in Hawaii for that three-year period in the early 70’s. That would include the stress and awkwardness of trying to fit into an island culture (albeit on the elementary school level) as “haole” mainlanders. In addition, there truly was a growing awareness of the dark and the menacing that surrounded us, even in a gated military housing area (and yes, it was named Manana). Much of that had to do with the current climate of the early 70’s. It actually was a quite unsettled time with America trying to wrap up the war in Vietnam, teenagers and parents often in bitter conflict with each other—not just over politics, but also over hair length, music, clothes, and yes, drug use. But having the Hawaii Five-O TV show on every week, also made that “menacing” aspect of island life seem all the more real (Oahu is a small place)! On the other hand, the emotion of discovering the glory of playing baseball for the first time—that is definitely in the book!
What were some themes that were important for you to explore in this book?
It wasn’t just simply exploring the glorious, and sometimes painful, world of all things baseball (Little League, following pro baseball, collecting baseball cards, etc.). Scott and I wanted to share how this captivating game could be viewed through the eyes of unjaded, elementary-school-age boys. Scott and I (as well as my younger brother, Kevin) were all on a mission during our Hawaii years: to play in the Little League World Series in Williamsport, Pennsylvania. After that, once we reached adulthood, the goal was to play in the Major Leagues. However, Scott and I were on the threshold of teenhood, so the flip side of our idyllic baseball-heavy island life was the aforementioned uneasiness with an often-scary youth counter-culture that was pervasive in the early 70’s. Throw an intense crush on an older teenage girl into the mix, and there’s a cauldron of mixed emotions going on!
What is the next book you are working on, and when can we expect it to be available?
I do know that Scott is working on another book. He hasn’t gone into it with me in detail, but it sounds like it will be a military thriller type novel. As for me, I do have a manuscript completed: it’s a novel having to do with the French Children’s Crusade of 1212. My goal is to have it published next year some time, but I don’t have a definite date yet.
Colorful Characters and Their Banter
The audiobook Baseball Humor: A Collection of Stories from Master Storytellers takes readers on a delightful journey through the eccentricities of baseball as told by some of the greatest sports fiction writers of all time. What inspired you to put this collection of stories together?
I’m a big fan of baseball and love baseball fiction. Several years ago, I worked as a voice actor on a radio drama based on You Know Me Al by Ring Lardner and I really liked his writing style. Then, a couple of years ago, I narrated a baseball biography about a Major Leaguer named Cy Williams who played from 1911 to 1930. The author included excerpts from newspaper and magazine articles, and I noticed the “flowery” writing compared to sports writing of today. At that time MLB was the dominant professional sport and the sports stories were a major source of entertainment. So, I read more Ring Lardner. He started as a sports writer but also wrote satire for magazines. And I discovered that many other writers, not just sports writers, wrote pieces about baseball. It dawned on me that the colorful characters and their banter would work well in audio format.
This is an amazing collection of Baseball stories that many readers may not have ever found on their own. How much research did you undertake for this book, and how much time did it take to put it all together?
The idea for the book was to find short stories that were both humorous and had dialogue that would be fun to bring to audio format. There first golden age of baseball started in the 1920s. I concentrated on that era. This project started out slowly. At first, I recorded stories in breaks in my audiobook narration schedule. It’s taken two years to complete but not full-time.
What was your favorite story in this collection and why?
I’ll say my favorite is “Alibi Ike” by Ring Lardner. It’s a satire about a talented ballplayer’s habit of making excuses about everything he does, whether good or bad, on or off the field. That earns him the nickname Alibi Ike from his teammates. He falls in love with the sister-in-law of the team’s manager. She mistakes his excuses for modesty and falls for him. She goes on a road trip with the team. He proposes and gives her an engagement ring but tries to keep it a secret from the team. In fact, one night he denies it. She finds out and walks out. He stops hitting, the team drops out of first place, and the irascible manager has to fix the mess. The story is almost entirely told through Lardner’s delightful dialogue.
What is the next book that you’re working on and when can your fans expect it out?
I’m working on a story about a courageous mayoral aide who is dealing with the squabbles in her city between a wealthy condo developer on beachfront property and the grumpy neighbors who oppose it. She leads a staff team on a retreat at a lake where they are instructed in sailing as a team-building exercise. While sailing she spots a man overboard and makes a rescue, and receives five million dollars. With that money, they come up with a solution to the property squabbles of which they had not previously thought. The timeline on it 6 months to complete but I’ll also be doing audiobook narration, which has deadlines that vary.
Author Links: X (Twitter) | Facebook | Website | Amazon
When Baseball Was King
When Baseball Was King, The New York Yankees Were Kings of Baseball by Dr. Len Bergantino is the full recounted story of the popular sport and its greatest players. From baseball’s history to its player’s stats and respective journeys throughout their careers. And while the main focus is the New York Yankees, there is also mention of other great teams and their players.
The peculiarity of this book is that it’s visually graphic. It includes texts and images from other sources such as magazines and newspapers. This adds a unique touch to back up the author’s quotes and citations. However, at times it seems like the author simply copied and pasted the pages of the books he thought relevant without summarizing and citing the information correctly. The book is fifty-three pages, almost a third of these being scans or excerpts from other books.
The story is narrated through Dr. Bergantino’s point of view as he discovers baseball and dives further deeper into its history and greatest stars. He tells the story of how his father introduced him to the sport and how he then fell in love with it; this gives it a nostalgic touch that I’m sure old baseball fans will very much appreciate.
While this book is non-fiction and primarily informative, having a “character” narrate gives it a storylike quality that makes it more enjoyable and feels less of an educational text and more like something to read for fun. This book gives readers a general insight into the sport and exciting facts about the most prominent players. It’s perfect for any baseball fans or as an introduction for anyone looking to get into the sport. It’s short and easy to read and quickly captivates the reader’s attention.
When Baseball Was King, The New York Yankees Were Kings of Baseball is an exciting historical look at the game with illuminating facts and entertaining stories.
Pages: 98 | ASIN : B085WMX5P6
Squash The Boorish Louts
The Ballpark Buster follows a boy who grows to be over seven feet tall and takes the baseball world by storm with his impressive skill and strength. What inspired the setup to your story?
I had been reading about a young man known as the Alton Giant — Robert Wadlow of Alton, IL. Robert had a pituitary disorder that caused him to grow at an unprecedented rate. In fact, he was more than 8 feet 11 inches tall when he died at the young age of 22 in 1940. Somewhere around the time of that research, I accidentally rediscovered a set of captivating baseball park cartoons done by artist Gene Mack for the Sporting News in the mid-1940s. I liked these cartoons as a kid, and as I revisited the panels after all these years I started thinking about what would happen if a super-large kid (one who benefited from a surgery that Robert Wadlow did not get) landed in historic baseball settings of the past. It took a lot of fitting together of plot puzzle pieces and baseball chronology in order to make this “new” history possible, but my big kid Buster made his way and knocked down quite a few barriers.
Buster Logan is a charming character. What were some driving ideals behind his character’s development?
I wanted to keep Buster pretty down-to-earth throughout the book. Although he has obvious physical gifts, I didn’t want him to try and intimidate anyone as he competed in professional sports and lived his life. He did not draw attention to himself. He was a quiet boy with a lively sense of humor. He never veered away from the simple values of loving one’s family and being accepting of others along the way.
What were some themes that were important for you to explore in this book?
Buster’s great size often positioned him as an outsider, and I didn’t minimize the struggles he had as a young person who sometimes took abuse from competitors, unruly fans and insensitive strangers. In the book, Buster rubs shoulders with others who are outside the norm in one way or another — players like Jackie Robinson, Babe Ruth and Ted Kluszewski. Buster both provides and receives encouragement from them. He interacts with a number of vicious people (including one major league manager) and, with great effort, learns to conduct himself with restraint even though he’s tempted to squash the boorish louts.
What is the next book that you are working on and when will it be available?
This isn’t anything traditional, but these days I’m writing and assembling a large compendium of comedic wordplay puns paired with images. (You could even say they’re memey.) I’m likely to release them as a collection in early 2023.
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The Ballpark Buster
The Ballpark Buster by Don Shearer tells the story of an average kid, Buster, who lives an ordinary life like everyone else, with just one difference: he’s well over six feet in height by the time he’s twelve years old. Buster strives to have a normal life, hanging out with friends, going to school, helping his parents at home, and playing sports, despite this unusual medical condition that rapidly speeds up his growth rate. Instead of focusing on the challenges of his record-breaking height, Buster Logan uses it to his advantage to become an athlete. He quickly learns how his size can work for him, not against his pursuits, transforming his life from ordinary to an extraordinary nationwide sports hero.
This fascinating story is set in the 1940’s, imbuing this sports fiction story a unique historical fiction feel. The story explores the golden era of major league baseball, a simpler life, and the nostalgia of this decade. Shearer writes a rousing story which feels like a classic with a clear and lighthearted tone throughout, making this an easy read. It’s a fun book for children and young adults. It conveys the importance of living your life to its fullest potential and using any attribute you have, including an unusual height, to your advantage.
Shearer adds creative and unique characteristics into a tale that could otherwise be considered ordinary. It’s a fantastic story for baseball fans as there are pictures of ballparks included, and the descriptions give the reader a decent visual of the author’s love of the game. It’s an inspirational and feel-good story that makes a great light read. I recommend The Ballpark Buster for its creativity and simple but profound writing that makes a fun story for all ages.
Pages: 287 | ASIN: B0B7QP7V9X
When Baseball Was King the New York Yankees Were King of Baseball
When Baseball was King The New York Yankees were King of Baseball recounts some of the greatest baseball players ever. Author Dr. Len Bergantino is able to recount many of their stats, from how fast pitchers could throw and how fast the greatest players could hit! From Mickey Mantle, Yogi Berra, and Jackie Robinsons, we get to read about how great each player was. While mostly discussing great Yankee players, Dr. Bergantino also discusses some of the other great players from other teams, such as the Cleveland Indians and the Brooklyn Dodgers.
I enjoyed reading about some of baseball’s greatest players in this enlightening book. The author is correct about baseball not being such a loved sport anymore. Most people seem to enjoy football now. While I have personally heard about most of the players mentioned, I didn’t know their stats. Reading about the batting averages from back then compared to the players now was eye-opening. It makes me wonder what has changed in the players between then and now.
I enjoyed reading the letters that Dr. Bergantino wrote to Carl Erskine. It was nice to see that Mr. Erskine replied to his letters as well. He even sent a copy of his book. While he originally disliked Carl Erskine because he was a great pitcher for the Dodgers, he realized he did like him in the end because he was such a great player.
There are scans of other books that Dr. Len Bergantino wrote inside this book. There are excerpts from those books as well. They are printed multiple times as well leaving the actual story to be about 45 pages. The rest is from the other books.
This is an illuminating book that conjures a nostalgic feeling while providing readers with interesting facts about great baseball players. I enjoyed this story, especially when the author talked about watching baseball as a kid. This is a great read for any fan of the New York Yankees and anyone interested in baseball history.
Pages: 98 | ASIN: B085WMX5P6
A Universal Fantasy
Born for the Game follows a man that has worked hard for all he has in life, now he wants to create the perfect baseball player. What was the inspiration for the setup of your story?
The original idea grew from a story I heard in the 1970’s about a blind man who tripped over his dog’s dish, hit the wall with his head and was able to see. I thought that there are tremendous possibilities within the brain. I played a lot of ball as a kid, so I originally thought of a baseball player who hits his head in a car accident and becomes the greatest ballplayer of all time, even though he was well past his prime. The story changed over the past 40 years, but the concept of being the greatest of all time and the challenges accompanying that lofty goal, remained the crux of the story. What does it take to be the greatest at anything? This is a universal question and dreaming about it is a universal fantasy. Someone has to be the best. Why not me? Why not you? The possibility of it, albeit slight, exists, and that’s what makes it so much fun to imagine.
Ryan Stone is the result of Phineas’s plan for the perfect player. What were some driving ideals behind her development?
When I was looking at a story with all-male characters, I thought it was in desperate need of a strong female presence, so I thought that the challenges facing a female to be the greatest baseball player adds so much more fuel to the story’s fire. Once I decided on that concept, I began thinking what a female would have to do to be better than men. Just because it’s never been done before doesn’t mean it cannot be done. Those who lived before the Wright brothers could have never imagined that a ton of steel and fuel could fly through the air to deliver people and goods all over the world or that picture and sound could be transmitted through airwaves into space and then shot down into your phone or TV. Just because it hasn’t been done, doesn’t mean it cannot be done. I had to build a story where this idea was feasible.
What were some themes that were important for you to explore in this book?
The pursuit of dreams, love, betrayal, gender roles, and how choices drive our life’s journey.
What is the next book that you are working on and when will it be available?
It’s hard to say at this point because I decided to work on getting a literary agent this year. I’d like to see my books as films. First, I write the screenplay and then I write the novel. Writing one book for me is writing two. I have several ideas for other stories and none of them are in the sports genre. I’ve written four books and a short story in the sports genre… although I really do flip genres during my stories, so this next one will be a whole new platform. I have seven or eight ideas scribbled on a piece of paper, but I won’t even begin until at least a year from now.
Author Links: GoodReads | Twitter | Facebook | Website
Multi-award-winning author Mike DeLucia is back with new and exciting characters, and a story about the pursuit of dreams, love, betrayal, and how choices drive our life’s journey.
Phineas Stone’s life as a dwarf and a product of the foster-care system mold his dogged determination to rise above his meager circumstances and build a financial empire. But even his magnificent wealth and influence cannot buy his lifelong dream of playing baseball for his beloved Los Angeles Greyhounds.
Together with Rollie Rollins, a former Major League knuckleballer with a penchant for mischief, and his longtime friend, Ito Hachi, Phineas effects a brilliant, yet unorthodox plan of creating an elite athlete under a veil of secrecy and pretense.
The characters in this story are driven by their dreams, but ultimately realize that chasing them brings with it the possibilities of both rapture or insufferable tragedy.
Born for the Game
What does it take to become the greatest of all time? Mike DeLucia’s new book, Born for the Game, presents a well-crafted and riveting premise where a bit of cleverness and hard work is all you need to achieve the impossible. Phineas Stone has big dreams, he’s trying to build a big, successful life for himself, and there’s nothing that can get in the way of reaching his goals. He creates a successful and profitable business through pure will, yet he knows that his biggest dream is one he can’t actually accomplish: getting the chance to play in the major leagues. Nevertheless, his immense determination and his inventiveness lead him to craft a plan through which he intends to create the greatest baseball player of all time.
Readers will find Phineas’ plan exciting to experience, from design to execution. He made sure to keep close people with talent and MLB connections to pull it all off. The plan involved the creation of the perfect baseball player from its conception, where he chose two of the most talented people as parents and only left one thing to chance: the gender of the baby. With this, we finally meet Ryan Stone, a girl and possibly the perfect player that Phineas had envisioned. Readers will have the fantastic opportunity of seeing Ryan’s unique career from the moment she was just a child, and it’s such an exciting and intriguing idea that readers absolutely will enjoy.
The book is structured in short chapters, each gripping and with a new, adventurous idea to present. DeLucia is an incredible storyteller. From the very beginning, readers will be hooked, flipping through every page to find out more, learn about Ryan’s experience, and finally see if she was going to prove herself. Phineas Stone was able to turn his plan from fantasy into reality, which will immediately captivate readers. There’s so much to love in this book, the writing, the story, the characters: everything is perfectly structured. It’s also fascinating getting to explore the idea of a girl trying to become the greatest baseball player of all time, demolishing sexist notions on her way to achieving the most significant success.
Born for the Game is a story about hard work, talent, and family. There are so many lessons hidden in this fiction story, making it entertaining and inspiring. Ryan is such a unique character with a fierce personality and unstoppable attitude that will leave readers asking for more. This riveting and enthralling story will entertain readers of sports fiction, women’s fiction, and baseball lovers of all kinds.
Pages: 179 | ASIN : B09KF6GCGN
LITERARY TITAN 