Hanging Curve
A Mickey Rawlings Baseball Mystery
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4.0 • 2 Ratings
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- $2.99
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- $2.99
Publisher Description
"Equal parts baseball and mystery are the perfect proportion." --Robert Parker
A Race To Stay Alive
1922. Another year, another team. Utility infielder Mickey Rawlings is now warming the pine for the St. Louis Browns, a team poised to go all the way. Rawlings should be overjoyed with the situation but the lack of playing time has him sneaking off to play incognito in the semi-pros. The competition is just as rough, though. In fact, some of the best players to ever throw a curveball or line up for a swing are his opponents. The only reason they aren't in the majors is because of their team color--black. Turns out that's the least of their worries. When the star pitcher of the Negro East St. Louis Cubs is found lynched after a win, Rawlings has to do everything he can to track down the killer and prevent a repeat of the deadly race riots of 1917. If he can stay alive. . .
Praise for the Mickey Rawlings Baseball Mysteries
"Full of life." --The New York Times Book Review on Hanging Curve
"A richly atmospheric journey through time." --Booklist on Hanging Curve
"A perfect book for the rain delay. . .a winner!" --USA Today on Murder at Fenway Park
"Delightful. . .mixing suspense, period detail that will leave readers eager for subsequent innings." --Publishers Weekly on Murder at Fenway Park
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Flappers, jazz and Prohibition are often used to evoke the hedonistic 1920s, but Rawlings discovers different hallmarks-- black baseball, the Ku Klux Klan, Jim Crow and lynchings--for his fine new mystery, which doubles as a cultural and political history. Peripatetic ballplayer Mickey Rawlings carries bat, glove and sleuthing skills from Cincinnati (where he played in his most recent outing, The Cincinnati Red Stalkings) to join the American League's St. Louis Browns for their 1922 season. Using an assumed name to hide his major league identity because of organized baseball's ban on interracial games, Rawlings plays with the semi-pro Elcars against the Negro East St. Louis Cubs as a lark. An ugly confrontation during the game is prologue to the later lynching of the Cubs' star player. Spurred by fear that the volatile situation could lead to a repeat of the terrible race riots of 1917, which left hundreds (mostly blacks) dead in East St. Louis, Rawlings tries to figure out who is behind the murder. In the process, he learns and reveals much about the grim realities behind baseball's ban on black players and also much about himself. Though filled with glimpses of baseball greats from both races and hinging on a well-constructed case of murder, this novel stands out particularly for its skillfully drawn background and intelligent use of historical and social detail.
