A non-sports fan's opinion Mar 1, 2009 (8 of 8 found this helpful)
It's a rare book that makes me want to play baseball. This book really captures everything about the game--the author clearly loves the game, and it infuses every bit of every character. The rivalries, the importance of the game to this sodden town, the cultural and personal heritages caught up with baseball... every page of this book is a mash note to the sport, and I mean that in a good way.
It's not all baseball, though--there's a family story here, brotherhood and parents and general familial relationships to each other. It could be very sappy, but none of the characters are perfect--they're all flawed in their individual ways, giving even the characters with little screen time or deep importance to the plot dimension and earning them sympathy. It would be easy to give some of these characters no redeeming qualities, but Scaletta tempers the bad and/or neglectful behaviors with hints that these parents do love their children--they just can't be good parents, for whatever reason. Their flaws make them human.
This is a sports book that interested me, even though I, the terminally graceless and uncoordinated, have no interest in sports, particularly baseball. I still don't fully understand in words what makes the game so great--but on a gut level, I think I understand it perfectly.
Buy This Book! Feb 24, 2009 (4 of 4 found this helpful)
It's About: Roy McGuire, twelve years old, just back from baseball camp, and back into the endlessly dreary town of Moundville- where it rained out a baseball game twenty-two years ago and hasn't stopped since. Most people in Moundville make do. Roy's dad has made good- he had his defining moment during that rained-out game, and ever since, he's been rainproofing houses in waterlogged houses for a living and caring for Roy, while Roy's estranged mother gallivants around the world, sending home the occasional postcard.
When Roy returns from camp to find his father has taken in a foster kid, Sturgis, Roy isn't quite sure what to think. Sturgis likes his dad's bizarre culinary palate, manages to work twice as hard in the rainproofing business as he does, and even turns out to be a better baseball player. And a few days after he arrives in Moundville, the epic rain stops.
The sun shines for the first time in two decades, and Roy- with the help of his friends- set about building a baseball field. And once there's a field- well, it's time to finish that game against Sinister Bend that got rained out all those years ago. The only problem is, Sturgis- Moundville's star pitcher- plans to pitch for the other team.
Populated with a unique cast of characters (including a kid whose only English phrase is Search Me, and thus, becomes known as Google,) Mudville is a story that contains baseball for sure, but it's not about baseball. (And when it is, Scaletta does a brilliant job of illuminating the arcane art of junkballs and line drives, so the unfamiliar reader never feels lost.)
Scaletta mingles the spirit of classic fables and tall tales, local mythology, and baseball legend with a very human story about belonging. Roy is a sensitive, thoughtful protagonist who still isn't above petty jealousy, and Sturgis is a fascinating foil- not exactly an antagonist, but definitely the catalyst.
And it's an especially refreshing novel about boys that isn't hardbound in scatalogical humor (the only gross-outs come in the form of the unusual dinners Roy's dad prepares- spam manicotti, anyone?) that allows its boys to be smart, strong and competitive, without letting them lapse into edgy, feral territory.
There's real affection between the boys and Roy's father, and the boys with each other- and that human connection, set against the backdrop of America's past-time, makes this book feel utterly classic.
Would I Give This Book to a Kid: Absolutely- and not just to boys, or baseball fans. I really think girls will find the friendship between Roy and Sturgis touching, and will enjoy seeing Rita and Shannon playing with the guys, competitively, as valuable members of the team.
Would I Give This Book to an Adult: I would. In fact, I plan to give it to my mother. Her tastes run more toward The Natural than Bull Durham, and I think Mudville hits that spot exactly.