Book Review: Take Me Out to the Ballgame by Gary Morgenstein

Take Me Out to the Ballgame 2 Title: Take Me Out to the Ballgame
Author: Gary Morgenstein
Paperback: 290 pages
Publisher: CreateSpace
Language: English
ISBN-1448620503
ISBN-978-1448620500

Reviewed by Lucinda Gunnin

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Gary Morgenstein’s Take Me Out to the Ballgame offers a slice of life look at the blue-collar folks of Buffalo and their love for a down on its luck baseball team, the Buffalo Matadors. Focusing on everything from the ineptitude of the Congressional extension of unemployment benefits to the overpayment of baseball stars, Morgenstein writes with his finger on the pulse of the real baseball fan and the real American worker, understanding what makes them both tick.

When he mingles the high power world of Matadors’ owner Harry Witowsky and the former steelworker fans, the combination takes the team from joke to the pennant race, with a mixture of politics and Americana thrown in. Witowsky starts with the gimmicks, including a locally famous singer to perform the national anthem each night, and then accidentally creates a tie-in between his baseball team and national politics. Witowsky decides to run for office and the life-long Democrat starts courting the Tea Party crowd, making “Where’s my bailout shirts?” the unofficial uniform for Matadors’ fans. As one fan goes off the deep end, a little bit of a push from Witowsky helps others to get back on their feet, Morgenstein takes one everything from healthcare to illegal immigration and racism.

Take Me Out to the Ballgame is a well-written novel that will appeal to baseball fans and political junkies as Morgenstein creates characters that will say what people are thinking, but afraid to say. Witowsky argues that white fans need white players to root for and then argues that a discussion of race doesn’t necessarily make one racist. The underlying commentary of the book is strong, but doesn’t overwhelm the story. Morgenstein’s ability to blend the story and the message makes it a book worth reading.

But Morgenstein suffers greatly from a lack of a good layout editor. The interior of the book changes formats as the story progresses, with large expanses of white space under the page number at the top of each page in the later portions of the book. Indentations and spacing are inconsistent, distracting from the story itself. Normally, as a reader, the formatting of the book should not be noticeable. When it is, it becomes distracting. Unfortunately for Morgenstein, the quality of the writing and the story must attempt to overcome the design of the text. While he manages to keep the reader interested through the end of the novel, better design would have made the book considerably more enjoyable.


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