Drawing Card: A New Baseball Novel of Cleveland
Information just received from the author on an interesting new novel:
"Drawing Card: A Baseball Novel, just published by McFarland, is a
Cleveland-based book written by an ex-Clevelander who was once a student at
Cleveland State and maintains connections there"
"In writing
this book I was inspired by learning from research that in the early part of
the 20th century at least two female ballplayers were hired by minor league
clubs, bit after signing contracts, they had their contracts cancelled by
Commissioner Landis specifically because of their gender. These two women
reacted to their rejection politely, as women were supposed to, and pursued
other athletic careers. In my novel, a woman whose baseball contract is
cancelled by Landis vows revenge."
In setting
my story in Cleveland, I was able to use the neighborhood in which I grew up
and many Cleveland landmarks as background. Then, in order to show the main
character's violent nature, I used violent events in Sicilian history,
beginning with the Olympic era, when Sicily was a Greek colony. This enabled me
to demonstrate that throughout history many women enjoyed athletics but had
little opportunity to engage in them."
"Today 's
women ballplayers face the same discriminatory attitudes that those in the past
had to fight against. Just reading one book, like Pam Postema's autobiography
(she was an umpire), demonstrates what women in baseball face right now."
posted by Bill Barrow @ 3:34:00 PM
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