Customer Reviews

Playing with the Enemy: A Baseball Prodigy, a World at War, and a Field of Broken Dreams

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The first question is "Who will like this book?"

Those most likely to enjoy this book would be:
1) A child who has affection and appreciation for his/her father;
2) A father who receives this book from his son/daughter/grandchild;
3) A child or grandchild of a World War II veteran;
4) An American veteran;
5) A fan of American military history; or
6) A fan of baseball history.

While others may certainly enjoy this book as well, I pick these 6 groups because the story is a unique tribute to those who belong to one or more of them. If you belong to one of these groups, this story will absorb you from the first chapter until you close the last page.

The second question is "What will I get out of reading this book?"

When you set this book down, you will have appreciation for:
1) The gallant call to duty of "The Greatest Generation";
2) Honest, unapologetic love of a son for his father;
3) Life's unpredictable -- but seemingly purposeful -- curve balls;
4) Every person's ability to create second chances in life; and
5) Some special shared experiences that are uniquely American.

I can't think of a better use of one's time, or a better gift for someone that means something to you. Enjoy it!

Playing With the Enemy: A Baseball Prodigy, a World at War, and a Field of Broken Dreams
Author: Gary W. Moore
Publisher: Savas Beatie
Year: 2006
Reviewer: Neal Stevens, Subsim.com



Mueller sought out the American's hand and gripped it tightly. "We are proud of what you have taught us--all of us are. We are grateful to you and your team."

Everyone likes a success story, the struggle of an underdog to overcome long odds and achieve glory. Just as popular are the stories where one blessed with extraordinary talents reaches his full potential, awing those around him. Gary Moore's Playing With the Enemy is the story of his father, Gene Moore, a story he only discovered by chance. It examines both themes of long odds and talent and reveals there is as much glory in facing adversity as overcoming it. The book combines baseball, U-boats, talent and sacrifice into one well-written tale tinged with bitter irony.

Born and raised in the Depression-era small town of Sesser, Illinois, where coal-mining is on the decline and pig farming is the future, Gene Moore knows one thing for certain: he was born to play baseball. At a mere fifteen Gene is a catcher with major league hitting power and a rocket arm that can throw out runners across the diamond. Behind the plate Gene projects leadership and good sportsmanship. The team and the whole town revere him. His father is a little puzzled by all the attention Gene receives for playing a leisure game and his older brother Ward is quietly jealous. "Everyone referred to Ward as `Gene's older brother' and Ward didn't like it one bit". One day a man drives into town in a new Buick, something not often seen in dusty Sesser. A scout for the Brooklyn Dodgers likes what he sees and pays a call on Gene's parents. Gene's dream is about to become reality.

Within a year he's producing outstanding play in the minors and is named the league's Rookie of the Year...and he's still a boy who has not seen his seventeenth birthday. Then on a warm December day, as he's leaving the theater with friends, the news of Pearl Harbor reaches Sesser. The US is at war. Gene's older brother Ward immediately declares his intent to join the military. Gene is too young to join but compulsory service looms months away. The Dodgers arrange for Gene to play exhibition baseball in the Navy. This will allow Gene to stay well behind the lines, safe and sound and able to keep his baseball skills honed.

It's on the US Navy Touring Baseball Team Gene meets pivotal character Ray Laws, a pitcher with a wicked forkball that few batters can hit and equally few catchers can handle. Gene proves up to the task of catching it, sparking a friendship. The team is shipped off to North Africa to entertain the troops engaged in operations against the Germans. They learn a cruel lesson that "being behind the lines" is not a precise term.

Neither coach had yet reached their respective bench when a faint thumping sound, followed by a whistle, was heard. None of the ballplayers had a clue what it was, but the wounded on the sidelines knew immediately. "Incoming!" screamed one of the soldiers standing along the first base line on a pair of crutches.

Gene's brother serves as a tanker and they enjoy a brief reunion. When the war moves into Sicily and Italy, the Navy baseball team receives an order to return to the States for reassignment. Gene sets off for Norfolk, Virginia while Ward continues the fight against the enemy in Europe.

Far from Gene's world of line drives and fly balls, a US naval task force relentlessly hunts a German U-boat in the Atlantic. There is something worth noting about this hunter-killer group: it is led by Captain Dan Gallery, "a seasoned hunter of German U-boats". Gallery is determined to capture a U-boat and seize the codebooks and Enigma encryption machine. Much of the Allies' success in the Battle of the Atlantic can be traced to codebreaking. With the successful capture of a U-boat and the resulting intelligence harvest, the Allies can route convoys around known wolfpack positions and send other hunter-killer groups after known U-boat positions.

Gallery's task force locates the U-505, a boat with a tainted history of disaster and tragedy. After a ferocious succession of depth charges, U-505 is plunged into darkness accompanied by the unnerving sound of water flooding into the fractured hull.

It was easy to imagine the seawater filling up beneath the deck plates, adding tons of weight that would soon make it impossible to bring the boat to the surface. And the ocean floor was a mile below them.

The crew of U-505, certain their sub is doomed to sink at any second, surface to abandon ship. Gallery sends in a special boarding party to descend into the sub's gloomy interior to secure the flooding and seize the Enigma. U-505 is captured and returned to the States, the "first enemy ship boarded and captured by the US Navy since the War of 1812". In order to preserve the usefulness of the captured codes, the seizure of U-505 and the abduction of the crew must remain secret at any cost.

The U-505 POWs are sent to a remote camp in Louisiana. Not even the Red Cross is notified of their existence. Gene and many of the Navy Baseball team are sent there as guards. The captured Germans view the Americans as the enemy with no reservation; their internment is just another chapter of the life and death struggle of the Reich. Gene doesn't make a very formidable guard. He passes time trying to coax the Germans into small talk. At times I found myself at odds with Gene's jarring Ring Lardner-style optimism and his abundant amity with the German POWs, until I realized that these are textbook American traits. For Gene, there are only thoughts of baseball. Everything around him is either an obstacle or an opportunity toward furthering his career and enjoying the game. And listless guard duty is hardly keeping him fit for the major leagues.

He wheedles the camp commander into letting him setup ball practice with any Germans who will cooperate. It's remarkable that the captured crew of the U-505 were allowed to mix and mingle with the Navy baseball team, to even play exhibition games in front of spectators, in light of the enormous security concerns. The U-505 men are not completely convinced that this "baseball" isn't a new interrogation tactic. Some of the U-505 crew will have nothing to do with the enemy and those who do participate are rude and uncooperative. However, in the end, the spirit of competitive sports won out with "the sound of men laughing and yelling in two languages" mixed with the "crack of a wooden bat giving a hardball a ride through the humid Louisiana morning air".

I've taken you partway into this story, the rest is best discovered first hand. Playing With the Enemy is a multifaceted narrative, a tale where several unlikely plot lines converge with intriguing--and at times, heartrending--results. At its heart, it's a personal drama of a hopeful young man; of two brothers, one with rising fortunes and one who ends up in VA hospital surrounded by men who were maimed in combat. A story of a hard-luck U-boat and its crew; of the common bonds good sportsmanship and optimism can create. Author Gary Moore sets up a brisk pace, advancing through the events of his father's life with regard and care. As a result, Playing With the Enemy is a pure joy to read. It surprises you and then surprises you again while you're still nodding in thought over the previous pages.

Good success stories are about more than luck and raw talent. The best success stories are also about courage, tenacity, and coping with misfortune, where success and victory are not always critical to the final outcome.

Here is a baseball and World War II story that brings an extraordinary time in our country's history alive, along with the people who made it fascinating. You will laugh and cry, and never forget it. History, after all,is about the people who lived it.

Even though the country had suffered through the Great Depression, and the coal mine just wasn't producing much anymore, the tiny town of Sesser, Illinois did have a town baseball team called the Sesser Egyptians. Gene Moore was a fifteen-year-old farm boy living there and helping out on the family farm. He was also the best catcher anyone had ever seen; he could throw men out from any position, not a ball ever got past him, and he could hit the ball farther than anyone else. Gene had a talent for controlling the game and even the older men followed his lead without question. When you are that good, word gets around, and the Brooklyn Dodgers sent a scout to take a look at Gene.

He had signed a contract with the Brooklyn Dodgers; but when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbour, he decided to do his duty and join the Navy. He was only seventeen years old. Gene was sent to play ball with a Navy team to entertain the troops in the Azores and North Africa. Then he and the other team members were sent on a special, top-secret mission to guard a group of German submarine sailors from the captured U-505 in Louisiana. Baseball was still the primary thing on Gene's mind, and since there weren't enough guys to make up a game, Gene convinced his commander to allow him to teach the enemy how to play baseball while he and his teammates waited for the war to end. They all hoped to be called up into the Major Leagues. Unfortunately, his destiny took a drastic change during the last game.

While Warren Eugene Moore never did achieve his dream of playing in the Majors, his son just may have catapaulted him into immortality with this passionate biography... a riviting story about a remarkable man. Gene had never talked about his possible career in baseball to his family; but finally, just before his death, he spent many hours talking to his son, Gary Moore, and revealing his unprecedented life story. Through extensive research, and talking to dozens of people who knew his father, Gary was able to flesh out the story and give us this compelling and sometimes heart-wrenching tale.

Playing With the Enemy is undoubtedly the best book I have read this year... I simply could not put it down.

Gene Moore had it right, every bat is unique, like no other. And this book is like no other I have read. If you don't believe in time travel, just crack the cover, and you will be transported to a simpler time. This book should delight rural America, war history buffs and baseball fans alike. But the real story inside the story is all about our collective journey in life. You can learn a lot about life in this book. I covered this one in record time, only stopping to eat and sleep. Gary nailed this one for sure, you will not be disappointed; you'll probably be motivated to live better - in many ways.

If you enjoy baseball or history, this is a story for you. Otherwise, you should read it anyway! Playing With The Enemy is the story of a young man's dreams realized, destroyed and realized again. Yet in the end the dream is different from the original one. Few people get a second chance at anything; Gene Moore got two second chances. He made the best of the one that counted the most. This story is above all else a story of the human experience in facing adversity and overcoming it with sheer desire.

Any man who has aspired to play big league ball as a kid will be touched by this story. Every boy longs to hear the words "you are good enough" at least once in their lives from a male authority figure. I can only imagine the joy that Gene Moore must have felt when the Dodgers told him he was more than good enough to follow his dream and his passion to play big league baseball.

As a young boy, all I wanted to do was play second base for the Boston Red Sox. By time I reached high school I realized that I did not have the talent or physical attributes necessary to go much further. But I continue to look at second base for the Red Sox as a holy place, no matter who is playing the position. It was very easy to emotionally step into the shoes of of the main character and identify with his feelings as the story unfolded.

From there, the story took me on a roller coaster ride that had me laughing, reminiscing, cheering, and shedding tears of both joy and sadness. Few books can move a reader through an entire range of emotions like that. I had to just sit still in silence for a while after finishing the last page. Congratulations on a masterful work.

The story of Gene Moore's life would never have made a good book. Not that he, as a family man and self-made business owner, wasn't a dynamic and interesting person; it's just that he was a middle America Everyman who came into adulthood as World War II ended.

That's probably how Gary Moore, sone of Gene and author of the book Playing With The Enemy, probably would have believed . . . before. Before he found an old letter addressed to his father. Before he wouldn't take no for an answer, this time, when asking his father about his past life one night over dinner.

That night Gary Moore was able to crack his father's hard exterior, and the story of Gene's youth poured out of him. I can only imagine what it must have been like to hear it for the first time, as the son. It's the stuff movies are made of, and I hear a major motion picture is in the works for Playing With The Enemy.

No matter who they get to play Gene, the two undeniable stars of the story are the game of baseball and World War II. It's a surprising but unbeatable combination, and when you add in the tantalizing fact of a secret mission, the tale gets even juicier. I won't spoil the story for you, although if you pick up the book you can learn far more than this just by reading the flaps and reviews. Suffice it to say that Gene was an extremely talented, likeable young man in an extraordinary situation who was tested, who failed, and who ultimately succeeded in human terms.

Gene Moore's story is compelling because it's true, and the fact that his son Gary coaxed it out of him 24 hours before Gene died makes it seem very "Hollywood" indeed. But don't be fooled -- this is not the story of a superhero, so don't look for that. This is not the ultimate Hollywood underdog story either, although there certainly are elements of that. This is the true story of your retired neighbor who waters his roses every morning in his undershirt. This is the true story of the man down the street who drives to his business every day, long after he needs to work, because it's his life, his passion, his responsibility. This is your grandfather or great-grandfather's true story that he never told you; that faraway look he would get in his eyes when the conversation turned to "the old days." The people who lived through World War II sacrificed in more ways than we can ever know, and this is just one extraordinary tale.

I have a special interest in this book, as our family friend Val Laolagi did the wonderful illustrations that grace the pages. That's how I learned of Playing With The Enemy. Thanks Val -- I am so glad I read it. Once I got going I read most of it in two days.

I gave Dad the book for Christmas, and if there's someone you know who appreciates a dramatic story from the World War II era, I recommend Playing With The Enemy.

This book came to me highly recommended so I was naturally skeptical. So with that skepticism I put off reading it for a month. Once I started it I couldn't put it down. Having met the author at a book signing, I'm sorry I hadn't read the book first. I thoroughly enjoyed the book and was equally impressed with Gary Moore. The book was a delightful read and the author was a pleasure to meet. Skepticism and all.........I just hope Hollywood can do this story justice. This is a story about real midwestern people like so many I have known all my life. This book is a gift I will buy for a friend.

I read this book on a cross country flight and then into that night, as I could not put it down. I sent this book to all of my friends for Christmas and obviously thought it was fabulous. My wife, who is not a baseball fan, loved it as well. If you buy this book, you won't be disappointed!

I read this amazing book in three days and couldn't put it down. It's the most incredible story of a phenomenal young baseball player from the little town of Sesser, Illinois who was recruited by the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1940. Sadly, the attack on Pearl Harbor interrupted Gene Moore's dream, and the U. S. Navy had other plans for Gene. When Gene and his teammates were sent back to the United States to guard the captured German sailors from a U-505 submarine, Gene had a brilliant idea. Why not teach the Germans how to play baseball! The story that unfolds will tear your heart out, and I promise you'll be hooked from the beginning. It's especially poignant, because the book is written by Gary Moore, Gene's wonderful son, who needed to tell his dad's story, and what a story it is! Don't walk---run to the nearest book store. Now sit down with a good cup of coffee. Get ready to be transported back in time to World War II. You will never forget this book!!!