Customer Reviews

A Season in the Sun

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The other reviewer is a bit confused. Dropping an i or an e is likely the work of a typesetter. Dave Halberstam's mistakes, noted by Bill James, are of a different order. Halberstam writes that in '47 Jackie Robinson ran wild against Yogi Berra, leading Berra to ask to be turned into an outfielder. Actual fact: during the 1947 World Series Robinson stole a total of one (uno) base, while Berra was catching. As for Scully's first name, he and Mr. Kahn were both covering the Dodgers in the 1950s and one does best to assume Mr. Kahn called him Vince.

If you enjoyed " The Boys of Summer " , you will enjoy this book .

Roger Kahn is famous as the author of The Boys of Summer, his melancholic portrait of the post-baseball lives of the Brooklyn Dodgers. Perhaps hoping that lightning would strike twice, he later wrote about the state of baseball in 1976. The result was A Season in the Sun.

The book is a loosely-connected series of vignettes about baseball. In addition to the prologue and two epilogues, the chapters are about:
- ex-Dodger outfielder Wally Moon, who is coaching baseball at a small college in Arkansas,
- one of 1976's most-successful franchises (the Dodgers) and one of its least successful (the Astros),
- minor league baseball in Pittsfield, Massachusetts,
- the very different lives of three retired major leaguers (Artie Wilson, Stan Musial, and Early Wynn),
- baseball in Puerto Rico,
- Bill Veeck's attempts to revive the White Sox,
- and Johnny Bench.

The chapters are of variable quality. To me, the standouts were the stories of two great characters - Bill Veeck and Early Wynn - and also the material on minor league baseball in New England. A lot of the other material is average. Also, potential readers should know Kahn is a "New Journalist"; that is, he makes himself a character in the book, which allows him to insert his opinions on everything that happens.

For those interested in Roger Kahn's work, I would recommend that they first read The Boys of Summer and then Good Enough to Dream (about the year that Kahn owned a minor-league franchise). For those who cannot get enough Kahn, A Season in the Sun is a decent read.

In this book, Roger Kahn writes about the 1976 season he spent traveling the globe in search of baseball stories of all kinds. In Siloam Springs, Oklahoma he finds ex-Dodger Wally Moon coaching a baseball at a small college. Kahn heads to Los Angeles to meet with the O'Malleys. Walter O'Malley gives Kahn the reason as to why the Dodgers moved to L.A. Kahn also spends time in Puerto Rico watching children aspiring to be major leaguers play. Perhaps the most enjoyable chapter is "William the Unconquerable" where Kahn discusses his time with Bill Veeck and his difficult time trying to reenter Major League Baseball.

What I found rather amusing in Kahn's afterword was him getting on David Halberstam for a factual error in Halberstam's "Summer of '49." Why I found it amusing was because in the text of his chapter on Johnny Bench he spells Bench's soon to be ex-wife Vickie's name two different ways, "Vickie" and "Vicki." Which is it, Roger? He also refers to Vin Scully as "Vince." As readers of Kahn will already suspect, he does spend some time talking about himself as well.

All in all, while it's not Kahn's best work, it's worth a read.