Saturday, October 22, 2005

Cubs Nation by Gene Wojciechowski--417 pages

Wojciechowski covers a different aspect of the Cubs organization over every game of the season--interviewing players, broadcasters, Dusty Baker, various coaches, and more interestingly--the fans and people who make their living indirectly through the Cubs--musicians who play outside Wrigley for change, beer vendors, and many, many others. The book works best when the author covers these folks, rather than the manager, broadcasters, and players--who have all been covered elsewhere ad nauseum. Recommended.

Genre: Nonfiction
Subgenre: Sports
Location: Chicago
Good Plane and/or waiting in line Reading: Yes--the short chapters make it easy to start and stop as needed.
Good Enough Reading to Keep You Distracted From Plane Movie: Yes
Good Enough Plane Reading to Distract You From Kids or Jerks on Plane: Yes, in most sections
Can read when depressed and/or when winter: No--it will only make you more desperate for baseball season to begin.
If you like, try this better book: The Last Night of the Yankee Dynasty by Buster Olney. I'm not a Yankees fan, but this book is excellent--one of the best baseball books I've ever read. Olney makes things I thought I'd read about before fresh.