He outslugged Willie Mays, Hank Aaron, and Mickey Mantle when they were in their prime, but while they made repeated World Series appearances in the 1950s and 60s, Banks spent his entire career with the woebegone Chicago Cubs, who didn't win a pennant in his adult lifetime.Today, Banks is remembered best for his signature phrase, "Let's play two," which has entered the American lexicon and exemplifies the enthusiasm that endeared him to fans everywhere. But Banks's public display of good cheer was a mask that hid a deeply conflicted, melancholy, and often quite lonely man. Despite the poverty and racism he endured as a young man, he was among the star players of baseball's early days of integration who were reluctant to speak out about Civil Rights. Being known as one of the greatest players never to reach the World Series also took its toll. At one point, Banks even saw a psychiatrist to see if that would help. It didn't. Yet Banks smiled through it all, enduring the scorn of Cubs manager Leo Durocher as an aging superstar and never uttering a single complaint.Let's Play Two is based on numerous conversations with Banks and on interviews with more than a hundred of his family members, teammates, friends, and associates as well as oral histories, court records, and thousands of other documents and sources. Together, they explain how Banks was so different from the caricature he created for the public. The book tells of Banks's early life in segregated Dallas, his years in the Negro Leagues, and his difficult life after retirement; and features compelling portraits of Buck O'Neil, Philip K. Wrigley, the Bleacher Bums, the doomed pennant race of 1969, and much more from a long-lost baseball era.

    Mays signed 100 copies for his Charity, The Say Hey Foundation. The signing took place at a local sporting goods store. You will receive the retail store receipt, copies of 2 newspaper articles announcing the signing and The Letter of Evaluation.

    

    In it she tells the story of a miraculous ocean encounter that happened to her when she was seventeen and in training for a big swim (she had already swum the English Channel, twice, and the Catalina Channel).It was the dark of early morning; Lynne was in 55-degree water as smooth as black ice, two hundred yards offshore, outside the wave break. She was swimming her last half-mile back to the pier before heading home for breakfast when she became aware that something was swimming with her. The ocean was charged with energy as if a squall was moving in; thousands of baby anchovy darted through the water like lit sparklers, trying to evade something larger. Whatever it was, it felt large enough to be a white shark coursing beneath her body.It wasn't a shark. It became clear that it was a baby gray whale—following alongside Lynne for a mile or so. Lynne had been swimming for more than an hour; she needed to get out of the water to rest, but she realized that if she did, the young calf would follow her onto shore and die from collapsed lungs.The baby whale—eighteen feet long!—was migrating on a three-month trek to its feeding grounds in the Bering Sea, an eight-thousand-mile journey. It would have to be carried on its mother's back for much of that distance, and was dependent on its mother's milk for food—baby whales drink up to fifty gallons of milk a day. If Lynne didn't find the mother whale, the baby would suffer from dehydration and starve to death.Something so enormous—the mother whale was fifty feet long—suddenly seemed very small in the vast Pacific Ocean. How could Lynne possibly find her?This is the story—part mystery, part magical tale—of what happened . . .

    The anticipation, memories, and celebrated relief of the season when it finally came together are captured in this chronicle of the World Series season of the Giants. Written in entertaining prose, the book is as much an enjoyable story to be reread through the years as it is a factual account of the events that brought the elusive title to the Giants.

    In The Death of Trotsky, Cecelia Holland brings this fated and fatal day to life, from its quotidian beginnings to its dramatic close. Between Trotsky’s waking and his final rest, she probes the outer-workings and inner thoughts of those who were with him till the end, illuminating a man who exited life as he lived it: defiantly. Cecelia Holland, author of more than 30 books and articles, lives in northern California with her family.Cover Design by Adil Dara.

    Includes 16 pages of photos.

    But there was much more to the story than what happened on that October night. From his family’s battle to escape Cuba and the Castro regime, to the ups and downs of his baseball career, to his battle with testicular cancer, this is the story of a man who overcame every challenge thrown at him to become one of the best third basemen in baseball— and a true role model for his millions of fans.

    So when he's arrested for drug possession, lawyer Melissa St. James knows that something doesn't add up. It's clear he's hiding something, though he denies it. But there's one thing he can't deny--he wants Melissa.

    An untold one that played out in the district of Kozhikode when a young IAS officer took charge as the District Collector in 2015. Over the next two years, he led the district and transformed the very concept of public administration with the use of social media, public consultation, usage of technology, volunteerism and public participation in governance. The two year tenure of 'Collector Bro' in Kozhikode transformed the landscape and narrative of district administration and communication with the citizens forever.Within a couple of months, 'Collector Kozhikode' Facebook page became a trendsetter in Kerala, and the most followed district administration page in India. It still is. With initiatives like Compassionate Kozhikode, Operation Sulaimani, Savari Giri Giri, Kozhipedia, Freedom Café, Yo Appooppa and Tere Mere Beach Mein, IAS officer Prasanth Nair, who was the District Collector of Kozhikode at that time, ushered in a new language of governance that endeavoured to bridge the gap between the district administration and citizens through the optimal employment of social media. The District Collector descended from the colonial ivory towers and mingled as one amongst the common man, totally dismantling the hierarchical stereotypes that the society was used to.This book traces the story of how exactly this happened and how and why the public responded so overwhelmingly to such an initiative. It also chronicles how these experiences transformed the young officer also - from a hesitant public speaker to a crowd-puller, from an introvert to a seemingly extrovert energetic leader. For the first time, the emotional roller-coaster of events that re-shaped the attitude and language of engagement by District administration is narrated with all the inside-stories. Straight from the horse's mouth. The author however takes pains not to take centre-stage in the book and manages that somewhat with wit and self-deprecating humour. This book has got nothing to do with government; but it is all about governance, life and compassion. At one level it is a collection of case-studies, the most readable and engrossing ones, narrated with fun and illustrations. At another level it is a chronicle of a personal journey of a compassionate administrator. This is not a typical arrogant bureaucratic ‘I did this’ book, but an ‘I went through this’ book. Not a high-horsed motivational ‘you can do it’ book, but a book that makes you think and prioritise what you want to do in life.As Dr. Shashi Tharoor says in the foreword, a must read for all civil servants, civil-service aspirants, students of public administration and all citizens who dream for a better tomorrow.

    It's a sport that shows us what a human being might be capable of, with extreme dedication--whether we're eating hot dogs in the stands, waiting out a rain delay in our living rooms, or practising the lost art of catching a stray radio signal from an out-of-market broadcast.From learning about America through ball diamond visits to the most famous triple play that never happened on Canadian soil, Forbes invites us to witness the adult conversing with the O Pee-Chee baseball cards of his youth. Tender, insightful, and with the slow heartbreak familiar to anyone who's cheered on a losing team, The Utility of Boredom tells us a thing or two about the sport, and how a seemingly trivial game might help us make sense of our messy lives.

    Here are those "last laughs" and "wit's end" pieces everyone turns to first but then loses in back issues of favorite magazines and newspapers, including:Merrill Markoeon Networking with angelsGarry Trudeau on re-retranslating MadonnaDavid Sedaris on reviewing school Christmas PlaysJohn Updike on cross-dressing with J. Edgar HooverAlso included are riotous contributions from Henry Alford, Jon Stewart, and David Ives, as well as millennial maxims by Mark O'Donnell, gardening advice by Mertensia Corydalis, and highlights from Randy Cohen's savvy "News Quiz."Brought to you by The Thurber House

    Ranging from the 19th to the 20th centuries, writers include James Augustine Aloysius Joyce, Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald, Richard Edward Connell, Henri Nathaniel Hawthorne, Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy, Jack London, Henri Ringgold Wilmer Lardner, Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde, Anton Pavlovich Chekhov, Henri René Albert Guy de Maupassant and Edgar Allan Poe.

    The untold story of the time when the New York Yankees were a laughingstock—and how out of that abyss emerged the modern Yankees dynasty, one of the greatest in all of sports

    A Slip of the Keyboard brings together for the first time the finest examples of Pratchett's non fiction writing, both serious and surreal: from musings on mushrooms to what it means to be a writer (and why banana daiquiris are so important); from memories of Granny Pratchett to speculation about Gandalf's love life, and passionate defences of the causes dear to him.With all the humour and humanity that have made his novels so enduringly popular, this collection brings Pratchett out from behind the scenes of the Discworld to speak for himself - man and boy, bibliophile and computer geek, champion of hats, orang-utans and Dignity in Dying.