A cool new book…
The Last Days of Shea: Delight and Despair in the Life of a Mets Fan
I’ll have more from Dana in the upcoming days. Here’s the review from Amazon.
Review
“Dana Brand’s The Last Days of Shea is a must read for any baseball fan. The ‘communal experience’ of living and dying with your team is something fans experience everywhere., but there is something unique about Mets fans. The Last Days of Shea chronicles the ending of a ballpark but, even more importantly, it reveals the spirit and resoluteness of Mets fans as they bring their ‘ya gotta believe’ attitude to their new home.” –Ron Darling, author of The Complete Game: Reflections on Baseball, Pitching, and Life on the Mound and SNY Mets broadcaster
The Last Days of Shea is a truly terrific book. Filled with passion and sincerity, it offers a deeper understanding of what it means to be a fan.–Gary Cohen, SNY Mets broadcaster
To me and millions of others, Shea was beautiful. I loved it when it had
blue and orange steel plates on the outside and I loved it at the end. My
memories of the place will last forever. In this wonderful homage, Dana
Brand ties together our experiences of Shea, in a celebration of a place
that, in memory, will always be far more substantial than most historians will care to admit. —Howie Rose, WFAN Mets broadcaster
‘When I read Dana Brand’s books, I feel as if I’m learning about the heart and soul of the Mets fan. The Last Days of Shea is a great tribute to Shea stadium and to the spirit of the fans who made it such a wonderful place to play baseball.–Jerry Koosman, pitcher, New York Mets, 1968-78
Dana Brand is one of the true Believeniks, and he’s earned his Shake Shackburger the hard way: an x-ray of his heart would show a Shea-shaped scar.–Jonathan Lethem, author of Motherless Brooklyn and Fortress of Solitude
Why care so much about a baseball team? Dana Brand has figured out a way to articulate that pleasurable or frustrating heartache and make it
understandable and even forgivable. If Mets Fan was filled with delights, The Last Days of Shea goes deeper: its real subject is loss and grief, and its prescription the consolations of philosophy. Brand is a first-rate personal essayist, who has chosed baseball as his focus the way Baldwin chose race or Hoagland nature.– Philip Lopate, author of Waterfront: A Walk Around Manhattan and Writing New York
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