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A Nice Little Place on the North Side: Wrigley Field at One Hundred Hardcover – March 25, 2014
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Editorial Reviews
From Booklist
Wrigley Field, home of the Chicago Cubs, turns 100 this season. Will, a lifelong Cubs fan originally from downstate Illinois, steps back from politics to indulge his passion for the generally hapless Cubs (last World Series win in 1908). In the context of Wrigley’s centennial, Will offers a rambling, gently amusing history of the team since it moved in. With few triumphs to write about, Will focuses on some of the dominant and/or quirky personalities associated with the team through the years. He has a particular fondness for Ernie Banks, aka Mr. Cub, who performed heroically for some atrocious Cub teams from 1953 through 1971, laying out the case that Banks, a first-ballot Hall of Famer, hasnt lingered in the minds of todays fans the way he should have done. Will also delivers brief but revealing examinations of longtime team owner P. K. Wrigley, players Phil Cavarretta and Hack Wilson, and manager Leo Durocher. Will, who has a Pulitzer for commentary on his mantel as well as a roomful of other awards, is one of the nation’s most visible Cub fans; this ode to the team and its home field will make a very pleasant read for baseball fans in general and Cub fans in particular. HIGH-DEMAND BACKSTORY: Expect lots of television and other media promotion for this one, tied to various Wrigley Field celebrations. --Wes Lukowsky
Review
Praise for George Will and A Nice Little Place on the North Side
“Fond yet surprisingly hard-hitting…an intelligent, tough little book.” –USA Today
“George Will is as serious about baseball as he is about the Constitution or foreign policy…. A Nice Little Place on the North Side is replete with the amusing trivia that in baseball constitutes lore.”—Wall Street Journal
“America’s leading poet of baseball” –Chicago Tribune, Printers Row Journal
“George F. Will’s wonderful book A Nice Little Place on the North Side reads like a history of a ballpark, but it’s really a fan’s interrogation of the most harrowing riddle: Why can’t the Cubs win?...[Will is] one of the great baseball writers.” –Commentary
“Will’s bow-tied, button-down prose wears quite well in this, his third insightful book about baseball, after Men at Work and Bunts. His eye for the game remains warm and acute, as do his conservative instincts.” –New York Times Book Review
“George Will is the most elegant of today’s political essayists, and with 'Men at Work,' 'Bunts' and this tribute to Chicago, the ballpark that graces it, and the fans who pack it to root for its hapless team, he can be counted among the best baseball writers to come down the pike…” –The Washington Times
“[Will’s] latest, A Nice Little Place on the North Side, will sit solidly on the bookshelf with his previous baseball classics…. As is always the case with Will, readers are treated to a mix of history, anecdotes, vignettes, cultural analysis, various informative diversions, and much wry humor.”—The American Spectator
“George F. Will is as eloquent on baseball as he is on politics.” –AARP Bulletin
“Required reading” –New York Post
“Fond yet surprisingly hard-hitting…an intelligent, tough little book.” –USA Today
“George Will is as serious about baseball as he is about the Constitution or foreign policy…. A Nice Little Place on the North Side is replete with the amusing trivia that in baseball constitutes lore.”—Wall Street Journal
“America’s leading poet of baseball” –Chicago Tribune, Printers Row Journal
“George F. Will’s wonderful book A Nice Little Place on the North Side reads like a history of a ballpark, but it’s really a fan’s interrogation of the most harrowing riddle: Why can’t the Cubs win?...[Will is] one of the great baseball writers.” –Commentary
“Will’s bow-tied, button-down prose wears quite well in this, his third insightful book about baseball, after Men at Work and Bunts. His eye for the game remains warm and acute, as do his conservative instincts.” –New York Times Book Review
“George Will is the most elegant of today’s political essayists, and with 'Men at Work,' 'Bunts' and this tribute to Chicago, the ballpark that graces it, and the fans who pack it to root for its hapless team, he can be counted among the best baseball writers to come down the pike…” –The Washington Times
“[Will’s] latest, A Nice Little Place on the North Side, will sit solidly on the bookshelf with his previous baseball classics…. As is always the case with Will, readers are treated to a mix of history, anecdotes, vignettes, cultural analysis, various informative diversions, and much wry humor.”—The American Spectator
“George F. Will is as eloquent on baseball as he is on politics.” –AARP Bulletin
“Required reading” –New York Post
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
17 of 20 people found the following review helpful
By
Paul Tognetti
TOP 500 REVIEWER on March 25, 2014
Format: Hardcover
Vine Customer Review of Free Product
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“In baseball, the difference between excellence and mediocrity is usually not the blockbuster signing of this or that free agent. Rather, it is the cumulative effect of management’s attention to scouting, player development, and so on—which—requires time, effort and, always, money. Because Cubs fans fill so many seats no matter what is happening on the field, there is a reduced incentive to pay the expense of organizational excellence.” -- page 136
And that, according to author George Will appears to be the gist of the problem. For baseball fans in the Windy City and for people all across the fruited plain Wrigley Field has become something akin to a shrine. There is a certain mystique about the place that attracts both avid fans and curious tourists, some of whom have little interest in what was once the national pastime. As Wrigley Field turns 100 in 2014 George Will thought it might be an appropriate time to recall its fascinating and sometimes bizarre history. He has scribbled his thoughts into a neat little book he calls “A Nice Little Place on the North Side: Wrigley Field at One Hundred”. This is a book destined to be great summer reading for sports fans, history buffs and general readers alike. Will conjures up a ton of fun facts, interesting tidbits and unforgettable yarns. As a lifetime baseball junkie I must tell you that I had a difficult time putting this one down.
Having been an ardent Cubs fan since 1948 George Will has pretty much seen it all—everything that is except his beloved Cubs playing in a World Series. In “A Nice Little Place on the North Side” Will recalls many of the memorable events and incidents from the sixty plus years he has been following the team.Read more ›
And that, according to author George Will appears to be the gist of the problem. For baseball fans in the Windy City and for people all across the fruited plain Wrigley Field has become something akin to a shrine. There is a certain mystique about the place that attracts both avid fans and curious tourists, some of whom have little interest in what was once the national pastime. As Wrigley Field turns 100 in 2014 George Will thought it might be an appropriate time to recall its fascinating and sometimes bizarre history. He has scribbled his thoughts into a neat little book he calls “A Nice Little Place on the North Side: Wrigley Field at One Hundred”. This is a book destined to be great summer reading for sports fans, history buffs and general readers alike. Will conjures up a ton of fun facts, interesting tidbits and unforgettable yarns. As a lifetime baseball junkie I must tell you that I had a difficult time putting this one down.
Having been an ardent Cubs fan since 1948 George Will has pretty much seen it all—everything that is except his beloved Cubs playing in a World Series. In “A Nice Little Place on the North Side” Will recalls many of the memorable events and incidents from the sixty plus years he has been following the team.Read more ›
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18 of 23 people found the following review helpful
By
John Jorgensen
VINE VOICE on January 24, 2014
Format: Hardcover
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What we have here is a light little read about Wrigley Field. Well, sort of; it's really not too well focused. It has many diversions, some of them pleasant and some of them tedious, into such wide-ranging fields as history, economics, psychology, neuroscience, architecture, sociology, and urban planning. (The section on the surprising importance of beer to the formation of the first civilizations comes fairly close to being worth the price of admission in and of itself.)
The problem is, the book is very scattered. It's anecdotal; in addition to the above mentioned digressions, it offers stories by the dozen of memorable Wrigley games, memorable Cubs, memorable opponents, etc etc. I managed to shake a handful of baseball trivia questions loose (Who was the only Major League player who was a contemporary of both Babe Ruth and Hank Aaron? True or false: Major League teams have never combined for fifty runs in a single game.) Still, while190 pages of potpourri is not an unpleasant way to while away a few hours, I had expected more from Will.
There's something of a thesis to the book, one mentioned now and again in desultory fashion. It has to do with the idea that Wrigley Field's unique position as a stadium where the goal of making game day a pleasant experience regardless of the score has led to decade upon decade of leadership with no incentive to improving the team, thus leading to the poor Cubbies' never-ending futility. It's an interesting point, but it's lost in the general structure of a meandering yarn.
An okay baseball book.
The problem is, the book is very scattered. It's anecdotal; in addition to the above mentioned digressions, it offers stories by the dozen of memorable Wrigley games, memorable Cubs, memorable opponents, etc etc. I managed to shake a handful of baseball trivia questions loose (Who was the only Major League player who was a contemporary of both Babe Ruth and Hank Aaron? True or false: Major League teams have never combined for fifty runs in a single game.) Still, while190 pages of potpourri is not an unpleasant way to while away a few hours, I had expected more from Will.
There's something of a thesis to the book, one mentioned now and again in desultory fashion. It has to do with the idea that Wrigley Field's unique position as a stadium where the goal of making game day a pleasant experience regardless of the score has led to decade upon decade of leadership with no incentive to improving the team, thus leading to the poor Cubbies' never-ending futility. It's an interesting point, but it's lost in the general structure of a meandering yarn.
An okay baseball book.
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14 of 19 people found the following review helpful
By
Dennis M. Wierzbicki
VINE VOICE on March 27, 2014
Format: Hardcover
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First of all, I am a big fan of George Will. Secondly, I was born less than a mile from Wrigley Field and have been a Cub fan all my life. Thirdly, I work as a professional sports photographer and "ply my trade" at the Friendly Confines a couple dozen times each season. So, I have more than a little familiarity with the team and the venue.
I obtained this little (only 194 pages) book hoping to read an in depth history of the ballpark located on the corner of Clark and Addison, but this was more of an abridged history of the teams that have played there, mostly the Cubs. As such, it was a bit disappointing. I have the excellent McGraw-Hill history of Wrigley that contains some truly wonderful photo's taken by Cubs team photographer, Steve Green, and far prefer this earlier work to Will's book.
Not only is there limited history, but there are very few photo's. Wrigley Field is a beautiful place, and publishing a book with hardly any photo's of the park is a shame.
Maybe the final version of this title will contain more images (the copy I received was a pre-production print, replete with spelling and grammatical errors).
Having said the above, I did enjoy the book, especially the full text of former manager Lee Elia's infamous tirade when asked about Cub Fans ("Don't these people have jobs?"). Of additional note is Will's postulate that, as long as they play at Wrigley, a place so visually stunning that it is, in and of itself, a destination, and one that invariably sells out, independent of the quality of the team that resides there, the ownership of the Cubs will never be incentivized to spend the money required to field a championship caliber team.
I obtained this little (only 194 pages) book hoping to read an in depth history of the ballpark located on the corner of Clark and Addison, but this was more of an abridged history of the teams that have played there, mostly the Cubs. As such, it was a bit disappointing. I have the excellent McGraw-Hill history of Wrigley that contains some truly wonderful photo's taken by Cubs team photographer, Steve Green, and far prefer this earlier work to Will's book.
Not only is there limited history, but there are very few photo's. Wrigley Field is a beautiful place, and publishing a book with hardly any photo's of the park is a shame.
Maybe the final version of this title will contain more images (the copy I received was a pre-production print, replete with spelling and grammatical errors).
Having said the above, I did enjoy the book, especially the full text of former manager Lee Elia's infamous tirade when asked about Cub Fans ("Don't these people have jobs?"). Of additional note is Will's postulate that, as long as they play at Wrigley, a place so visually stunning that it is, in and of itself, a destination, and one that invariably sells out, independent of the quality of the team that resides there, the ownership of the Cubs will never be incentivized to spend the money required to field a championship caliber team.
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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
By
Rob Astrop
on April 19, 2014
Format: Kindle Edition
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This book is mildly interesting, not much baseball detail. More like an essay than a substantive book. And not very long.
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