Books with author Jonathan Etra

In the wake of a high school massacre, a copycat shooter begins to stalk otherwise sleepy Franklin, Missouri, further traumatizing the community. Disturbed by these crimes, logistics manager, Jackson Warner finds his way into an illicit chatroom ‘happydayz,’ dedicated to glorifying the killers. Jackson fixates on the young men’s disregard for life and suspects the copycat is among them. In his frenzy, will he mistake a troubled youth for a killer?

The definitive account of the life and tragic death of baseball legend Lou Gehrig.Lou Gehrig was a baseball legend—the Iron Horse, the stoic New York Yankee who was the greatest first baseman in history, a man whose consecutive-games streak was ended by a horrible disease that now bears his name. But as this definitive new biography makes clear, Gehrig’s life was more complicated—and, perhaps, even more heroic—than anyone really knew. Drawing on new interviews and more than two hundred pages of previously unpublished letters to and from Gehrig, Luckiest Man gives us an intimate portrait of the man who became an American hero: his life as a shy and awkward youth growing up in New York City, his unlikely friendship with Babe Ruth (a friendship that allegedly ended over rumors that Ruth had had an affair with Gehrig’s wife), and his stellar career with the Yankees, where his consecutive-games streak stood for more than half a century. What was not previously known, however, is that symptoms of Gehrig’s affliction began appearing in 1938, earlier than is commonly acknowledged. Later, aware that he was dying, Gehrig exhibited a perseverance that was truly inspiring; he lived the last two years of his short life with the same grace and dignity with which he gave his now-famous “luckiest man” speech. Meticulously researched and elegantly written, Jonathan Eig’s Luckiest Man shows us one of the greatest baseball players of all time as we’ve never seen him before.

Draws on hundreds of new interviews and previously unpublished letters to present a comprehensive account of the life of the Hall of Fame ballplayer whose career was cut short by the disease now named for him, in a portrait that shares background details about his rivalry with Babe Ruth, the onset of his illness, and the final years of his life. 100,000 first printing.

The definitive account of the life and tragic death of baseball legend Lou Gehrig.Lou Gehrig was a baseball legend—the Iron Horse, the stoic New York Yankee who was the greatest first baseman in history, a man whose consecutive-games streak was ended by a horrible disease that now bears his name. But as this definitive new biography makes clear, Gehrig’s life was more complicated—and, perhaps, even more heroic—than anyone really knew. Drawing on new interviews and more than two hundred pages of previously unpublished letters to and from Gehrig, Luckiest Man gives us an intimate portrait of the man who became an American hero: his life as a shy and awkward youth growing up in New York City, his unlikely friendship with Babe Ruth (a friendship that allegedly ended over rumors that Ruth had had an affair with Gehrig’s wife), and his stellar career with the Yankees, where his consecutive-games streak stood for more than half a century. What was not previously known, however, is that symptoms of Gehrig’s affliction began appearing in 1938, earlier than is commonly acknowledged. Later, aware that he was dying, Gehrig exhibited a perseverance that was truly inspiring; he lived the last two years of his short life with the same grace and dignity with which he gave his now-famous “luckiest man” speech. Meticulously researched and elegantly written, Jonathan Eig’s Luckiest Man shows us one of the greatest baseball players of all time as we’ve never seen him before.

====An excerpt from the book:====Everything about that night was weird. I mean everything.There we were, sitting at a booth in Jimmy’s Steakhouse, our favorite restaurant in all of Boulder, Colorado, like it was the most normal thing in the entire world. Only, it wasn’t. Not for our family, you see, because it was a weeknight, and we never went out on weeknights. We’d just finished the Thursday night meeting and Dad had suspiciously suggested we go out for dinner and Mom hadn’t said anything about us having school the next day, or the need to get in bed at a reasonable hour, or raised any number of sensible Mom-like objections, and so there we were.Also strange: the faces Mom and Dad kept making at each other during dinner. These were not normal faces. In fact, they kind of looked like the we’re-so-sorry-Will-but-we’ve-decided-to-euthanize-your-beloved-pet-hamster-Mr-Pickles-because-that-kidney-of-his-just-isn’t-getting-any-better faces burned into my memory from a few years back. (Actually, it was more than just a few years probably because I was about seven at the time of the Mr. Pickles incident but I guess that gives you an idea of how traumatic that experience had been, and just the fact that these current expressions reminded me of those expressions was putting my pulse at dangerous levels.)Alarm bells were ringing in my skull. There was a storm brewing on the horizon and everything told me to run.The other bizarre thing worth mentioning was that Mom was letting me have a mint chocolate malt after dinner when I knew she was concerned about my weight. It had gotten to the point where if she even heard me opening the refrigerator, she would yell out some conspicuous thing like how there was a bag of apples or grapes in the cupboard and some low fat granola bars, and didn’t that just sound delicious? She’d also recently taken the drastic measure of replacing all the actually good-tasting cereals in our home–like Cap’n Crunch, Fruit Loops, and Cocoa Puffs–with generic healthy ones that were basically just ground up wicker furniture.So there I was, just chewing and swallowing my food and looking at my parents being awkward. It was 2002 and I was fifteen years old and wise to the ways parents have of dropping bad news on their kids, and all the signs were there in full force. Sophie, on the other hand, was as happy as could be, just a blissful little nine-year-old thrilled out of her mind to be having ice cream past ten o’clock on a Thursday night. As I wiped the last steak fry in my malt glass and prepared to throw it in my mouth, Dad started to speak. The storm had arrived.“So, William. Sophia…” Dad does this thing when he’s trying to seem cool and relaxed where he leans back and crosses his legs and maybe undoes the top two buttons on his shirt and just really overdoes the whole casual thing...====Reviews & comments from readers:====“Anyone who reads "The Bloom of Youth" will be able to relive their own youth. The struggles of coming of age, the fact that we once thought our parents weren't as smart as we were, the first love interest, the true value of older mature friends, it all comes together in this story. It is well written and will certainly help any witness youth to give thought to where they are going with their life.” -John P. K., USA“I kind of surprised myself while reading this, not wanting to put it down... the perspective was refreshing and enlightening. As a father of a preteen young man, I feel I could identify with Will’s dad and really enjoyed having this window into their life.” -Rob M., USA“One of those books that you finish and just have to tell a friend about, because you know they've been there too and will "get" it on so many levels. An entertaining read.” -Patrick O., Canada

A chronicle of the 1947 baseball season during which Jackie Robinson broke the race barrier is a sixtieth anniversary tribute based on interviews with Robinson's wife, daughter, and teammates that covers such topics as his relationship with fellow players, the St. Louis Cardinals' proposed boycott of the Dodgers, and Robinson's associate with segregated hotel roommate and sportswriter Wendell Smith. 125,000 first printing.

This bestselling account of the most important season in baseball history, 1947, tells the dramatic story of how Jackie Robinson broke the color barrier and changed baseball forever.April 15, 1947, marked the most important opening day in baseball history. When Jackie Robinson stepped onto the diamond that afternoon at Ebbets Field, he became the first black man to break into major-league baseball in the twentieth century. World War II had just ended. Democracy had triumphed. Now Americans were beginning to press for justice on the home front—and Robinson had a chance to lead the way. In Opening Day, Jonathan Eig tells the true story behind the national pastime’s most sacred myth. He offers new insights into events of sixty years ago and punctures some familiar legends. Was it true that the St. Louis Cardinals plotted to boycott their first home game against the Brooklyn Dodgers? Was Pee Wee Reese really Robinson’s closest ally on the team? Was Dixie Walker his greatest foe? How did Robinson handle the extraordinary stress of being the only black man in baseball and still manage to perform so well on the field? Opening Day is also the story of a team of underdogs that came together against tremendous odds to capture the pennant. Facing the powerful New York Yankees, Robinson and the Dodgers battled to the seventh game in one of the most thrilling World Series competitions of all time. Drawing on interviews with surviving players, sportswriters, and eyewitnesses, as well as newly discovered material from archives around the country, Jonathan Eig presents a fresh portrait of a ferocious competitor who embodied integration’s promise and helped launch the modern civil-rights era. Full of new details and thrilling action, Opening Day brings to life baseball’s ultimate story.