Chin Music
by Lee Edelstein
SELA House, 2012
$14.95
“Chin Music” author Lee Edelstein describes himself as a retired entrepreneur who finally has time to write. After reading Chin Music, I wish Edelstein had found time to combine his passion for prose and the national pastime sooner. He brings readers an inspiring story and an endearing cast of characters that are easy to read and easy to like.
Chin Music is more than just a baseball book, it’s a book about life – about tragedy, triumph and the importance of relationships. It has mystery, history, action and even romance. Baseball – from the Yankees of the mid-1920s, to the world of sports memorabilia, to the ball fields of today – is the thread that weaves it all together.
The story centers around Ryan Buck, a talented and tormented high school athlete. He has survived a devastating car crash that took his father’s life and his brother Michael’s left leg. Yet Ryan, suffering survivor’s guilt that has spurred recurring nightmares and blocked memories of the accident, may be the most damaged of all. Ryan is just beginning to find some release on the baseball diamond (exceptional speed and glove, strong arm, but alternately magnificent and miserable at the plate), when a mystery from generations past sends ripples through the Buck family’s lives and Ryan’s future.
The roots of that mystery lie in Saint Petersburg, Florida, and the 1926 New York Yankees’ Spring Training Camp. Early in the book, Edelstein takes us back to that time and geography. He sets the scene skillfully (and believably), working the vernacular of the day and historically accurate set points into his prose.
Chin Music’s early flashbacks prove not just essential to the story, but also informative and entertaining. They are, in the words of the day: copacetic; the berries; or even the cat’s pajamas. Readers meet Ryan’s great-great grandmother Zel, one of St. Petersburg’s first lady barbers (which male residents found quite revolutionary). Zel is relegated primarily to cutting children’s hair – until Babe Ruth drops into Spud’s Barber Shop and chooses “the dame” for his daily shave and bi-weekly haircut. As the relationship between Zel and The Babe develops, Edelstein also provides plenty of entertaining insight into the times. Zel’s weekly budget, for example, includes nine-dollars a week boarding house rent (which covers her room, five suppers and one brunch) and seventy-cents a day for “breakfast, lunch, a Dr. Pepper, an occasional picture show, and miscellaneous items like toiletries and the chocolate candy she craves.”
Without giving away the story, the relationship between Zel and The Babe eventually involves trips to the ball park, a game-used bat and hat, a yellow flapper dress, Rum and Dr. Pepper, a few of the Babe’s hair clippings, the Sultan of Swat’s penchant for cigars, and Zel’s treasured personal journal.
From 1926 Spring Training, the story moves to the 21st century, with Ryan’s mother Susan facing the prospect of selling some of the Buck family’s Babe Ruth memorabilia (to meet Michael’s ongoing medical expenses) which has been passed down through the generations. This brings Susan together with retired memorabilia collector/seller Sam Frank, who sums up his relationship with baseball early on, stating “Baseball is a part of me. It’s a place I keep going back to.” Soon, the Buck household also becomes a place Sam keeps going back to and, as he becomes closer to the family, he sees not only the potential of the Babe Ruth items to bring considerable value at auction, but also the potential of young Ryan on the ball field.
There is, of course, the need to authenticate the Babe Ruth memorabilia and to do that Susan and Sam must rely on Zel’s journal – the pages of which surface a mystery that has plagued (even divided) the Buck family for generations. Resolution of that mystery, Sam discovers, has the potential to change the Buck family’s lives not just for now, but for generations to come. Solving that mystery, ultimately, changes not only the Buck family, but baseball itself.
If you are looking for page-after-page of inning-by-inning baseball action, detailed accounts of bad locker room behavior, or obscure statistics like Wins Above Replacement (WAR) or Fielding Independent Pitching (FIP), Chin Music may not be the book for you. However, if you are looking for a solid, well-written story that blends tragedy, redemption, mystery and even romance – all with a baseball hook – Chin Music is a darn good read. BBRT recommends it – not just for baseball fans, but for anyone who likes an inspiring and entertaining tale. Chin Music available at http://amzn.com/dp/0988
