→ November 6, 2015
→ By

A Fable.

My ranking of the top 50 free agents for this winter, with scouting/stat notes on each player, is now up for Insiders.

…thinking how war and drink are the two things man is never too poor to buy.

William Faulkner is, I think, a pretty divisive figure in American literature; his lengthy sentences and often obscure descriptive style can make you insane, but he tells vast, emotionally complex stories that capture huge swaths of American history (especially of the South) through the lens of just a handful of characters. The connected novels Absalom, Absalom! and The Sound and the Fury are both on my top 100, as is The Reivers, one of two novels for which Faulkner won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction (posthumously, in this case). The other, A Fable, is largely overlooked today even within Faulkner’s oeuvre, despite its grand scale and rich subtexts, which seem ripe for literary analysis, but it may suffer from Faulkner’s obtuse prose and adumbration of character descriptions and plot details. (And his vocabulary; “adumbration” appears at least twice in the text, and Faulkner engages in his own wordsmithing at times, such as “cachinnant,” a Latin word that means something like “laughing immoderately.”)

A Fable is a highly allegorical work that takes the Christ-like Corporal Stephan, referred to for most of the book merely as “the corporal,” and puts him in the trenches in World War I, where he leads a group of 12 other commissioned officers in a mutiny of peace. The novel opens just after the corporal and his disciples have convinced an entire regiment of three thousand French soldiers to refuse to fight, after which their German enemies similarly lay down their arms, causing a spontaneous outbreak of peace in the midst of a war. The book itself covers the various reactions to the corporal’s move, where the French army wants to execute him while also covering up the incident so that the war can continue. Woven into this is a second, loosely related story of an injured American racehorse whose rider and trainer rescue him from either death or work as a captive stud, traveling to small towns where the horse still wins various races even though he’s running on three legs, with the rider becomes a sentry in the war and the trainer adopts a new identity and travels to Europe to find his partner.

The corporal’s Christ allusions are blatant, perhaps too much so for modern analysis. He’s 33 at the time of the mutiny and eventual execution. He’s tempted by his father (“the general”) before the order for his execution, and the night prior to his death he has a last supper with his disciples, including the one who betrays him and the one named Piotr who denies knowing Stephan three times. His mother was Marya, and his fiancée was a prostitute from Marseilles. After his death, his corpse disappears (thanks to a German air-raid). Even his name alludes to Christianity – Saint Stephan, who is mentioned in the New Testamant, is considered the first martyr in the history of the Christian Church.

The novel is virulently anti-war, as you might expect with a Christ figure at its center, but there are elements of the picaresque in the book as well, such as the ragtag group of soldier’s at the book’s conclusion who need to find a corpse to bury in the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in Paris. I don’t know if Joseph Heller read A Fable, but there’s a similar vein of lack of respect for military authority and an awareness of the absurdity of war as a solution for most international problems and of the war machine’s desire to keep the combat going as a way to feed itself. Faulkner thought of this novel as his masterpiece, which leads me to believe that he viewed it as a strong pacifist statement that would incorporate satire and religious/moral arguments as a statement against war, with World War II ending around the time he began the novel and the Korean War occurring while he was still writing it.

I found the reading itself to be difficult, in part because his prose is too prolix, perhaps Proustian, but even more because he refuses to use his characters’ names, sometimes failing to name them at all. Keeping the corporal, the runner, the sentry, the general, and so on straight is hard enough without using their names, and it’s worse when there’s another general (Gragnon, who oversaw the mutinous regiment and realizes his career is over when they stop fighting) and a handful of corporals running around the book. There’s one point where Faulkner connects the horse’s groom (Mr. Harry) with the sentry, but I kept forgetting the two were the same character because he never uses the name with the term “the sentry,” who’s also a bit of a loan shark in his new regiment. A surfeit of descriptive prose can be acceptable if it’s actually descriptive, but much of the first third of A Fable felt shrouded in fog to me, including the opening section with the mutiny and the scene where a German general flies through a faked firefight to reach a negotiation to resume combat. So while the plot itself is elegant and simple, with much to ponder and analyze, it’s a book that probably requires a second or third reading to fully grasp the specific details of the story. That’s the best reason I can conceive why it’s so little read or discussed today, even as less ambitious works like As I Lay Dying continue to receive copious praise.

Unrelated: So a smart, professional person of my acquaintance saw I was reading this book the other day and mentioned how she heard Faulkner speak at Montgomery College about “five to seven years ago.” Faulkner died in 1962. I didn’t know what to do with that so I just smiled and nodded.

Next up: James Essinger’s Ada’s Algorithm, a biography of Ada Lovelace, the daughter of Lord Byron and the creator of the world’s first computer algorithm, about a century before we had the first true computer.

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→ November 3, 2015
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Starship Troopers.

My latest review for Paste covers the app version of Camel Up.

Robert A. Heinlein was both a prolific and critically-lauded writer of science fiction, with an emphasis on keeping the science somewhat grounded in the possible and using it as the platform to explore themes of liberty, individualism, and the role of government. Yet as far as I can remember, I’d only read one of his books, one of his young adult novels called Between Planets, and none of the four core Heinlein works that won Hugo Awards for Best Novel. (What I remember most strongly about that book was the absurd notion that humans could colonize Venus, but apparently at the time Heinlein wrote it scientists were unaware of that planet’s hellish atmosphere and climate.)

Starship Troopers won Heinlein the second of those four Hugos, four years after he won for Double Star and two years before his magnum opus, Stranger in a Strange Land, did the same. I was turned off from reading the book after seeing the trailer for the apparently very unfaithful 1997 film adaptation, but the book is nowhere near as dumb as the movie. (Casper Van Dien, who starred in that film version, was most recently spotted in a straight-to-DVD film called Avengers Grimm that holds a 13% audience rating on Rotten Tomatoes.) Heinlein’s book, written as a first-person memoir of the protagonists youth and first few years serving as a space marine, touches on many of the themes I mentioned above, while also apparently drawing controversy for its overtly militaristic setting … although I don’t agree with criticism of the work as somehow pro-war or even pro-fascism.

Johnny Rico is the space marine and narrator of Starship Troopers, having defied his wealthy father’s wishes and signed up for the service, only to find himself in a boot camp of unimaginable intensity, one designed to weed out most of the recruits. In this future society, Earth is ruled by a single government, and is engaged in war against sentient ant-like creatures just called “Bugs” from another solar system, and only retired veterans of the armed forces are allowed to vote. Rico’s personal philosophy is shaped by his experiences at boot camp and through “moral philosophy” professors he encounters (although he also takes a lot of math), but his presentation is hardly such that the reader should take his views as Heinlein’s. The one-world government arose after western societies collapsed due to rampant crime, much of it committed by undisciplined juveniles, and gave rise to this military-focused regime, one that seems built to feed the machine even when no conflict exists and thus to extend any conflict when one arises.

That bit of cynicism is more mine than Rico’s, but led me to believe that Heinlein was presenting a somewhat extreme scenario – a veiled dystopia – to show one potential outcome of contemporary social and economic trends. While Heinlein seems to come down on the side of harsher discipline of errant children, he also clearly presents the one-world government as one that sees war as the answer to many questions, and thus is somewhat unable to find non-conflict resolutions. If Heinlein is praising the military at all, it is for the way that such experiences can shape the character of an undisciplined young person or one who feels no sense of personal responsibility – although in Rico’s case, it wasn’t so much a lack of discipline or responsibility as a case of teenaged rebellion and a lack of motivation to work because of his father’s wealth. The world of Starship Troopers is hardly utopian; while individuals have a wide degree of personal liberty, the lack of the franchise is a significant debit, and the war-torn world where Buenos Aires and San Francisco are “smeared” by alien attacks is hardly one to appeal to any readers and make them want to sign up for the space marines.

If anything, Starship Troopers comes across as lighter fare than the discussion around its themes might indicate; Heinlein gives Rico a colloquial tone and matter-of-fact delivery that breezes through the philosophical lectures and lets the tension of the book’s few military encounters take over. There isn’t a single central narrative; the plot is the memoir itself, rather than a single military mission or even a story of the war with the Bugs. You could just as easily read the book without worrying about whether Heinlein was promoting fascism or capital punishment or revoking most citizens’ right to vote.

Next up: Still slogging through William Faulkner’s A Fable.

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→ November 2, 2015
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October 2015 music update.

After a slew of highly-anticipated albums hit stores from mid-August to early October, I figured we’d get a lull in good new music … only to have lead singles show up from forthcoming records from Savages, Grimes, Chairlift, and St. Lucia in the second half of October. By the way, my MLB free agent rankings will be up for Insiders on Friday.

Zhu with Bone Thugs-N-Harmony and Trombone Shorty – Hold Up, Wait a Minute. I hadn’t heard of Zhu before this track, but of course I know BTNH from their 1990s heyday and have heard Trombone Shorty before. Zhu’s work is all electronic dance music, but this track draws more heavily from 1970s funk than his previous work, and I don’t mean in the way that Mark Ronson just appropriates stuff and claims it’s his own. It’s great to hear Bone Thugs-N-Harmony active again ahead of their upcoming album E. 1999 Legends, especially as their faster, melodic style of rapping has completely disappeared from the scene. This might be the best pop song of the year for me.

Savages – The Answer. The all-female quartet Savages had my third-favorite album of 2013 with their debut Silence Yourself, and are set to release their follow-up disc in January. This lead single is harder and angrier, teetering on the edge of total collapse for most of its length, and I love it.

Chairlift – Ch-Ching. Chairlift’s “I Belong in Your Arms” is one of my favorite songs of the decade so far, more than their more popular track “Bruises,” and I think “Ch-Ching” – the first single from their album Moth, due in January – is more in the former vein, a song that blends strong hooks with elements designed to put you on edge or even slightly irritate you, like the duo are trying to ensure they have your full attention.

St. Lucia – Dancing On Glass. Jean-Philip Grobler’s debut album as St. Lucia also made that list of my top albums of 2013, and he also just released the lead single from his upcoming sophomore disc, which doesn’t seem to have a release date yet. It’s the same kind of bright 1980s electronic new wave music that populated that first album, and while I preferred some of the tracks with a little hint of darkness (“All Eyes on You,” “September”) Grobler has created another very sunny, catchy hook here.

Grimes – Flesh without Blood. It’s been a tumultuous couple of years since Grimes’ last album, Visions, but her sound has evolved for the better, with two non-album singles in “Go” and “REALiTi” that weren’t similar to each other or her earlier work. Her new album, Art Angels, will be released in digital format this week, and she’s promised yet another change in sound, with most songs recorded with “real instruments” according to a tweet of hers from May. This lead single seems like her most commercially viable song yet, but it’s also still distinctively her in the vocals and biting lyrics.

Moon Taxi – Red Hot Lights. The fourth album from this Tennessee rock act came out in early October, featuring this heavy blues number that would draws from the more progressive side of 1970s classic rock.

Laura Stevenson – Claustrophobe. Stevenson grew up a couple of towns over from me, and it seems like the music that surrounded me in college became her primary influences, as this hazy, slow rocker is very college-rock circa 1994 or so – very Belly, Throwing Muses, Helium, Blake Babies kind of stuff, with a sweet voice singing acerbic lyrics over dissonant guitars.

City and Colour – Runaway. City and Colour is actually Canadian singer/songwriter Dallas Green, who is not the former Phillies manager, and puts out inconsistent, pleasant folk-rock tracks that only sometimes have the kind of biting edge that I think songs in this genre require to separate themselves from the masses of Mumford & Sons clones. The melody here really reminds me of Violent Soho’s “Fur Eyes,” released in April.

A Silent Film – Paralysed. This is a pop song, right? A Silent Film were pretty well under the U.S. radar, with a few songs I liked between their first two albums (especially “You Will Leave a Mark”), but the duo seems to have thrown their alternative sensibilities out the window to record something far more commercial. There’s nothing directly drawn from it but “Paralysed” keeps calling to mind Cause and Effect’s minor 1994 hit “It’s Over Now.”

A Tribe Called Quest – Bonita Applebum (Pharrell Williams Remix). I dislike remixes as a general rule, since most of them render the original song worse and/or unrecognizable … but Pharrell did a pretty good job here with a Tribe hit that isn’t one of my favorites by them.

Martin Courtney – Airport Bar. Real Estate singer/songwriter puts out song that sounds like Real Estate.

Ten Commandos – Staring Down the Dust (feat. Mark Lanegan). Ten Commandos features Soundgarden’s bassist, Pearl Jam’s drummer, QotSA’s other guitarist, and Off!’s guitarist, with Screaming Trees vocalist Mark Lanegan contributing vocals here but sounding nothing like himself at all. It’s full of grunge heroes but the song is distinctly stoner or desert rock, reminiscent of peak Masters of Reality.

Porches – Hour. I vaguely knew Porches as singer Aaron Maine’s folk-rock project, but it sounds like he’s been possessed by Vince Clarke here on this gothic synth-pop track.

Co-pilgrim – You Come Over, You Go. This kind of indie-rock seems like it’ll never really catch on in the U.S.; it’s a little too lush, a little too ethereal, not enough of any one thing to fit neatly into a specific bucket like hard rock or folk or whatever the latest term is.

Bloc Party – The Love Within. This sounds more like a Kele solo jam than a classic Bloc Party track, and given how mediocre Four was, I’m okay with this.

Pure Bathing Culture – Palest Pearl. PBC’s solo album is solid but couldn’t live up to the huge promise of its lead single and title track “Pray for Rain.” This is a little poppier, less wistful, my second-favorite song from the album so far.

Deerhunter – Duplex Planet. Never was much of a Deerhunter fan before this latest album, but they’ve expanded their musical palette enough to rope me in; “Snakeskin” is a top 20 or so song for me for the year, and “Duplex Planet” has some of that same frenetic energy and psychedelic vibe.

Panama – Jungle. I loved Panama’s minor 2013 hit “Always,” and this is somewhat in that vein, a more soulful take on classic new wave reinterpreted through current electronic music sounds.

The Creases – Point. The Creases made my top 100 in 2014 with “Static Lines,” an annoyingly-catchy song that was very distinctly Australian in its pop sensibility; there’s a certain sound that’s come from Down Under for about three decades now – I trace it back to the Go-Betweens, who were hugely successful and influential in their home country and nearly unknown here in the U.S. This song is a little catchier and a little less annoying, as if the Creases have maybe decided to lighten up a little bit.

Disciples – Flawless. This London production trio (also written as DISCIPLΞS) had a huge hit in Europe earlier this year with “How Deep Is Your Love,” hitting the top ten in at least sixteen countries (per Wikipedia, which is never wrong), but I like this song more – it’s a darker track, emerging from the depths of late-80s acid house, a sound that originated in the U.S. but really caught fire in the UK.

Lemaitre featuring Jennie A. – Closer. I’ve included Lemaitre on the site before for their 2013 song “Iron Pyrite,” which placed 44th on my list of the top songs of that year. Their sound here is different, with prominent horns and better vocals (I have no idea who Jennie A. is, though), more electronic-jazz than straight electronica and I think a welcome evolution in their sound.

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→ November 1, 2015
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The Man Within.

Graham Greene is one of my favorite novelists, period; I’ve read more novels of his than of any other author save P.G. Wodehouse and Agatha Christie. Greene wrote twenty-six novels, two of which he later repudiated and which have been out of print for over eighty years, and divided his works into serious novels and mere “entertainments,” the latter typically what we’d now call spy novels, although some of his entertainments, like my favorite work of his, Our Man in Havana, still had serious themes and the distinction seems arbitrary when one has the vantage point of reading his entire oeuvre. His first novel, The Man Within, foreshadows the potential dichotomy in his work, as a suspense novel with a tragic-romantic component, themes of Christian morality and guilt, and a central character grappling with fundamental questions of right and wrong.

Francis Andrews, the novel’s protagonist, is on the run as the novel begins, fleeing his former smuggling mates after betraying them to the authorities. After three days on the run without sleep, he stumbles into a hovel occupied by a young woman, Elizabeth, watching over the corpse of her just-dead guardian, an encounter that begins with her threatening Francis with a gun but improbably turns into a Victorian romance. Their entanglement comes apart when Elizabeth persuades Francis to follow through on his anonymous letter and go to Lewes to testify against the smugglers, who stand accused of killing an officer of the law when the authorities caught them on a local beach – but who remain so popular with the townsfolk that securing a conviction is very unlikely. Francis, who labels himself a coward throughout the book, in contrast to his fearless (and likely sociopathic) smuggler father, faces choice after choice to put what is right over his own skin, a path that endangers Elizabeth and himself before a strange ending allows Francis to make one last stab at finding some measure of courage.

The Man Within was published when Greene was 25, and it reads more like an homage to British literature of the 19th century than a novel of its time; it came four years after The Great Gatsby appeared, three years after The Sun Also Rises, and seven years after Joyce ushered in postmodernism with Ulysses, all of which makes Greene’s first stab at a novel seem quaint in comparison. His second novel, Orient Express (also published as Stamboul Train), was a pure “entertainment,” a thriller set on the train that Christie made famous two years later. While that novel had elements of romance between the characters, those threads were more cynical in nature, dispensing with the naïve take on love Greene displayed in The Man Within, which has Greene’s voice in evidence but without the life experience he might have needed to craft his later works, both the serious “Catholic novels” and the thrillers that made his reputation. The most interesting character in this book gets relatively little screen time or development – Carlyon, Francis’ patron on the smuggling ship, a friend who filled in as a father figure, and who was most directly hurt by Francis’ ultimate betrayal and who is hunting Francis with the intention to kill him. That relationship, prior to the anonymous letter, isn’t well fleshed-out, and Carlyon is drawn too thinly for a character that would have to be complex to generate the remorse he does in Andrews.

Greene himself later derided this book as “hopelessly romantic,” but at least allowed this one to remain in print whereas the next two novels he wrote were, in his view, so bad that he renounced them and let them fall out of print. The Man Within stands more as a work of historical interest, as it shows Greene the storyteller learning his craft in a work that would probably rank as very good had it come from most novelists but, from one of the masters of 20th century literature, feels immature and a bit hollow.

Next up: I’ve finished Robert Heinlein’s Starship Troopers and started William Faulnker’s Pulitzer Prize- and National Book Award-winning novel A Fable.

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→ October 31, 2015
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Saturday five, 10/31/15.

No Insider content this week, as I’ve been on vacation, but I did hold a Klawchat on Thursday. My AFL scouting notes from last week are here and here.

The app version of the cooperative boardgame Elder Sign is on sale right now for $0.99 for both Android (via amazon) and iOS. It’s absolutely worth it.

And now, the links…

  • No, bacon doesn’t really cause cancer, not in the way the media’s coverage of the WHO designation would lead you to believe. This was a case of mass science ignorance at work.
  • Chimeras are real! Well, again, not really, but there is a phenomenon in humans known as chimerism, where one of two twins in the womb doesn’t make it, and the surviving twin absorbs some of the lost sibling’s DNA. This led to failed paternity test last year which led to this significant scientific discovery.
  • The NY Times covers the fraying narrative around the medical startup Theranos and its founder Elizabeth Holmes. My favorite quote in the piece, from another reporter, is, “People in medicine couldn’t understand why the media and technology worlds were so in thrall to her.” Uh, maybe because she’s 31 and blonde and pretty?
  • David Mitchell has a new book out, Slade House, and Wired has a piece praising it for being so beginner-friendly. I read Cloud Atlas this spring (that links to my review) and enjoyed it quite a bit. Still waiting for that second Luisa Rey mystery, though.
  • Tokyo will have a bookstore-themed hostel starting next week. I’m a bit old for hostel travel now but there’s something decidedly romantic about this whole concept.
  • SXSW is trying to undo the damage done by its earlier decision to cave to online harassers, now restoring panels on the problem of online harassment of women, although one of the panelists is himself accused of just such a crime.
  • All the news on China this week focused on the end of the one-child policy, but the NY Times has a long read on the country’s construction of seven new islets in the Spratly Islands chain, ownership of which has long been disputed among multiple countries. This is a highly aggressive move that seems like a play toward gaining more control over undersea resources in the region.
  • A small study in North Carolina found that parents’ vaccine-denial beliefs often preceded pregnancy, coming from cultural factors, often correlated with other anti-science beliefs.
  • Subway earned plaudits for its decision to switch to antibiotic-free meats, but they gave themselves ten years to do it, and the linked piece details some of the challenges for ‘suppliers’ (that is, the people who raise the animals). Humans started using antibiotics prophylactically on animals because it allowed them to crowd more and more of the creatures into smaller spaces without incurring the wrath of bacteria that spread quickly when conditions are tight. Such practices are, in my view, inhumane to begin with, but antibiotic resistance is the very real cost on which there should be no disagreement. Evolution’s real, and it has little regard for our species’ whims.
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→ October 29, 2015
→ By

Klawchat 10/29/15.

Klaw: The bridge you burn is gonna take its toll. Klawchat.

Drake: Who do you think could replace AA as Blue Jays GM? Would they promote LaCava?
Klaw: The name I keep hearing is Ross Atkins, who has overseen the farm system in Cleveland for several years now.

Steve: Since more people are killed by knives than by rifles, do you think there should be laws limiting knife ownership?
Klaw: I think this question further illustrates how bad American public schools are at teaching math.

David: Thoughts on Bud Black to the Nationals?
Klaw: Solid, but how solid depends on whether some of his in-game tactics improve. He gets high marks within the game for his behind-the-scenes work, and I know when Hoyer was GM there Black’s in-game management was better, too.

Bryan: Will Almora be an early season call up next year?
Klaw: To do what? A no-power CF with poor on-base skills isn’t going to help the major-league club.

Aaron Gershoff: It seems like Harvey and deGrom are hitting the end-of-season wall…they were both missing in bad spots (as opposed to missing off the plate). deGrom especially was missing right over the heart of the plate…even the worst MLB teams can hit a 95mph fastball right down the pipe. I also thought deGrom’s arm was at a lower angle…I’m guessing this would take some movement off his fastball and make it easier to track for KC’s hitters. Thoughts?
Klaw: Lower arm slot generally leads to more movement rather than less, but also I think the Mets’ plan of attack vs KC didn’t work: most hitters miss their fastballs, but the Royals’ hitters didn’t and probably won’t.

Sam: Which Astros pitching prospect has the best stuff? Do you still see Appel as a top of the rotation guy?
Klaw: Prospect as in still in the minors? Probably Martes. Appel has more like #2 starter stuff but still needs better command, and the Astros need to let him become primarily a two-seamer guy because pitching up with the four-seamers isn’t working for him.

Derek Harvey: What is your opinion of Josh Hader? I heard he was hitting 97 in instructs and now in the AFL. Do you think that’s a real change for him or is it more likely he’s unloading because he’s only pitching in short stints?
Klaw: I saw him hit 96 or 97 in the C-C All-Star Game here last year. He’s a reliever for sure but filthy with the life on the sinker and the hard slider.

Kingpin: What can you tell us about Byung-ho Park? Can he be at least an average big league first baseman? From what I’ve read, he is limited to 1B so the bat has to be pretty darn good, right?
Klaw: And there’s a lot of swing and miss too.

J: This is a bit of an open-ended question, and maybe one less well-suited for a chat than another forum. You’ve been adamant about the loss of efficacy for a starting pitcher the 4th time through a line-up. At the same time, pitching staffs are already overstuffed to an annoying degree. How can baseball recalibrate to handle what feels like, if not contrary, then at odds thoughts – less complete games and less specialization. Perhaps the answer is in what we’re seeing after two games of the WS with Niese, Colon, and Young – the joys of a good long reliever. In short – how can we get back to an 11-man staff, tops, and accommodate new understandings of pitcher fatigue?
Klaw: Employ some actual “long” relievers – which in this day and age means anyone who can pitch to more than four batters without being hauled back into cold storage.

Jonathan (St. Louis): Randal Grichuk question: The knock on him is that the hit may not be good enough to get to the power. His OBP this year was about 330. To my (uneducated) ear, that sounds good enough. Is it? Is he likely to repeat it, or was that him playing over his head?
Klaw: Playing over his head in a short season with some judicious usage.

My real name is Matt: Hi Keith. Is Schwarber at 3B a crazy idea? Seems like a all-state linebacker candidate in high school would have good quickness/lateral movement- at least enough to man third. Bryant to left. What say you?
Klaw: Yes, it’s a crazy idea. Also a very bad one.

Brian: Any chance the Mets can dig themselves out of this 2-0 hole to win this thing? The Mets look overmatched and their pitchers look frustrated. Thanks!
Klaw: Of course. That’s pure recency bias – they’re the same team that swept the Cubs. And plenty of teams have come back from 2-0 to win seven-game series in MLB history.

Eric: Hi Keith, should Tony LaCava get any consideration for the GM job in Toronto?
Klaw: Yes but apparently he won’t.

Sriram: Did you read the Rosenthal piece on the hiring practices of MLB – agree, disagree, it’s complicated?
Klaw: Agree. We’ve had one Black manager or GM hired this offseason and he’s white.

Derek: Perhaps the best way to improve the Nats’ lineup is to move Harper to CF and buy FA for RF (e.g., Heyward, Gordon, Upton, etc.) What do you think about Harper in CF (it sure seems like a good way to maximize his insane value; he’s been a competent CF in the past)? The reasoning is that the spread of potential outcomes for M.A. Taylor in CF is too much risk for a contending team like the Nats to bear. What do you think? If the plan is to go with Taylor in CF, I think I’d want a premium 4th OF who could step in if he craters. You probably can’t sign a guy like that, so you’d have to trade for him. Do you think AJ Cole could fetch somebody who fits that mold?
Klaw: I agree with you on Harper – I think he can handle it and be at least an average defender. Taylor’s glove is much better, but there’s huge OBP downside risk. Also, I don’t see the Nats (or most teams in this situation) giving three significant roles to rookies – CF, SS, and a rotation spot. Cole could (should) fetch you a fourth OF or better as I think he’s an MLB ready starter right now.

Jason: My buddy is trying to tell me the two best teams in baseball are playing right now, I countered that the Jays are better than KC…. Settle this for us…. He told me that Price just isn’t good in October
Klaw: The playoffs don’t determine better or best. They determine the winners. Once your friend accepts that those two things aren’t the same, and that you don’t have to care about the former if you don’t want to, he’ll enjoy the playoffs much more. And Price looked just fine to me.

Jesse: Granted the trades were probably necessary and Tulo’s got some years left, but on a scale of “coincidence” to “coincidence, my ass,” where do you rank AA gutting the farm, then declining an extension and ultimately moving on elsewhere?
Klaw: Absolutely a coincidence. Your read on the situation is comically wrong.

Blake Guyer: What’s your take on the Royals adding Raul Mondesi Jr. to their World Series roster?
Klaw: Joe Sheehan’s newsletter piece on it was great: if this is indeed a way to cover for Ben Zobrist possibly leaving if his wife goes into labor early, then Yost and company deserve a ton of credit for doing so and for handling it as they did. Because Mondesi has basically no way to help this team right now.

Alex: We know the Cubs will pursue Price and/or Zimmermann, but what do you think the likelihood of a trade is? Do they flip one of the kids for a more reliable bat or do they keep the band together and hope everyone just learns from experience?
Klaw: How about both? They have more bats than they can use. Castro and Baez can’t both be on this roster in 2016.

Pat: Did you notice anything last night that would lead you to believe de Grom was tipping his pitches? It seems like the Royals knew what was coming once he got into the stretch.
Klaw: Many people have said that, but I doubt I would have seen it even if I’d watched the game live, which I didn’t.

Greg: As much as I wish I could read through great novels like you seem to, I prefer comics. Easy quick stories but still complicated plots, great humor, and never ending twists. Did you as a kid or even now read comics?
Klaw: Never – neither comics nor “graphic novels.” I like words.

Scott: Is strikeout rate an improvable skill? Specifically, do you see the Cubs young hitters capable of improving that skill? If you don’t, how much will that hamstring them?
Klaw: The skill is the ability to make contact. It can be improved, although some of it (e.g., hand-eye coordination) is likely innate.

Greg: Assuming Daniel Murphy leaves the Mets, how do you see the infield shaping next year with Herrera, Flores, and Tejada. Would you play Herrera at 2B, Flores at SS with Tejada the back up? Do you see a FA infielder that you think fits with the Mets well?
Klaw: Flores is not an everyday shortstop. Neither is Herrera, though, so they may have to look outside – and may have to decide now if they believe Cecchini is likely to fill that spot for them in the next 24 months, before Rosario becomes a possibility for the major-league job.

Casey: What’s the ceiling for Patrick Wisdom? Is he just a bat off the bench or could be an everyday player?
Klaw: Bench or less.

Casey: Where will Alex Reyes start next season and could he be in the Cardinals bullpen or rotation by the end of the season?
Klaw: I assume he starts in AA or AAA and finishes in their rotation if healthy. He looked outstanding in the AFL but I can see some delivery issues that might have contributed to the shoulder problem.

Rick: Which white Ivy League graduate will replace AA in Toronto?
Klaw: The Ivy League bit really pisses me off, and I think I can go after it because I went to one of them fancy schools. It’s less about white – Harvard’s population is only a little less diverse than the US as a whole, at least in terms of African-American and Latino students – but more about privilege. Ivy League is not a good proxy for intelligence, and it isn’t even a great proxy for wealth, but it is a damn good proxy for privilege. It’s damn hard to get there unless you grew up in the right circumstances. And if we are closing the door as an industry on anyone who didn’t grow up in those circumstances, then I won’t be supporting the industry for much longer.

Alex D.: Did you happen to see Bubba Starling during your AFL visit? If so, have you seen anything different that would lead you to believe he can be an everyday major leaguer, or is the window closing?
Klaw: I did, and it was more of the same. He’s marginally better than he was in 2014, with more consistency to the swing, but not enough that I’d say he could hit enough to be a big leaguer.

Adam (PHX): What are your initial thoughts on Olivera? Needs to improve his approach? Defense to stick at 3rd?
Klaw: All of the above. Defense might not even stick at third, so that has to improve too.

Dino: What are your thought on Jemier Candeliaro and W. Conteras. Are we looking at Major league regulars?
Klaw: Yes on Contreras. Candelario hits enough to be a regular at 3b but is a 40 defender there.

Ray A.: What do you think of Christian Arroyo? Get a chance to see him during your Fall League trip?
Klaw: I did but not enough. I like the swing – I did when I saw him in the AFL in 2013 – and I don’t think he’s a shortstop.

David (San Diego): Gardenhire and Sofield are allegedly the two finalists for the manager’s job in San Diego. Any thoughts on these gentlemen?
Klaw: White guys! I don’t know anything about Sofield but Gardenhire was so bad tactically and showed zero improvement in Minnesota that I think I’d rather take the complete unknown (from a great organization).

Alex: Did I make a good choice?
Klaw: I’m behind anyone who chooses family, job satisfaction, or personal happiness over money or prestige.

Jon V: Cleveland allowed Shapiro to leave for a lateral move and now could lose a top front office guy (albeit to a promotion). Are they being “too easy” to work with?
Klaw: Not a lateral move (he was not involved in baseball ops in Cleveland) and maybe they were OK with him leaving too?

Jeff: Opinions on the Matt klentak hire?
Klaw: I think it indicates that MacPhail will be very heavily involved in baseball ops. Klentak is very sharp and has a strong resume, but I read his hiring as one of Andy choosing someone he knows and with whom he’s comfortable. Given this trend in so many front offices now, MLB has to bear down on hiring of Presidents because they’re becoming the de facto GMs – and I think there’s exactly one of color in any organization.

Anonymous: So, what coaching position will AA get with the Red Sox? But seriously have you ever seen anything like the Amaro move? The closest I can think of is Farrell himself. I believe he was Cleveland director of player development before becoming pitching coach. But that’s neither as high as GM nor as low as 1B coach.
Klaw: I love it. I never cared for Ruben’s work as GM, and my limited interactions with him weren’t positive, but it takes a lot of character to start relatively low on the totem pole (first base coaches don’t have a ton of responsibility) like he is.

Adam D.: Have you ever found yourself giving a prospect the benefit of the doubt simply because you’ve met them and like them as people? The other way around? More harsh on a guy because you know he’s a bad character guy? Any examples?
Klaw: No on the former. I would suck at my job if I did that stuff. A “bad character guy” who has a lousy work ethic or doesn’t listen to coaches is legitimately a worse prospect, though.

Randy Burgess: Since being signed, there has not been much discussion of Yadier Alvarez. Do players in his situation have to wait before working in the minors or do they workout at some kind of extended full-season training?
Klaw: He’s had trouble getting his visa to get to the US.

JR: Do you get a kick out of all these articles we see this time of year about how player X has made/cost himself $$ due to postseason performance? Do they really think GMs are going to toss out years of data based on a 10-18 game sample size (or even smaller for pitchers)?
Klaw: I bet that stuff used to happen 15-20 years ago but now it’s just filling column-inches for lazy writers.

Michael: Where does Cooper Johnson rank among amateur catchers?
Klaw: Among the best. It’s a bad crop, but he look like a legitimate potential first rounder.

Ryan: Is it weird to be at the AFL while the Series is going? i.e Conceptually strange at all to be so completely focused on the future at the cost of the present?
Klaw: I’m back from the AFL but no, it’s not weird to be there in October. It’s my job and one of my favorite trips of the year.

Ryan: As a Rangers fan, where should I set my expectations for Profar?
Klaw: I think he’s all the way back as a hitter. I have no idea what his throwing will look like once he’s cleared in the spring, and of course they don’t have an obvious place to play him.

Mike: If you were Bud Black, what would do on your first day on the job in Washington?
Klaw: Call Bryce Harper and make sure we’re on the same page as much as possible. He’s the center of the team right now, and while you’re his nominal ‘boss’ you want to start that relationship off on the right foot.

JA: Thanks for taking time to answer q’s on your vacation Keith! What have you seen out of Mac Williamson during the AFL? Is he ready to contribute in SF next season?
Klaw: Bat speed looked good, recognition of sliders wasn’t, seemed to be limited throwing (nursing an injury?), still a great athlete who runs well and should be very good in RF.

Austin: What do you make of the comment that Shapiro was upset with Anthopolous for trading so many prospects? Should Jays fans be worried about a decrease in payroll, or anything of the sort?
Klaw: If that’s true, and I don’t know if it is, it seems awfully shortsighted (ironically enough) given the mandate to win and the market’s desire for a playoff appearance. AA used those prospects the right way – to get high-impact players in return.

Ryan: You have a youngish child. Is it a problem that MLB has playoff games ending at 2:20 am EST on a school night?
Klaw: I can’t stay up that late for the end of a game. She wouldn’t either, assuming she cared about baseball.

Hermoine G: Is there any chance that baseball will address its anachronistic and self-defeating blackout policy. It seems that a sport with a declining viewer base doesn’t really want to arbitrarily limit demand.
Klaw: Yes. Really, the whole TV policy is going to have to change as more homeowners cut their cable/satellite subscriptions. We’re going to deal directly with content providers more frequently.

Keith: There’s currently 1 minority manager (Gonzalez) and he’s bad. I don’t buy that there’s just not any good/qualified minority managers, so are teams just failing in their searches and not giving enough minorities consideration?
Klaw: I think like hires like, and people hire people they already know. With whites all over the top of the game, you’re not getting much consideration of minority candidates below them because (I believe) the white execs just don’t know enough people of color within the sport.

Michael: What generally happens to the scouting and front office infrastructure after a move like AA’s? Will the scouts/executives move on and/or get fired?
Klaw: Over the next twelve months you’ll probably see a lot of them move on, either because they wanted to or because they’re not renewed.

Anonymous: You have to think this spells the end for Gibby in Toronto, no? I think he’s done a great job but he was AA’s guy
Klaw: I think it’s the end for him. Look for Shapiro to bring in someone he knows/likes – maybe my colleague Eric Wedge?

Ken: I was surprised with the number of relievers throwing high 90’s, low 100’s in AZ. What is holding them back from being on a big league roster? If they flame out, it seems the best strategy is to get them up and use as many of the bullets as you can.
Klaw: Lack of command and/or secondary stuff.

Tim: The Royals and Giants both strike out at very low rates. Given their recent success, does this weaken the “a strikeout is just another out” thinking by some FOs? I kind of see both sides.
Klaw: The strikeout is just another out thing is true from a direct run-expectancy perspective, but that’s not the same as saying that there’s no added value in making contact, because not all contact is created equal.

Evan: Am I crazy to think the Cubs should do nothing with Schwarber (as in keep him in left)? I have seen way too many people (on the internet granted, not to self: don’t go on the internet) ready to trash him as useless for the Cubs.
Klaw: Play him in LF. He’ll be fine and he’ll hit a lot of homers and everyone will be all YAY SCHWARBER again.

AJ: Hi Keith any thoughts on Chris Shaw? He had a good short season and showed some power the Giants seem to lack in their system
Klaw: Has power, power over hit though, and decent chance he’s a DH not a 1B in the long run.

Justin: Considering Toronto is the only team in Canada, which, while lovely, has a different exchange rate, tax rate, and an additional immigration component, is it harder for the Jays to find front office talent? What about coaching, scouting, and player talent?
Klaw: No, that’s just a myth. You pay very slightly more to cover the tax issues and you’re fine. Plus it’s an amazing city from April to September. As long as I don’t have to spend the winter there I love it.

John: Looking at the Nats’ selection process, Black is clearly a better choice than Baker. Do you think teams game the system with respect to which minority candidates they bring in? Like, “Ok, we checked the box by interviewing Manny Ramierez, but all of you can clearly see that he has some defects compared to our first choice.”
Klaw: There’s no question they do. In many processes it’s more important to get a minority than to get the right one.

Dan: Asking once more then I’ll leave you alone (respecting if you don’t want to answer and I don’t want to bug you) – are there any prospect annuals you would recommend to someone who doesn’t know much but enjoys your yearly ranking columns?
Klaw: No, sorry. I haven’t bought or used any books like that in years.

nb: Keith – Andrew Knapp tore things up in Reading after his promotion. Did you see him in Arizona? Do you see him or Afardo as the Phillies catcher of the future? Thanks.
Klaw: Alfaro. Knapp’s stat line doesn’t match the scouting report. You can beat him pretty easily at the plate.

Julius (Oakland): Have you seen Matt Manning in person yet? He seems to be getting a lot of helium in the fall showcases. Could he be working his way into first round consideration?
Klaw: Longenhagen saw him good this summer and I heard from a scout Manning was 91-95 with a good CB in Jupiter, so I think he’s a possibility for the first round – but it is SO early to make any bold statements on that topic.

Jeff: Keith I am sort of “getting back” into reading but generally prefer nonfiction. Of the little I have read of his, Malcolm Gladwell’s writing appeals to me. Have you reviewed his work in the past? General opinion of him?
Klaw: Tends to gloss over some details to craft a stronger narrative. Michael Lewis does the same; both are wonderful writers but their work doesn’t stand up that well to deeper scrutiny.

AJ: Hi Keith what are your thoughts on Tyler Beede? Is his low K rate a concern? Reports are that he’s lost some velocity. While he did well in high A, he also got hit quite a bit in AA
Klaw: He didn’t lose velocity per se but switched to a sinker and is now 88-89. He no longer misses bats and his control has gone backwards. I think there’s still a big-league starter in there, but the current iteration doesn’t look like one.

Kyle: At the time the Rangers were thought to “sell the farm” for Hamels. IMO I think they actually sold Williams on a high and that Brinson will be a better overall player especially defensively. Thoughts?
Klaw: I’ve always preferred Brinson, for defense, power, and makeup. Williams’ approach at the plate isn’t that good – he had a few weeks of walking and then went back to his old self – although he has made himself a viable major-league glove in CF.

Mike: Likelihood of Price back to Jays smaller now, or nil?
Klaw: It was always nil.

Travis: How high could Ian Anderson go in the draft next year? Between him and Whitley this year, it’s been an unusually strong couple years for upstate NY prep talents.
Klaw: He’s in that group with Manning of possible first-round HS arms, but it’ll all depend on how they pitch in the spring (and who stays healthy).

Bob: I know you were on the radio in Toronto talking about the AA situation. I have seen anything from you in writing yet. Do you have a short capsule you can share here in chat?
Klaw: I’m not going to write about it (I’m on vacaaaaaation) but TSN1050’s Twitter feed has the linnk to the audio.

Michael: Would you be in favor of preferred hiring for entry-level jobs? I’m white (and yes, had a fairly privileged upbringing), but I’d be fairly disappointed–I have tried pretty hard for years to get a job with a club–if someone got a job on less than merit.
Klaw: Plenty of meritorious candidates of all backgrounds out there. Supply far exceeds demand at the entry level.

Kevin: You were always high on the Royals system, Mouse and Hosmer especially. Is this what you envisioned out of them, or did they take a different path from your scouting, but still manage to turn into very good players
Klaw: Hosmer is getting closer to what I envisioned from him but I still think there’s more in there. Moustakas is right about at the realistic ceiling I expected – but both guys took longer than I would have guessed to get there.

Robert: Have you gotten a chance to see Joe Rizzo in action? Wondering where position you would project him as a Pro, not sure he can stay at 3rd base.
Klaw: Saw him a bunch in August, feel very good about his hit tool, not sure on his position either because I didn’t get many reps in the field.

Rob: You seemed to be down on Domingo Acevedo in your quick mention the other day. Does he even project as a MLB reliever at t his point, or am I reading too much into what you wrote?
Klaw: He’s a possible ML reliever. There are a lot of guys with his size and stuff kicking around the minors.

Steve: My problem with having a youngish child and the WS isn’t start/end times, it’s the fear that she’s paying attention to the commercials and is about to ask me what an erection is.
Klaw: Better that than she ask you what “daily fantasy” means.

Hugo Z: Did you mean that Mauricio Cabrera should literally throw all fastballs for the forseeable future? How will he make progress that way?
Klaw: That’s a bit of a straw man, in a couple of ways. He needs to make progress with his fastball command, and because his fastball has life at 98 mph (a little less at 102, natch), he can get away with throwing it an inordinately high percentage of the time.

Tom: Non-baseball question: are there any books that would crack your top 102 if you updated the list today?
Klaw: Looks like I’ve only tagged two that way – Middlemarch and Infinite Jest. https://meadowparty.com/blog/tag/klaw-103/

Sean: Keith, thoughts on why someone like Jason McCloud is not getting more traction for GM positions. Seems like a sharp guy and for those who care, fills the minortity quota.
Klaw: I am still floored that Milwaukee didn’t ask to interview him. He’s 90 miles away, in their division, hits all of their alleged criteria, and is a minority (Pacific Islander), yet they never called – perhaps because, as I’ve said before, they knew who they were going to hire before they went through the whole interviewing process.

Julia: I’m stunned by the number of books you review. You don’t seem to have a lot of down time. Are you catching up or do you really read a book a week?
Klaw: I’m on pace to read over 100 books this year. I think I read fairly quickly, at least when the book engages me. And when I fly, I read. I knocked out nearly all of Inherent Vice on the flights to Phoenix (that was such a great fucking book).

Ed: You often mention that Severino is a reliever for you. In an admittedly small sample size, I see why (physically) you say that. It’s all arm as you say, but his performance was the best on the team besides Tanaka. Do you mean you think he breaks down and they have to put him in the pen because he can’t come back and handle the load? I mean, what is the path by which he becomes a reliever now that he is clearly one of their top starters?
Klaw: Yes, that’s the main thing I mean. I don’t think he’ll ever have good fastball command – he has very good control, though – but the durability is the main concern. They were also very smart about limiting how deep he worked into games. I think guys like him and Reynaldo Lopez will have a hard time staying healthy as starters over multiple years. Perhaps I’m wrong on one of those specific guys, but if you give me, say, 20 minor league starters who throw like that, I would bet more than 3/4 of them end up in the pen. Maybe even that’s too low.

Kevin: Do you see anything in how Aaron Sanchez pitches that makes him so bad against lefties. I imagine he will go back to the rotation next season, but those splits were ugly.
Klaw: His stride is too short. He hasn’t been the same guy since that changed – I once rated him over Syndergaard because he had better raw stuff and just as easy a delivery. Once the delivery changed, the stuff got a tick worse and the effort level spiked.

Addoeh: Staycation then?
Klaw: We went to Disney for 3 days to do Food and Wine at Epcot. My daughter loves that and Soarin. There were some pretty good dishes this year – the pork belly at Brazil, the frozen chocolate mousse at the Chew Lab, the bulgogi at South Korea (although that wasn’t kimchi; those were pickles), the venison at New Zealand. I skipped the haggis though.

Michael: You often point out that people give jobs in baseball to their buddies, but then you praise Eric Wedge and Alex Cora, two people you are very close with. Are you falling into the same trap?
Klaw: No.

Greg: Thoughts on Luke Weaver?
Klaw: Reliever or very back-end starter. Below-average slider.

Dallas: With the World Series almost being over the countdown begins for the Gaylord Opryland hotel; feel the heat!
Klaw: I hate you.

sriram: andy green to sd, thoughts?
Klaw: I’m glad to see someone actually hire a manager who has managerial experience in the minors.

Corey: Speaking of starter/relievers, is Joe Kelly closer material ? if so, should Boston work him into that role or try to trade for Chapman to eventually replace Uehara ?
Klaw: I think that’s his best role in the long run.

Michael: If you were the Yankees though, would you gamble with Severino and keep him in the rotation–even if the odds, as you think, are against him sticking there?
Klaw: Hell yeah – i’ve never at any point advocated they put him in the pen.

Jason: Should left handed hitters spend more of their time in development hitting left handed pitching? It’s amazing how few of them actually hit lefties well.
Klaw: It’s kind of hard unless you know of a parallel universe to which they can travel and face lots of left-handed pitchers for practice.

Greg: Give Lackey a QO?
Klaw: Yes.

Tom: My mom went to Phoenix to visit her sister. I made her go to Cartel to get me some coffee. She texted me a picture of her at the place and brought me back beans. Just wanted to let you know your influence is spreading.
Klaw: I went three times last week, brought home a bag, and sent a bag to a coffee-snob friend of mine recovering from surgery. I miss that place.

Joe Mauer: Should I just catch again?
Klaw: Sure, traumatic head injuries are totally no big deal.

Mike: Why are there no catchers who throw lefthanded? Can it be done?
Klaw: We call them “pitchers.”

Jeff: How would you compare Jason groome to Brady Aiken?
Klaw: Not even close. Aiken was way, way more polished with better offspeed stuff.

JG: How do you not look like the love child of Rich Garces and Bob Wickman with your love of good food and drink?
Klaw: Portion control plus a decent metabolism, a weak stomach, and occasional exercise.

BK: Can the Jays, in fact, NOT have nice things?
Klaw: No, they can’t, but you can just by visiting the dish! Thanks for all of your questions this week – I’ll still be scarce on social media for the next few days but will have posts up here, and am back to work as usual on Monday. Enjoy the rest of the Series … it’s just about all we’ve got until spring training.

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→ October 27, 2015
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Hominids.

Robert Sawyer’s name might be more familiar to those of you who watched the short-lived ABC series Flash Forward, based on his novel of the same name, but his one Hugo Award for Best Novel came four years after that book with Hominids, the first book in a trilogy that posits a parallel universe where Neanderthals won the evolutionary battle over Cro-Magnons and have since become the dominant species on their version of Earth.

The two parallel Earths are joined briefly during a quantum computing experiment gone awry in the Neanderthals’ universe, opening a portal that rather rudely deposits Neanderthal physicist Ponder Boddit in our world, smack in the middle of an underground heavy-water tank at the Sudbury Neutrino Observatory. If that name sounds familiar, it’s because it’s real, located in the Creighton nickel mine a bit north of Lake Huron, and the director of the neutrino-detection experiment just won the 2015 Nobel Prize in Physics earlier this month. Sawyer grounds everything in the Homo sapiens world in reality, using real place and brand names, although some of them (Palm Pilot? Handspring?) already sound comically out of date.

Boddit’s appearance in our world and sudden, unexplained disappearance in his creates two separate storylines: one here, focusing on the mystery of his arrival and the very short-term impact on him from a substantial shock to the system; and one there, where his coworker and sort of life-partner (sexual orientation in Sawyer’s Neanderthal world is fluid) Adikor Huld finds himself accused of murder because he was the only one present when Boddit left the building. The latter story ends up the more interesting one despite what would appear to be a simpler premise, as Sawyer uses it to explore both the Neanderthals’ culture and the individual personalities of several characters, primarily Adikor himself. Boddit’s adventure on our side – which, it is clear from the beginning, can only end properly with the opening of a new portal and his return to “his” earth – feels rushed and somewhat rote, as if Sawyer had a sort of checklist of things he wanted to cover and felt compelled to hit them all.

For example, Sawyer has made the Neanderthals a nontheistic and nonreligious society, primarily to set up a scene where he attacks the Catholicism of the main female character, Mary Vaughn, who develops feelings for him during the few days they spend together; it feels forced, and a bit unlikely that the entire culture of Neanderthals would be without religion even before it had a scientific explanation for the existence of the universe or of consciousness. Mary’s character herself is also problematic – her first appearance on the pages is as a rape victim, which serves no purpose within the novel as a whole except possibly to make her more open to seeing Boddit as a fellow human because he is, in our terms, more of a “gentleman.”

Sawyer’s Neanderthals fall too much into the “noble savage” cliché, as their universe has no war, pollution, poverty, or even crime, with a global population of just over 150 million and all citizens equipped from birth with a Companion, an electronic device implanted in the wrist that measures vital signs and records locations, movements, and actions for later storage. It’s a crime-prevention device, a walking encyclopedia, and a near-complete abrogation of individual privacy in the Neanderthals’ Marxist society. It’s also terribly convenient because it allows Boddit to communicate with the people who find him on our side of the portal within a matter of hours, as the Companion can “learn” English and translate for him. (Granted, without that, the book would be a very frustrating read and probably quite boring.)

The two plots are so thin, in fact, that Hominids feels more like an extended prologue for another story than like a standalone novel. While Sawyer’s explanations of quantum mechanics and the existence of this second, parallel universe are quite clever and mostly grounded in real science, once he gets Boddit here, not a whole lot happens either in terms of action on the pages or exploration of the many ramifications of such a discovery, both scientific and anthropological.

Oh, by the way: Not that anyone should take my predictions seriously, but I’ll say Mets in 5.

Next up: Graham Greene’s first novel, The Man Within.

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→ October 26, 2015
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Arizona eats, October 2015 edition.

My second and final Arizona Fall League post for this year is up for Insiders, covering Dom Smith, Clint Frazier, Jake Reed, Jason Garcia, and more.

The biggest news in Phoenix food has been the arrival of the Noble Bread Company, crafted artisan loaves of classic European breads, so good that every restaurant I tried all week that served bread bought it from Noble. (One such restaurant: the estimable FnB, still outstanding and one of the best bets in town if you want to eat a lot of vegetables and still feel like you had a real meal.) Noble now has a second spot, the Noble Eatery on McDowell, where the menu changes daily and includes two or three sandwiches, a flatbread option, and a salad. I went with their open-faced tuna salad sandwich, made with olive oil rather than mayo and including chickpeas and potatoes, served on a dark, crusty peasant loaf; with three slices and a huge portion of the tuna it was more than a meal for me, closer to two. The bread is just to die for – this ranks among the best breads I’ve ever tasted, with the texture expert bread bakers describe as “creamy” inside a crackling crust.

nocawich reopened in a new location in Tempe on College Avenue, right in the heart of ASU’s campus, this summer, with their justifiably renowned fried chicken sandwich still on the menu, as well as a giant patty melt served on good rye sandwich bread and triple-fried French fries that are out of another world entirely. On this trip I tried their breakfast, getting an oversized egg and chorizo sandwich with arugula, avocado, tomato, mayo (not much), and cheese on a sesame bagel from H&H in New York City. Everything Elliott creates there is amazing, and if I wasn’t behaving myself a little bit this week I would have grabbed one of the incredible pastries available – he has a pastry chef fly in from Portland to make them weekly. Other than nocawich I stuck to morning favorites on this trip: crêpe bar, the Hillside Spot, Matt’s Big Breakfast, Cartel Coffee Lab, and Giant Coffee.

My frequent dining partner-in-crime Nick Piecoro introduced me to a new taco/burger place in Arcadia called the Stand, where the menu is very simple: a burger, three types of tacos, hand-cut fries, and shakes. I tried all three tacos, for research purposes of course, and would recommend the short rib and chicken tacos but not the vegetable taco, which couldn’t hold the fillings in and was decidedly flat in flavor, with a lot in it (mostly quinoa and some sort of winter squash) but nothing that really popped in flavor. It needed something with umami to bring it together.

Speaking of that fifth taste, Umami in Tempe (very close to nocawich, at 7th and Mill) does ramen, and a few other things, but mostly ramen, customizable to order with five choices of broths and about a dozen or so toppings or add-ons, including chicken, roast pork, and pork belly. I went with the pork and chicken bone broth, roast pork, and a soft-cooked egg, all of which came out perfectly – the broth itself was a little salty but full of body and depth of flavor. They could probably stand to use better noodles, though; these tasted like they came right out of the package, even though more hip ramen joints in other towns have gone with fresh ramen noodles instead. The ramen, a small seaweed salad, and an iced tea ran about $13 before tip, and it was plenty of food for one.

La Piazza al Forno isn’t new – it’s been open since around the time I first moved to Arizona in 2010 – but its location in downtown Glendale, next to Cuff (one of my favorite spots on the west side), isn’t that convenient to any of the ballparks, so I hadn’t tried it till this week. Their specialty is Neapolitan-style pizzas, and they have the VPN certification that is supposed to go only to places that correctly follow the standards of Neapolitan pizza … although in my experience the VPN designation means virtually practically nothing. La Piazza’s pizzas are thin and they use top-quality ingredients, including San Marzano tomatoes and the option of using mozzarella di bufala, but the pies’ centers aren’t wet as they should be in Neapolitan pizza, and they put the basil on before baking the pizzas so it comes out very dark and loses its bright, faintly sweet flavor. Still, if you’re looking for pizza on the west side of Phoenix it’s this and Grimaldi’s and nothing else I’d recommend.

My one real disaster meal of the week was at a new modern Italian restaurant in Old Town called Evo, where the focus is on handmade pastas but not on service or even execution. The concepts for the dishes are sound, but neither item I ordered was well-constructed, and one of them came out wrong (spinach, which I can’t eat, instead of the promised escarole, an essential ingredient in the dish). The white-bean hummus with the roasted cauliflower was too thin and coarse, and didn’t add anything to the cauliflower itself, which was beautifully caramelized. The house-made orecchiette in the main course were shaped incorrectly – more like thimbles, so that the individual pieces couldn’t pick up any portions of the sauce or the other items in the dish. Even the fennel sausage in the dish was off, cut into inch-long rectangular blocks rather than broken up into smaller pieces when cooked. My meal also took forever; I don’t think my main course was fired until I reminded my server about it, a half hour after I ordered, despite the fact that the restaurant was almost empty. I would guess that EVO will be gone before I get back in March given the food and the rent at that location.

Still good: FnB, especially their socca with pickled butternut squash and cultured butter, and their salad of persimmons, pecans, pomegranates, and shaved Parmesan with mixed greens; and Welcome Chicken and Donuts, although I think the next time I go there I’ll try the chicken without any sauce at all. I tried a chocolate-glazed donut with pistachios and what I think were rose petal-flavored marshmallows; it was good but the donut tasted a little past its peak. Crêpe Bar in Tempe (Elliott and Rural) appears to be expanding, and they still bring out all kinds of little bites that the kitchen has thrown together. I can also verify that Citizen Public House still makes a mean negroni. The Revival in Tempe has closed; however, former executive chef Kelly Fletcher is now at Phoenix landmark El Chorro as chef de cuisine.

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→ October 24, 2015
→ By

Saturday five, 10/24/15.

I had one Insider post this past week, covering Arizona Fall League prospects, and will have another one up this weekend now that my trip to the Valley is done. I also held my regular Klawchat on Thursday.

I’m taking vacation this upcoming week, so I’ll be off social media for a bit and won’t have any Insider posts after the second AFL dispatch goes up. I may still chat Thursday, however, now that those are mine and a bit more loose and fun.

And now, the links…

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→ October 23, 2015
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The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch.

My first AFL dispatch for Insiders covers Jurickson Profar, Alex Reyes, Ian Clarkin, and more.

The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch is Philip K. Dick at his paranoid, mind-bending best, the kind of fiction he was doing long before it became somewhat mainstream with films like Inception and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind to play with layers of reality and imagination. There’s a mystical component here that also presages the outright religious overtones of his later work (notably V.A.L.I.S.), but with a more questioning and slightly cynical note to it, along with an absolutely bleak view of the near future of our species.

In the novel, PKD gives us an Earth so ravaged by environmental destruction that it is too hot for anyone to go outside unless they’re in one of the resort towns of Antarctica, while overpopulation has led the UN to undertake forcible migration via a draft lottery to various colonies scattered throughout the solar system, all of which involve living in underground “hovels” with only occasional glimpses of the surface. There’s also been interstellar travel to the (fictional) planet Prox, presumably around Proxima Centauri, from which the industrialist Palmer Eldritch has returned after a ten-year voyage, crash-landing on Pluto with a suspicious, unknown bit of cargo with him.

The colonists are all hooked on a drug called Can-D (say it out loud) that allows them to engage in a sort of group hallucination where they can inhabit, almost Being John Malkovich-style, two fictional characters, Perky Pat and her boyfriend Walter, whose environments within the hallucinations are determined by what layouts and miniatures the colonists have purchased. To put it another way, you buy the dolls, the dollhouse, the doll furniture and doll cars and doll whatevers, and then you chew the drug that lets you be the dolls. It’s big business, including the folks who sell the goods that get “minned” to be sold to colonists for their layouts.

Eldritch has brought back a new drug, called Chew-Z, that requires no layouts and is even more potent in the dream-states it provides to the users – but with an apparent cost in lost liberty, although exactly how that works isn’t revealed until later in the novel. But suddenly the users no longer control their hallucinations, and who exactly is controlling them and what the nature of that being is become the critical questions for the protagonists of the novel, none of whom is exactly operating with clean hands.

PKD touches on three of his most frequent and successful themes in The Three Stigmata: perception, paranoia, and mortality. What’s real is never clear in the book; we get layers of unreality, characters emerging from altered states unsure whether they’ve left the alteration or merely entered new ones, and the aforementioned questions of control of their perceptions. That plays into PKD’s paranoid themes, which also appear in the book’s greater structure – Earth in a sort of environmental ruin, the UN exercising a tyrannical hold on the world’s population, a free (or sort-of-free) market that enslaves its workers through their materialistic demands. As for the theme of our mortality, saying too much would spoil the book’s conclusion, but this book presages the exploration of the same theme in Ubik and also hints at the mystical conversion he underwent after what he believed to be a religious experience in the early 1970s.

PKD avoids the taut ending the reader might demand but that the story obviates – you can’t tie all of this up cleanly because the story is, by design, so messy. But it also fits the difficulty of addressing all of the metaphysical questions he asks in this book and in most of his works, about the nature of reality as we perceive it, about how much we cede our privacy and liberty to governing bodies, and of course about life and death and whether there is something beyond the latter. The Three Stigmata asks this sort of uncomfortable, unanswerable questions, just as PKD does in most of his best works.

Next up: Another Hugo winner, Robert Sawyer’s Hominids.

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