SummaryRobert B. Parker fans have been quick to embrace each
addition to his remarkable canon, from the legendary
Spenser series to the novels featuring Jesse Stone and
Sunny Randall. And his occasional forays into the past-
Gunman's Rhapsody, a fresh take on Wyatt Earp, and Poodle
Springs, based on a Raymond Chandler story-have dazzled
critics and confirmed his place among the greatest writers
of this century. With Double Play, he presents us with a
book he was literally born to write. It is 1947, the year Jackie Robinson breaks major-league
baseball's color barrier by playing for the Brooklyn
Dodgers-and changes the world. This is the story of that
season, as told through the eyes of a difficult, brooding,
and wounded man named Joseph Burke. Burke, a veteran of
World War II and a survivor of Guadalcanal, is hired by
Brooklyn Dodgers manager Branch Rickey to guard Robinson.
While Burke shadows Robinson, a man of tremendous strength
and character suddenly thrust into the media spotlight, the
bodyguard must also face some hard truths of his own, in a
world where the wrong associations can prove fatal. A brilliant novel about a very real man, Double Play is a
triumph: ingeniously crafted, rich with period detail, and
re-sounding with the themes familiar to Parker's readers-
honor, duty, responsibility, and redemption.
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