But then as I kept reading, I thought, wow, there are some bold claims being made here-where are the footnotes? Where are the sources to support these arguments? And the poetic narrative stopped being so pleasant for me. The beginning was great, filled with poetic narrative about Tisdale's childhood memories of food, casseroles made from cans, faux-apple pie kind of food.

The second book was The Best Thing I Ever Tasted by Sallie Tisdale. And I wasn't hooked enough to keep reading.

But I got about 50 pages into it (of 500) and felt a little overwhelmed at the time that I was never going to finish it or get to my other library books before they were due (poor planning on my part). I think I may give it another try some time in the future because I think it's probably a good book, and a historically important one for major-league baseball. It's written in a journal style, with a matter-of-fact tone by Bouton, a player at the time. Ball Four apparently caused quite a scandal when it was published in 1970 as it exposed the behind-the-scenes world of locker rooms and big league ball. The first book I started and put down was Ball Four, by Jim Bouton. I ran a half-marathon (and spent that afternoon eating ice cream and brownies while sprawled on the couch, then spent the next week hobbling around because my feet hurt so badly), started two other books and decided not to finish them (more on that below), started taking an online course on marine biology through UC Berkeley Extension (did you know that the pufferfish itself is not poisonous, its the symbiotic bacteria living in it that are?), and had to prep for my fantasy baseball league (I'm already looking at the Yahoo! baseball headlines with dread-will the $140 pillow Carlos Delgado bought help his stiff neck? Will Ordonez be okay after being hit in the head with a pitch during Spring Training on Saturday?).

E mc2 book david bodanis