If I Never Get Back

OK. If you buy the premise that a down on his luck newspaper writer, taking a train to Cleveland, wakes up at a station in 1869 - 130 years earlier, you will enjoy this work! He makes acquaintance with, befriends and finally accompanies pro baseball's original team, the Cincinnati Red Stockings through their undefeated inaugural 1869 season. It rings true to the records of the time and offers fascinating eye witness account of events. But beyond that, the adventures are fast and furious and mostly believable. However, some are not. This stopped me from rating this 5 stars instead of 4. Enjoyable, fast paced and recommended for folks who enjoy a good novel that includes baseball, time travel and post Civil War America.

i really enjoyed reading the book If i never get back by darryl brock. The book is a sports/historical fiction with some mystery and romance. Sam fowlwer, the main charcter that tells the story travels back in time to 1869. There Sam Fowler meets with and travels around the country with the Cincinati red stockings baseball team. The twist and turns of sam's adventure are entertaining reading.He becomes involved with gambling ,grave robbing, meets mark twaine and falls in love. The book is centred around baseball which is intersting but at times to detailed.

Like all of the good time-travel novels, this one begins with an interesting premise. Better, it travels to an era we know for its political history, not its social history. Yes, baseball fans will enjoy the depiction of early baseball. The accuracy of that depiction is unknown, but is makes for a good yarn nonetheless. The book does not attempt to unravel the metaphysical riddle of upsetting history, and that is good. Enjoy this adventure for what it is. The weaknesses of the book are two. First, the far-fetchedness of a plot that interweaves Mark Twain, corrupt politics, the first professional baseball team, etc. smells of 'Forrest Gump.' They add plot pieces but subtract from the focus. Second, there are too many 1990s-vintage liberal guilt comments tossed in like weeds in the lawn. Would someone transported to the 1860s really care about using wood to fire the boilers of boats and trains? Hardly. This book is a fine summer book. Take it as a mystery wrapped in time travel, not as accurate history.

I'm still waiting for Brock's sequel to this great book. A history of the game, and a look to what middle America was like back in the 1870's. If you like baseball, you will love this book.

If you're interested in how baseball started out in America and how they played the game back in 1869, this is a good book to read. I found the first 50 pages rather hard to get through but then it really picked up and was quite informative and also a good time-travel epic. I was amazed to learn how popular the game was becoming back in the 1860's and how hard they played the game. One could easily argue that today's players wouldn't be able to match the 'toughness' of the professional players from 130 years ago. True baseball fans will enjoy this book.