A young doodlebug describes how he and his father are alike and the things they enjoy doing together.

"Just before Henry Aster's birth, his father -- outsized literary ambition and pregnant wife in tow -- reluctantly returns to the small Appalachian town in which he was raised and installs his young family in an immense house of iron and glass perched high on the side of a mountain. There, Henry grows up under the writing desk of this fiercely brilliant man. But when tragedy tips his father toward a fearsome unraveling, what was once a young son's...

Roddy Doyle has earned a devoted following for his wry wit, his uncanny ear, and his ability to fully capture the hearts of his characters. Bullfighting, his second collection of stories, offers thirteen bittersweet takes on men and middle-age, revealing a panorama of Ireland today. Moving from classrooms to local pubs to bullrings, these tales feature an array of men taking stock and reliving past glories, each concerned with loss in different ways-of...

Follows the divergent paths of a rookie hitter for the Chicago Cubs and a hard-hitting Mets pitcher.