Calico Joe

by John Grisham

Author Grisham once dreamed of a career as a professional baseball player for the St. Louis Cardinals. The book was also inspired by some of Grisham's personal baseball experience; as noted in the forward, when a teenager Grisham played baseball, and developed a dislike of aggressive, bad-mannered pitchers; at the age of 19, Grisham saw a ball flying very near to his face, at the speed of about ninety miles per hour - and quit the game, promptly and permanently.

Grisham's novel involves a nearly fatal pitch thrown in August 24, 1973 and its implications 30 years later on both the batter, "Calico Joe" Castle, and the pitcher as narrated by Paul Tracey, the 11-year-old son of New York Mets pitcher Warren Tracey. Castle starts his career with home runs in his first three Major League Baseball at bats as well as hits in his first 15 plate appearances and is able to keep his batting average over .500 for the first six weeks of his season. In a late-summer visit to Shea Stadium, Castle hits a home run in his first at-bat against Warren. Paul Tracey is a huge fan of Castle's. Castle's career is ended later in the game when Warren intentionally hits him with a pitch. Castle goes into a prolonged coma, suffers a stroke and is incapacitated for life, his ball-playing days definitely over. The Traceys become estranged and Paul does not watch another baseball game for 30 years. When Warren Tracey is on the verge of death from pancreas cancer, Paul Tracey decided to try to arrange a meeting between him and Castle. That is far from easy. Paul visits Joe's hometown of Calico Rock, Arkansas, where the incapacitated Joe lives, devotedly tending the town's baseball field and being supported by his two brothers. The sympathetic editor of the local Calico paper tells Paul that Joe hardly ever talks to any strangers - much less would he speak to Warren Tracey, who destroyed his career. In fact, there is a concrete danger of Warren being physically assaulted, should he appear in Calico - the townspeople still angry at what he did to their hero. And going to Florida, where Warren Tracey had retired with fifth wife, Paul finds his long-estranged father as egoistic and vindictive as ever - reiterating , as he did for thirty years, that his hitting Joe Castle was an accident, that he had nothing to apologize for and that he had no interest in meeting Joe.

However, at the very last moment before cancer would make him unable to move, Warren has a change of heart. He does travel to Calico, and Joe does consent to meet him. In a moment of sincerity, Warren admits to having deliberately hit Joe out of pure spite and offers an apology, asking "Do you hate me?" To which Joe answers "No, you have apologized". Warren then says "You are a greater man than me" and the two shake hands.

Having brought about such a startling reconciliation between the old foes, Warren Tracey and Joe Castle, Paul Tracey finds himself unable to himself reach a similar closure with his father - too many memories of abuse blocking his way. When saying goodbye to his dying father, knowing he would never see him again, Paul is unable to offer the embrace his father hoped for at this last moment.

After Warren's death, Joe Castle and his brothers surprisingly turn up at the sparsely-attended funeral in Florida. When Warren's will is opened, it turns out that he had left $25,000 to the baseball field of the town of Calico - tending which is Joe's last link with the world of baseball.