Roger Director

This book is yet another entry in the series of "sports fan who intermixes personal experience and a season in the life of their team." It follows in the footsteps of Nick Hornby's Fever Pitch, but fails at almost every level.

One might come to the book out of an interest in the Giants, or football in general. There is little to no insight to be found here. Most of the football discussion involves Director simply describing plays, and centering his description of the game around idols, most notably Tiki Barber. He makes assumptions about statistics, assuring his reader that he has not looked them up, but they must be true. Late in the book he refers to a statistic, and apologizes to the reader for encumbering us with a banal number (about the Giants record after scoring first). He seems to take serious analysis of the game as a hindrance to the story-telling, and this frank admission tells the story of this book. There is no analysis or insight. Though Director may know the team and the game, he leaves that knowledge out of this book.

Now, that might be fine if the story were interesting. One can read Fever Pitch without knowing who Charlie George is. The stories and anecdotes from Director's life are largely cliched and uninteresting (there are a few bits worth telling, but they don't hang in a narrative). We are treated to routine "I love this team so much it is a disease" sorts of passages and the usual "my family doesn't get my overwhelming passion" bits. Given that he spends more time in the book on himself than the Giants, and that his Giants sections are not particularly insightful - the reflections on being a fan have to carry the water for this book. Unfortunately, we are simply treated to a shallow accumulation of tropes.

Whether one comes to this book as a fan of the Giants, or looking for a good book in the vein of Fever Pitch, I Dream in Blue will disappoint.… (plus d'informations)