Faith and Fear in Flushing: An Intense Personal History of the New York Mets

Love this book. I’m a lifelong Mets fan. Perfect reading for me

Greg Prince does a great job in his book, as he does on his blog, of weaving our painful devotion to the Mets into the fabric of our lives. A real fan (of any team, to be fair) knows what this is like - who pitched the day you got married, the first time your kid pretended to be his/her favorite player, the last baseball conversation you had with a deceased relative. Faith and Fear isn't as philosophical as Richard Grossinger's The New York Mets Ethnography, Myth and Subtext, but does an equally good job of capturing how life and the Mets are intertwined and inseparable for their true fans. If you cried on September 28 as you watched Seaver throw that last pitch to Piazza, you must read this book.And the cover says it all...there is no other team for whom a huge fan would celebrate the franchise with a book showing a moment of glory combined with a moment of pure agony. As I often say, rooting for the Yankees is easy, anybody can do that. Being a real Mets fan takes a lot more courage, guts and stamina. Can you imagine a Yankee fan writing a book and putting a Red Sox celebration on the cover?

I liked this book. I followed the Mets in the early years and then lapsed. The part of the book that covered the years I followed them was extremely fun reading, being reminded of players and events. Once into the years I lapsed, it lost some of its fun, no fault of the author, but it still provided me with info on the team and the angst of being a Mets fan. I have returned to the fold and am hoping for better days. Go Mets!

Years ago, Joel Oppenheimer penned a personal diary on a Mets season gone awry entitled ''The Wrong Season.'' It was a mini-classic interweaving humorous anecdotes with the exasperation of rooting for an endearing near-miss baseball club (the 1972 Mets). Greg Prince has taken Oppenheimer's season and gone one better in this tour de force on Met fandom, examining 40 years of mostly exasperation in Flushing, not through the eyes of the team, players, the media or owners ... but through that of a diehard fan.What won't you find in this non-objective easy-to-read, always-fun rant? Too many stats. This isn't for the SABRmetricians or one looking to put the Mets' 1986 championship run or 2007 collapse in a historical context. Instead we are treated to the parent who admonishes Prince for staying up late to watch the famous Ball on the Wall Game in 1973, the phone call from a buddy announcing that he is leaving Met fandom in 1977 ... and taking two pals with him, the joys and tortures of 1985 culminated in the beating up of a Whitey Herzong likeness.In short, Prince has not only kept Oppenheimer's flame alive, but given every Mets fan a welcome addition to their library.

This book is, pardon the use of the term, Amazin'. If you believe that you are a true Mets fan, consider this required reading. As an age peer to the author, it was very easy for me to place myself in his shoes. I found myself nodding in agreement so often that anyone watching me read it would assume that I was a human bobblehead doll. I haven't enjoyed a book this much in many many years. Recommendation? No, this is demand. Read it. You'll be a better Met fan for it.