Chad Harbach

A disastrous error on the field sends five lives into a tailspin in this widely acclaimed tale about love, life, and baseball. Wonderful ... a novel that is every bit as entertaining as it is affecting. The New York Times First novels this complete and consuming come along very, very seldom. Jonathan Franzen, New York Times bestselling author of Crossroads At Westish College, a small school on the shore of Lake Michigan, baseball star Henry Skrimshander seems destined for big league stardom. But when a routine throw goes disastrously off course, the fates of five people are upended. Henrys fight against self-doubt threatens to ruin his future. College president Guert Affenlight, a longtime bachelor, has fallen unexpectedly and helplessly in love. Owen Dunne, Henrys gay roommate and teammate, becomes caught up in a dangerous affair. Mike Schwartz, the Harpooners team captain and Henrys best friend, realizes he has guided Henrys career at the expense of his own. And Pella Affenlight, Guerts daughter, returns to Westish after escaping an ill-fated marriage, determined to start a new life. As the season counts down to its climactic final game, these five are forced to confront their deepest hopes, anxieties, and secrets. In the process they forge new bonds, and help one another find their true paths. Written with boundless intelligence and filled with the tenderness of youth, The Art of Fielding is an expansive, warmhearted novel about ambition and its limits, about family and friendship and love, and about commitmentto oneself and to others.Named one of 2012s best books by The New York Times, NPR, The New Yorker, The Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, Christian Science Monitor, Bloomberg, The Kansas City Star, The Richmond Times-Dispatch, and Time Out New York.

The acclaimed author of The Art of Fielding returns with a long-awaited, immersive new novel. The Brightness follows the electric, chaotic, everything-can-happen lives of Pella Affenlight and her best friend, Irma, as they fumble their way into a larger world that wont stop changing. At 27, Pellas life looks settled: shes a recent college graduate, engaged to Mike, her longtime boyfriend, and helping her friend Owen pull off his own destination wedding on Block Island. But over that wild wedding weekend, Pellas past and present collide spectacularly, blowing up her plans and sending her spiralling toward an unplanned future in New York City. There, in a city thats equal parts glittering opportunity and cutthroat grit, Pella is forced to see herself in constantly changing lights as she wrestles with who she is and what she will become. As she cycles through possibilities and identities is she an artist? A bartender? A scholar, a lover, a wife? Pella navigates the heights and depths of passion and ambition, and the incalculable wages of love and loss. In stunning scenes and spectacular characters, Chad Harbach captures that specific, shimmering anxiety of your twenties when life still feels wide open, even as hard and irreversible choices start closing in. Energetic, funny, and deeply human, this much-anticipated follow-up to The Art of Fielding confirms Chad Harbach as one of the most accomplished and perceptive writers of our time.

Henry Skrimshander est une véritable star du baseball : dans l’équipe du Westish College, petite université du Wisconsin, il conclut tous ses matches par un sans-faute. Jusqu’au jour où il rate un la

A wonderful, warm novel from a major American voice.Its left a little hole in my life the way a really good book will Jonathan FranzenA small American college. Five very different lives. One terrible mistake.At Westish College, baseball star Henry Skrimshander seems destined for the big league until a routine throw goes disastrously off course. His error will upend the fates of five people. Henrys burgeoning self-doubt threatens to ruin his future. College president Guert Affenlight falls unexpectedly and helplessly in love. Owen Dunne becomes caught up in a dangerous affair. Mike Schwartz realizes he has guided Henrys career at the expense of his own. And Pella Affenlight returns to Westish, determined to start a new life.As the season counts down to its climactic final game, all five are forced to confront their deepest hopes, anxieties, and secrets.The best debut novel Ive read this year assured, funny, poignant and deeply satisfying Evening Standard

Una novel·la emotiva sobre l'ambició i els seus límits, sobre la família, l'amistat i l'amor, i sobre el compromís amb un mateix i amb els altres.Tota la vida l'Schwartz havia desitjat tenir algun talent transcendent, una aptitud especial per la qual tothom coincidis a considerar-lo un geni. Ara que havia vist aquell talent tan a prop, no podia deixar-lo escapar".En Henry Skrimshander acaba d'arribar al Westish College. Es un noi timid i inexpert, pero te un talent pel beisbol que frega la genialitat. Els seus unics amics son en Mike Schwartz, el capita de l'equip, i l'Owen, el company d'habitacio d'en Henry, intel·ligent i carismatic, amb un secret que podria fer perillar la seva brillant carrera.La Pella, la filla del rector de la universitat, que ha tornat a casa despres d'un matrimoni fracassat decidida a posar ordre a la seva vida, descobreix que el seu pare s'ha enamorat bojament.I un dia fatidic en Henry comet una errada: un llançament desafortunat. I, de sobte, tot canvia..."Pur divertiment, agil, com si Henry Fielding hi hagues ficat ma: com si Tom Jones gires entorn del beisbol i de la vida en un campus universitari". John IrvingUna primera novel·la tan completa com aquesta es una perla vertaderament estranya. Jonathan Franzen

Con esta historia sobre la amistad y la madurez, envuelta en cierto aire de melancolía, Salamandra presenta en lengua española un escritor con un talento verdaderamente excepcional. Chad Harbach ha sido protagonista de uno de los debuts más resonantes en el panorama literario estadounidense. Elogiada con igual ardor por Jonathan Franzen y John Irving, por The New Yorker y la revista de Oprah Winfrey, la novela fue incluida por el New York Times entre las diez mejores obras de ficción de 2011. Desde entonces, mientras su libro se mantiene en las listas de los más vendidos y se publica en más de quince idiomas, el prestigio de este joven autor no ha hecho más que aumentar. Un acontecimiento fortuito es el nexo que une las vidas de cinco personas. Henry Skrimshander, un talentoso jugador de béisbol, llega a una pequeña universidad con una misión: rescatar al equipo de otra desastrosa temporada. La buena estrella del joven deslumbra a los entendidos y lleva al equipo a los mejores resultados de su historia. Sin embargo, un lanzamiento fallido, que Henry ha realizado con éxito millares de veces, tendrá consecuencias devastadoras para él y quienes lo rodean. Extrañas simetrías, giros inesperados de la fortuna y pruebas del delicado equilibrio entre la voluntad individual y el azar sirven a Chad Harbach para pintar un adictivo retrato de la América contemporánea, trazado con un conmovedor realismo psicológico. Harbach tiene el don de escribir con emoción sin caer en el sentimentalismo, y de crear con humor personajes que conquistan la mente y el corazón del lector.