Running the Bases

All the awkwardness of puberty with many more laughs: An audience may be more elusive than a date, though.

Edmonton Journal, Sunday, Oct. 23, 2005

by Eamon McGrath

It seems as thought every young male growing up needs to have a book that expresses his desperate and confused feelings towards sex, adolescence and girls. There are no answers, it seems, when stuck in the violent outer wall of the hurricane that is puberty, and the insecurities associated with this disillusionment are less discouraging when the realizations that they are totally normal hit home like a brick in the head.

These principal themes of alienation, frustration and futility are humorously explored in Paul Kropp's latest novel, Running the Bases . This story's protagonist, Al Macklin, is but a blind teenage traveler, coasting through life; though running amok throughout the tumultuous forest of adolescence, struggling to find himself amidst the blistering social climate of high school—these are troubling times, dude, and Al is one troubled dude.

So troubled is Al that his frustrations with his inability to attract the opposite sex influence him in one of the most life-altering decisions he will ever make. Al decides to enlist the help of a female classmate—the at-first illusive Maggie—in setting him up on dates, and giving him love advice to help put him on his way to his “Ultimate Goal”—Al, like any other boy smack-dab in the middle of Testosterone City, wants to, as he puts it, “get laid.” Maggie, being one smart young lady, decides to make a buck out of this, and declares Al her client, sets up a contract and finds some success for Al in his love life, and some financial success for herself as well.

The story takes a lovable turn of events as everything that can go wrong does go wrong for Al Macklin, which only plummets Al further down to the depths of teenage frustration. Eventually, as his number of dates increases, so do the dollars in Maggie's bank account. Thankfully, like any coning-of-age story, it all works out in the end.

I must say that I did not have many of the problems of this story. It was at times funny—very funny—especially some memorable scenes when Al lies about his age to bed a university student, and the writing was snappy and quick enough to give off the feeling of a good French farce.

My only quibble is the sometimes juxtaposed mature subject matter with the juvenile writing style—I think it will be difficult for this book to find a concrete audience, but I think it's funny enough that you might just see it on the YRCA shortlist for 2005-2006. Perhaps clever, level-headed young readers who have not yet delved into the sometimes intimidating world of adult literature will enjoy this through and through.

All in all, if you want an easy read that will make you chuckle to yourself wholeheartedly, and, if you are an older reader, recall the times when you were in the very same boat as Al Macklin, pick up Running the Bases and have an innocent, good time.

Eamon Mcgrath is a freelance reviewer