One City One Story

Last year, the Boston Book Festival was revitalized. (It appears to have been a Globe run event years ago and then it just died completely.) A nonprofit was established and for a full day in October, Copley Square and the BPL were overrun with people who write, think about, write about, and care about books.

This year, they are back for a second go at it and it looks like a spectacular line up. Check it out here. I missed it last year because I was away in Turkey, so I'm really looking forward to this year.

As a new initiative, they have selected and produced a One City One Story publication with a short story by Tom Perrotta. They are giving out 30,000 copies all around the city prior to the October 16 Festival. Perrotta is local and wrote Election (movie made famous by Reese Witherspoon and Matthew Broderick) and Little Children (movie made famous by Kate Winslet and three Oscar nominations - including a writing one for Perrotta). He's got a new book coming out this fall called The Leftovers. The One City One Story is called "The Smile on Happy Chang's Face" and it is pretty great.

I was worried about how I would get a copy, since I bounce between JP and Tufts and hardly ever get in between - to the heart of Boston. But then I went to the free Pops concert on the Common on Sunday and there I noticed the huge orange BBF logo on a table across the grass. I ran over and got my copy of Perrotta's story, all happily bundled up in a little white booklet with staple stitching and the same awesome orange ONE CITY ONE STORY on the cover. I went right back over to my seat, and since Keith and Co. hadn't started performing yet, I read it right then and there.

Wow. Now, I realize I could've read this story before now. Perrotta wrote it in 2005 and it has been published in some other places, most notably in the Best American Short Stories of 2005. But I never came across it before.

I can't wait to attend the Town Meeting that is happening at the BBF to discuss the story (or hear it discussed, more likely) with Perrotta himself. (As an aside, there is nothing better than talking about a famous author's work with the famous author!) I'm really hoping I can make it to that - I'm waiting for the final schedule to be announced on the BBF website.

The story is about a little league game. The protagonist is one of the umpires - Jack. It's a town where little league is a big deal, and the umps and coaches and players all take themselves seriously. There's a fantastic pitcher named Lori Chang, a little slip of an Asian girl who just guns one pitch after another into the plate. Interwoven into the story is the backstory of the Jack's life, which has fallen apart in recent years due to some major mistakes on his part. He's full of anger and full of hope and just a giant mess overall. And he's trying to redeem himself through his actions during a town little league game.

As I was reading, I gasped at one point and my phone rang at that exact moment. I ignored it, because I couldn't stop at that particular time in my reading. And then I read forward with a vengeance, because I desperately needed to know what the outcome was going to be. I've no idea how many words this story is, but you wouldn't think it was long enough for me to care about the characters that much. That's Perrotta for you, though. He creates characters who are flawed - often drastically or irredeemably so - and makes you care enough about them to stick it through to the end and beyond. (Here I am writing a blog post about his story, right?)

I hope Bostonians (and those who venture into our fair city) will pick up a copy of the booklet and read it. Here's where. You can also download it here. Even if you aren't going to the event (which I also hope you'll do), it is great read. And it's a neat feeling to know that a whole bunch of other people are reading it too. Common experiences are cool. Common intellectual experiences are even cooler because they are pretty rare after leaving school; as an adult. The people at BBF knew this and made this happen for us as a city, which I love. Thanks for that, BBF!