Murder at Fenway Park

By: Troy Soos

Narrated by: Johnny Heller

Length: 7 hrs and 31 mins

Publisher's summary

Troy Soos' entertaining whodunit hits a home run with a perfect blend of mayhem and early baseball lore!

He takes you back to 1912 where the days are full of sunshine, players use homemade wooden bats, the legendary Ty Cobb captivates fans, and a young rookie stumbles into a web of danger and deceit.

Reporting for his first day as a Boston Red Sox player, Mickey Rawlings discovers a faceless body in the empty stadium. When police name him as their suspect, he knows he must clear his name or give up baseball and his freedom. But nameless foes are trying to silence him with warnings that become increasingly dangerous.

A member of the Society for American Baseball Research, Troy Soos creates delightfully authentic ballplayers and places them in believable, colorful settings.

With Johnny Heller's expressive narration, Murder at Fenway Park becomes exciting for baseball fans and all who enjoy a good mystery.

©1994 Troy Soos (P)1997 Recorded Books,LLC

A better baseball novel than a mystery

I was excited to read a novel about a player on the Red Sox in 1912 - one that touches a little bit on the world of the city during that time. And the baseball scenes were fun. But, the mystery was just okay and the romance wasn't very good. It was Soos' first novel, and he was able to check the basic boxes. He just hadn't developed his skill set very fully yet. The writing is simple, the characterization straight forward. I haven't read any later Soos books so I can't say whether he developed.

OK for what it is.

Historical fiction, with enough insights into the sights, sounds, customs and personalities of the time to make it interesting. The mystery is reasonably good, but don't expect to be drawn in waiting to find out what happens.

Baseball with a side of murder

Troy Soos' entertaining whodunit hits a home run with a perfect blend of mayhem and early baseball lore! He takes you back to 1912 where the days are full of sunshine, players use homemade wooden bats, the legendary Ty Cobb captivates fans, and a young rookie stumbles into a web of danger and deceit. Reporting for his first day as a Boston Red Sox player, Mickey Rawlings discovers a faceless body in the empty stadium. When police name him as their suspect, he knows he must clear his name or give up baseball and his freedom. But nameless foes are trying to silence him with warnings that become increasingly dangerous. A member of the Society for American Baseball Research, Troy Soos creates delightfully authentic ballplayers and places them in believable, colorful settings. With Johnny Heller's expressive narration, Murder at Fenway Park becomes exciting for baseball fans and all who enjoy a good mystery

This is the 2nd book by this author I’ve read, and it starts his series about vintage baseball. In this book, the author captures the game of 1912, with its differences and similarities to the game we have come to know, and reminds me that, while I may never be an aficionado of the game, there is, has always been, and probably always will be something a bit magical about going to a baseball game, anywhere, to watch teams of any league. It isn’t just the game itself, but the gestalt, the crowd, the music, the sun and the smells and tastes. The author captures this gestalt perfectly, and immerses the reader in it so well, that one can almost hear the crack of the bat, watch the ball sail over the wall, or the players running the bases.

But this is a mystery, and again, the author excels. Not only is the puzzle intricate, but the steps which the hero takes to solve it are interesting, and reveal as much about his character as they do about his goal. As usual, I didn’t figure things out until just before the protagonist did, mostly because I was enjoying the “ride” so much that I wanted to experience it along with Mickey, instead of pitting myself against him in a game of “who did it?”.

The characters, famous and otherwise, are wonderfully drawn and entirely believable and the writing is story telling at its very best. The book was enhanced by the excellence of the narrator, who was able not only to give characters their own voices and personal styles, but who clearly demonstrated his understanding of the essence of this book. I give both book and narrator a full 5 stars.

I received a free copy of this book in exchange for this unbiased review through the courtesy of audioBookBlast dot com.

Baseball mystery in 1912

MURDER AT FENWAY PARK --Troy Soos--As a baseball lover and mystery lover, I found this book to be a fun beginning to a baseball mystery series. In 1912, a young baseball player, Mickey Rawlings, has just gotten his call to play in the big leagues with the Boston Red Socks. He's come into the brand new Fenway Park to check in and immediately finds the body of one of his team mates. Red Corriden's head is bash up badly, but the police and team owner just seem to want everything hushed up. Would've want any bad publicity for the new stadium. But there's much more to it than that, and Mickey finds he has to discover the murderer before someone kills him too.

I found this book to be a real winner. The mystery was interesting, and was filled with numerous fun facts about real historical players and team owners of that time period. It was also interesting living the life of a ball player of that time. Surely different from today's players. Lots of big names came into play, Ty Cobb and Cy Young amongst them. Troy Soos managed to be factual about the real people and maintain a fictional story as well. Great reading for mystery lovers during baseball season!!