The Johnny Bingo Award - 2022

It is late December, and therefore time for the least-anticipated literary prize of the year – The Johnny Bingo Award!  I’m sure you all remember how this works, but just in case here is a cut-and-paste reminder of the rules:

This award too has only one criterion – for a book to be eligible, I had to have started reading it this year. It could’ve been written by a blind Greek poet in the 8th century BCE or be an unpublished galley hacked from an MFA candidate’s MacBook in a Brooklyn cafe.  As long as I read the first paragraph before Dick Clark’s puppeteer walks him through the New Year’s Eve Countdown, it can be a winner.

There is a significant difference between The Johnny Bingo Award and the slightly more prestigious Nobel Prize for Literature: there is a chance you may have heard of my authors!

The Nobel Prize for Literature should be renamed “The Nobel Prize for a Random European Author Nobody Reads”.  This year, it went to somebody named Annie Ernaux.  As is often the case with the Nobel Prize for Literature, after the winner is announced readers all over the world say “Who?”, then go to the person’s Wikipedia page, which has like one paragraph, and then try to buy the book, and find it is out of print.

This is not a new phenomenon for the Nobel Prize.  In the 19th century they skipped over Leo Tolstoy and Mark Twain – who were beaten out by such literary giants as Bjornstjern Bjornson, Jose Echeragay, Henrik Sienkiewicz, and Rudolph Christoph Euken.   In the 20th century, Joyce, Nabokov and Proust were defeated by Lagerkvist, Andrik, and Elytis.   

So Cormac McCarthy*, my old friend, you may have published some masterpieces, but you committed the unpardonable sin of being liked by Oprah, The Coen Brothers, and actual readers.  No Nobel for you!

* McCarthy published two novels this year, his first in 16 years.  But alas he is not eligible for a JB as Santa Claus (actually my son) gifted them to me 4 days ago, and I have yet to read them.

On to the Johnny Bingos!

Best Biography

Peter the Great: His Life and World, Robert K. Massie

When Russia invaded Ukraine earlier this year, some ill-informed TV talking heads said he wanted to bring back the glory of the Soviet Union – to be the next Stalin.  But well-informed historians said no – he wanted to bring back the glory of Mother Russia – to be the next Peter the Great.

Robert K. Massie is the preeminent English-language historian of the Romanov Dynasty, and his biography of Peter has sat on my shelf a long time.  I bought it not long after reading his thrilling masterpiece, Nicholas and Alexandra: The Classic Account of the Fall of the Romanov Dynasty.

Putin's blunder* finally inspired me to pull this one from the shelf, and it is well worth the 1000+ pages.  Like all great history, it illuminates our world while telling a thrilling story from the past.  

* By the way, remember how everyone thought the Russian army was going to roll through the Ukraine with ease?  Well, if you were reading Freetime you may have been more skeptical.  I wrote this piece the day before the invasion.  As I said above, history is almost always a better guide to the present than the TV news shouters.   

Best Newly Discovered Dead Writer*

John MacDonald

In a lifetime of reading mysteries and thrillers, not sure how John MacDonald slipped through the cracks.  Most famous for the Travis McGee series and his novel The Executioners (which inspired the two Cape Fear movies, the original with Robert Mitchum and the remake by Scorsese), MacDonald is a fascinating guy whose Wikipedia page is way more interesting than Annie...oh shoot I forgot her name already...

I like my serial private detectives (and McGee is kinda sorta one) to be resourceful and tough, but also flawed, intellectually-inclined, and a bit of a wise-ass.  I'm about 1/3 through the 21 McGee novels, and looking forward to the rest of them.

* if you're new to the Johnny Bingo Awards, you should know I just make up categories whenever I feel like it.  Speaking of which...

Best Book by a Newly Discovered Contemporary Writer

The Force, Don Winslow

When you read as much as I do, you sometimes worry you're going to run out of great books  But then one day you see a tweet about Don Winslow retiring from writing, and all sorts of book people with good taste are heartbroken about the retirement of Don Winslow, and I'm over here saying, "Uh, who is Don Winslow?"

So I did some research, and decided to read The Force by Don Winslow.  And I get why people are so upset.  Dude is good.  I am very much looking forward to reading The Cartel trilogy in 2023.

Oh, and I suspect he'll be back.  He's retiring from writing novels to make political videos opposing Trumpism.  Which seems like maybe not a long-term gig?

Best Book Recommended by a Friend

The Immortal Irishman: The Irish Revolutionary Who Became an American Hero, Timothy Egan

As a Civil War guy (not a buff), I was aware of Thomas Meagher as the general of the legendary Irish Brigade (or, The Fighting 69th).  But I had no idea that was only part of his extraordinary life.  

He was an Irish revolutionary, famous for his stirring oratory.  He was sent to the penal colony in Australia, from which he escaped in dramatic fashion.  A penniless immigrant in New York, he won the heart of a beautiful and wealthy socialite, who was devoted to him despite (or because of?) her family's disapproval.  After the Civil War, he became Governor of Montana, and died a mysterious death in the Old West.  And yeah, was one of the best fighting generals on either side of the Civil War.  

That, my friends, is a life.

(Hat tip to my bro-in-law Jocfun, who also recommended a Johnny Bingo runner-up, The Splendid and the Vile: A Saga of Churchill, Family, and Defiance During the Blitz.)

Best Book by a Film Director

Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, Quentin Tarantino

This year I read two books by successful film directors, so let's make it a category!  Making Movies  by Sidney Lumet (12 Angry Men, Dog Day Afternoon, The Verdict, and much more) is a highly readable, slightly dated book about how he makes movies.  From the script to working with actors to editing and lighting and so much more - it's a fine behind-the-scenes look at what it means to be a director.

But if you like QT movies as much as I do, I think you'll thoroughly enjoy his own novel based on his latest movie.  In part, it is a fleshing out of the story.  And in part, it is much more interior monologue from key characters.  But mostly it is an excuse for Tarantino, through his characters, to geek out on film.  

Best Book of the Year

A Gentleman in Moscow, Amor Towles

This was one of the first books I read in 2022, so the words to describe it don't come easily.  But it reminded me a bit of some of Mark Helprin's finest books.  

Helprin is, to my mind, the most underrated novelist of my lifetime.  He didn't start out that way...one of his early novels, Winter's Tale, received (on the front page of The New York Times Book Review, no less) one of the most gushing reviews ever written:

"I find myself nervous, to a degree I don't recall in my past as a reviewer, about failing the work, inadequately displaying its brilliance".  Benjamin Mott

Mott was not alone.  His first few novels all received this sort of adulation.  But the literary world lost interest in Helprin, I think perhaps because some of his politics, particularly in regard to Israel and Palestine, were unacceptable to the literary elite.  

Anyway Helprin's best novels have a mix of history, magic realism, philosophy and poetry that really speak to me.  A Gentleman in Moscow is more realism than magic.  And it has a core of stoic philosophy at its heart.

But spending a few hundred pages with Count Alexander Rostov will make you feel better about humanity, and perhaps about your own life.  

Congratulations to all the winners!

n.b. All the links to books here are to Bookshop.org.  I like the convenience of Amazon as much as the next guy, but if you want to buy online and still support independent booksellers, please shop at Bookshop.org.  

Barbarossa Redux: Russia in Ukraine

The Decision to Invade Often Ends Badly

I am very far from an expert on current events in the Ukraine.  I know enough to understand what is happening, and why…but not nearly enough to know what to do about it.

But let me say this: the decision to initiate war often ends badly for the initiator.

• The US decision to invade Iraq in 2003 (a decision which I admit I supported) ended (?) with an enormous loss of blood, treasure, and prestige – and an Iraq still in turmoil.
• The Soviet decision to invade Afghanistan led indirectly, if not directly, to the fall of the Soviet Union.
• Hitler’s decision to invade Poland ended in his suicide in a bunker and his country in ruin. 
• The Confederacy’s decision to fire on Fort Sumpter ended with no Confederacy, and their land in ruin.
• It’s not clear who fired “the shot heard round the world”, the opening shot of the Revolutionary War; but the British Crown’s decision to quell their American colonists’ dissent by force, ended with a loss of their American colonies.

Putin’s decision here reminds me less of the Russian invasion of Afghanistan, though there are interesting parallels, than it does of Hitler’s invasion of Russia (Operation Barbarossa) in June of 1941.

That invasion was, obviously by hindsight but even for many in the German high command at the time, a horrendous tactical decision – the one that most obviously led to that bunker*.  But it was also one he had to make – because his worldview demanded it.  There was no way Hitler, supreme in continental Europe, turned back in his aborted invasion of England, was going to sit idly by with an enormous Communist bear on his Eastern borders.  His personal ideology demanded war and conquest.

·      *  If you want to argue for Hitler’s deployment of tanks prior to D-Day, that's fair

So, too with Putin.  He considers the fall of the Soviet Union to be an utter catastrophe.   He considers Ukraine as part of Russia.  Here is Putin yesterday:

"Ukraine is not just a neighboring country for us. It is an inalienable part of our own history, culture and spiritual space. These are our comrades, those dearest to us — not only colleagues, friends and people who once served together, but also relatives, people bound by blood, by family ties."

He considers the loss of breakaway Soviet satellites as an intolerable loss of Russian honor and one he must reverse.  And he is gambling that the West doesn’t have the will to stop him. 

Do we?  What does that even look like?  I don't know, but I'm fairly certain it's not economic sanctions.  I suspect Putin cares as little about those as the Iranian mullahs and Kim Jong-un.  

One can’t help but think of a line attributed* to Churchill:  In the end, America will always do the right thing, only after they have exhausted every other option. 

* To paraphrase Yogi Berra, Churchill didn't say most of the things he said

Plug in “the West” for America, for this is Western Europe’s problem even more so, and perhaps there is cause for hope.  Perhaps Putin's callous disregard for his own people, his neighbors, and global order, may end for him in a gilded bunker.  Or worse.  

OBJ: Super Bowl Champion?

The Rise, Fall, and Rise of Odell Beckham Jr.

 Occasionally you’ll hear someone say – on sports radio, on ESPN, at a bar – that it is pointless to compare players across eras because the game has changed so much, or that it is a waste of time to debate whether a quarterback is elite because elite is an arbitrary term, or some such thing.

These people are morons.  

Every sports argument, indeed every sports conversation ever had, is ultimately about one thing:  How good is X?  How good is that:

- player

- play

- team

- game

- season

- coach

- GM

- sport

- rule

- manager

- call

- trade

- official

- prospect

- announcer

Heck, sports fans will debate beer commercial quality.  Replay has given us a whole list of new things to debate – how good is that camera angle, the reversed call, the speed of the decision.

“How good is X?” is the whole reason we have sports conversations.

Which brings me to Odell Beckham Jr.

The OBJ Trade

In March of 2019, the New York Giants traded the 3-time Pro Bowler to the Cleveland Browns for strong safety Jabrill Peppers and two draft picks. The trade was surprising for two reasons, but unsurprising for a third.

Surprising Reason #1

In August of 2018 then-GM Dave Gettleman signed Beckham to a 5-year, $90m contract extension.  On February 27, 2019 he said "We didn't sign Odell to trade him.  That's all I need to say about that."  Two weeks later he traded him to the Browns.

Now look, Dave Gettleman is the worst kind of stupid…the stupid guy who thinks he’s smarter than everyone else.  He showed that with his two biggest draft picks, Saquon Barkley and Daniel Jones.

But still, the Giants gave every indication of wanting a long-term relationship with OBJ…until they didn’t.

Surprising Reason #2

It was more shocking because OBJ wasn't merely a Pro Bowler - he was through 5 seasons one of the best wide receivers in the history of the league.  Injuries in his 4th and 5th seasons slowed him down a bit, but his pro-rated 16-game numbers for the Giants look like this:

106 Catches, 1485 yards, 12 touchdowns.  

I mean, holy crap!

And by “slowed him down a bit”, well…in his 5th and final season in New York despite only playing 12 games, he caught 77 passes for 1052 yards and 6 touches.  

In the 3 seasons since, no Giant wide receiver has come anywhere near those 12-game #s in a full season.  Indeed, in a 17-game season this year, the top totals for Giants receivers was 40/521/2.  Jeez.

And he wasn’t just wildly productive.  He was extremely entertaining.  We forget sometimes that we watch sports to be entertained, and boy did OBJ put on a show in a Giants uniform.

The Not Surprising Reason

Odell was, as coaches like to say, a world-class distraction.  

Ill-advised boat trips, sideline tantrums, on-field tantrums, questionable hotel videos, and perhaps the worst thing a wide receiver can do – not backing up his quarterback to the press.  His 2-time Super Bowl MVP quarterback that is.  Oh, and then there was this…

The Giants’ brass ultimately decided all that on-field productivity wasn’t worth the off-field nonsense.

How Giants Fans Reacted

In the week after the trade, I conducted an extremely scientific survey of every Giants fans I know.  The results were as follows:

- Every Giants fan in their 20’s said “Nooooooo!” (because of Surprising Reason #2)

- Every Giants fan over 50 said “Good Riddance!” (because of the Unsurprising Reason)

I had never seen such a striking disagreement on the “How good is X?” question.  

In the years since, it has certainly looked like the old guys had it right.  His first season in Cleveland was pretty good* (74/1035/4) but not the explosive season everyone expected with Baker Mayfield throwing to him.  And the two seasons since have been filled with injuries and unproductive play.

* by “pretty good”, I mean “way way way better than any Giants receiver since”

The Giants meanwhile, got two pretty good players out of the deal in Peppers and Dexter Lawrence.

But here’s the thing:  the old guys weren’t saying “Good Riddance!” because they thought OBJ was about to fall off a statistical cliff.  The old guys basically didn’t care how awesome he was.  Their feeling was that he was a bad locker room guy and the Giants couldn’t win as long as he was kicking nets, going boating, and pretending to pee in the end zone.

Fair enough.  So, how have the Giants done since removing this cancer from the locker room?

Well, they haven’t been the absolute worst team in football.  At 14-35, they did edge out the Jaguars, Lions, and Jets (between 10-14 wins each).  But it’s been pretty putrid.

The Browns, while disappointing, have had a winning record and a playoff appearance during the OBJ years.  

Ram Tough

But something funny happened on OBJ’s trip to irrelevance.  Mid-season, the Rams picked him up after Robert Woods’ injury.  In a half season with the Rams he was okay – 27 catches for 305 yards.  More importantly, he found the end zone 5 times.

* Again, sorry to keep pointing this out, but he had more than twice as many TD catches in half a season for the Rams than Darius Slayton, who led the Giants with…2 TDs in 17 games.  Kenny Golladay, the G-Men’s big offseason acquisition, the man who was supposed to fill OBJ’s still-empty cleats as a star receiver, had (checks notes…) zero TD catches in 14 games

In the playoffs he’s been better.  Over two games he has 15 catches and 182 yards.  He is, for the first time since 2019, a legitimate threat.

He's not a star receiver again.  His productivity is certainly helped out by the fact that the best wide receiver in football is on the Rams.  Cooper Kupp's awesomeness attracts a defensive backfield's attention, and allows Beckham space to make some plays.  I suspect OBJ's injuries took 1/10th of a step away from him - and a 1/10th of a step was enough to transform him from a super-weapon to (in the parlance of Bill Parcells) a JAG - Just Another Guy.

And, uh, he still has the temperament of an unpleasant toddler...

BUT - it turns out a team can win with such a terrible person on its roster.  It turns out that removing such a terrible person from its roster doesn’t unlock a winning formula.

By this evening, Odell Beckham Jr. might be a Super Bowl champion.  At the very least, he will be an NFC champion.  

And the Giants continue their sad rebuild.

The 2021 Johnny Bingo Award

 As faithful followers (both of you) of The Johnny/Bingo Awards know, this is a somewhat haphazard accolade.

Presented to the best books I’ve read this year (regardless of when written), there is very little order to the affair.  Sometimes I have 5 finalists and pick awinner.  Or I’ll select multiple books indifferent categories.  I occasionally skip a year…or a decade.

But this year I’m going to write about a single book, as it happens the last book I finished in 2021.  Without further ado, the Johnny Bingo Award for 2021 goes to:

The Daughter of Time, by Josephine Tey

“When the Legend Becomes Fact, Print the Legend” – The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance

If you know my reading habits, you know my passions include history, Shakespeare, and a cracking good mystery. Josephine Tey, nom de plume for the Scottish author Elizabeth Mackintosh, brilliantly combines these elements in this, her most revered novel.

There is a fourth passion of mine that elevates this book from a great mystery to a miniature masterpiece.  I love books that examine how history and its telling evolve through the ages.  Was there a Trojan War?  Were Caesar and Marc Antony captivated by Cleopatra - and vice-versa - or was it realpolitik? Did Washington actually stand in that boat as it crossed the Delaware?

It’s why I’m so fascinated by Arthurian legend.  If there was an Arthur, he certainly wasn’t King of England – a place called England wouldn’t exist for 500 years after the first Arthur stories.  An Arthur, if he existed at all, was likely some sort of local warlord who may (or may not!) have briefly been part of a Romano-British alliance that only briefly held off the Saxon invaders.  And, you know, it’s unlikely there were wizards and magic swords and dragons. 

And yet, stories of Arthur are still everywhere.  Not only in recent films and television series and books that tell and re-tell the stories in different ways, but in some of the most popular stories of our time. Indeed, see how often Merlin is reborn  – as Dumbledore, as Gandalf, as Obi-Wan Kenobi. 

Where was I?  Right, The Daughter of Time…

“Determined to Prove a Villain” – Richard III

Few writers have shaped how we remember history better than Shakespeare.  Even residents of bookless houses, if they know nothing about Julius Caesar, know “Et tu Brute” and ‘Friends, Romans, Countrymen, lend me your ears”, and “Beware the Ides of March”.  But none of these words come from ancient Rome…they come from Shakespeare’s rendition of it.

So, too, the villainy of Richard III.  As written by Shakespeare (and played by such modern actors as Denzel Washington, Kenneth Branagh, Ralph Fiennes, Ian McKellen, Alec Guinness [two Merlins!], and more), Richard III is the villain of villains.  A hunchbacked monster, he frames his brother, steals the crown, and most notoriously murders his nephews – the infamous Princes in the Tower - to keep his throne.

Or did he?

Historians have long wondered if perhaps Shakespeare didn’t exaggerate the King’s lesser qualities – in part to tell a wonderful story (don’t let facts get in the way of a good story and all that), but also to flatter the Tudor monarchs of his time.  It was Henry Tudor, after all, that defeated Richard III at the Battle of Bosworth, establishing the monarchy.

Indeed, quite recently, the body of Richard III was foundbeneath a car park in England – and after exhumation and DNA confirmation, we learned that (among other things) Richard was not quite as deformed as Shakespeare wrote – and many pompous actors have played – him.

“Truth is the Daughter of Time” – Francis Bacon

Josephine Tey doesn’t need me to extol the virtues of her novel.  In 1990 it was voted the best crime novel of all time by the British Crime Writers' Association.  The Mystery Writers of America put it in the 4 slot.  This is the mystery novelists’ mystery novel.

Without giving too much away, a Scotland Yard detective, convalescing in a hospital bed in the middle of the 20^th century, gets interested in the murder of those nephews – the fabled Princes in theTower.  Something doesn’t add up to him.  With the help of an eager young American, he purses this 500 year-old murder case as a way to keep boredom at bay. 

It’s a marvelously original novel, and one that accomplishes the seemingly impossible task of creating suspense out of the idea of a guy in a hospital room trying to solve the coldest of cold cases.

From what I can tell, Josephine Tey truly did not care about actual accolades during her lifetime, so she certainly wouldn’t give a flying fig about a fake accolade 70 years after her death – but Congratulations nonetheless!