EXCERPT
“Ernie was a quick study in sociology and human nature. After I finished reading, he gazed kindly at me and said he thought he understood what my wife’s family must have been through as it made its way in a Brahmin world. He looked away, perhaps wondering if that’s what his own life would have been like had he made it to the majors alongside Jackie Robinson.
Through the darkness I could see his eye shift from empathy to impishness. ‘So why she call you a rat? You know … Ratan.’ When I reminded him that was my name, he laughed and said that given how I kept digging away for morsels of his story, a rodent-sounding name was befitting. The joke faded, and Ernie slid his bag of letters between the two of us before giving me a tight hug. He pushed the paper bag into my unsuspecting hands. ‘I don’t know anyone else who I can share these with.’
The northbound train came, and Ernie gently nudged me into the passenger coach as the doors swung open. I was feeling alone and connected at the same time. Together alone. Alone together. Looking at my reflection in the glass window, I chased an epiphany from the concert: Ernie was the sitar, struck hard on its neck for the privilege and pleasure of others; my wife was the tabla, a distant drum whose echoes insisted that Ernie’s sitar be heard; and I was the droning tanpura, a steadfast witness to the ragas playing out in front of me.”
PRAISE
"Adroitly balanced between autofiction and history, Double Play is a sensitive and suspenseful depiction of the growing friendship between two very different men of color—an Indian-immigrant professor and an African American peanut-seller at Wrigley Field—as they investigate the wrongful murder conviction that destroyed the latter's promising baseball career. The novel depicts powerfully the unexpected similarities between the prejudice each man has experienced—in different countries and under very different circumstances. Carefully researched and filled with perceptive statements."
Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni
McDavid Professor of Creative Writing
University of Houston
Author of Independence, The Last Queen, Mistress of Spices, and more
~ ~ ~
“At the heart of Oza’s kaleidoscopic debut, Double Play, lies the unrelenting struggle of an innocent man to protect his integrity against the sweeping tides of racism, history, and political adversity. Double Play paints a vivid tableau of both a man and a city, weaving together the threads of a fateful 1953 murder in Chicago, a wrongful imprisonment, an unlikely friendship, and a promising baseball career that never was. In Oza’s ambition to blend memoir, fiction, historical account, and cultural analysis, Double Play hits it out of the park: a timeless and searching exploration of truth, injustice, and ultimately, redemption.”
John W. Evans
The Phyllis Draper Lecturer in Non-Fiction & Lecturer of DCI Memoir
Stanford University
Author of The Fight Journal, Should I Still Wish, Young Widower, and more
~ ~ ~
“In Rajesh C. Oza's astonishing work, Double Play, history and memory collide and collude in the heartbreaking yet hopeful story of a friendship between an Indian-American immigrant professor and an African-American peanut vendor convicted of a crime he has not committed. Meticulously researched, utterly compelling, and radiating a rare empathy, Oza's exploration of quintessentially American themes—baseball, racial injustice, violence, and the promise of success—deftly illuminates the resonances between the lived reality of marginalized Indian caste and indigenous groups and African-Americans.”
Rohit Chopra
Professor, Department of Communication
Santa Clara University
Author of The Gita for a Global World, The Virtual Hindu Nation, and Technology and Nationalism in India, and more
~ ~ ~
“I admire how Rajesh C. Oza shines a light on baseball, academia, the justice system, and racial dynamics in Double Play. This book entertainingly and empathetically applies lessons from the world of sports to the world at large. It's an important read that illustrates the power of building cross-cultural bonds of trust and friendship.”
Dan Grunfeld
Former professional basketball player
Academic All-American at Stanford
Author of By the Grace of the Game
~ ~ ~
“In 1980s Chicago, an Indian-American professor of sports journalism hunts for the truth behind the 30-year-old wrongful murder conviction of a Black baseball player who would have otherwise made it to the Major Leagues alongside Jackie Robinson. A gripping mystery and a poignant meditation on race, caste, immigration, and friendship, Double Play brims with empathy and brings history marvelously to life.”
Ron Nyren
Writing Instructor, Stanford University
Author of The Book of Lost Light, Deepening Fiction, and more
~ ~ ~
“Double Play is a picaresque, a mystery story, a chronicle of one man's contemporary experience as an Indian immigrant in the Chicago of the early eighties, and another man's experience as an aspiring Black baseball player in the Chicago of the fifties whose career was derailed by an unjust murder conviction. Rajesh C. Oza weaves these two stories—one, an aspirational tale in the post-colonial diaspora, another, a dream cruelly deferred—with sharp wit and political insight, through the fabric of Chicago's obsession with baseball, a mirror of the city's complex racial dynamics, into a multi-generational tale of loss and redemption.”
Thomas H. McNeely
Senior Affiliated Faculty, Emerson College
Writing Instructor, Stanford University
Author of Pictures of the Shark, Ghost Horse, and more
~ ~ ~
“I enjoyed immersing myself in various worlds of this [novel]—baseball, India, the judicial system, journalism, Chicago. There’s a lot for a reader to sink his teeth into here. There’s something here for fans of historical fiction, for fans of love stories, for fans of multicultural literature, for social justice warriors, even for fans/natives of Chicagoland.”
TJ Beitelman
Chair, Creative Writing Department, Alabama School of Fine Arts
Author of John the Revelator, This Is the Story of His Life, and more
~ ~ ~
“Race, identity, history, justice—how Oza blends these themes with baseball is astonishing. Following a scorching odyssey of a Chicago summer, you will be pulled into the story of the Black phenom wrongfully accused of murder, and amazed how so much of the human condition is wrapped up in the game of balls and strikes.”
James Finn Garner
American Writer and Satirist
Custodian of “Bardball”
Author of Rex Koko, Private Clown (A Series) Tea Party Fairytales, Politically Correct Bedtime Stories, and more
~ ~ ~
“During another losing game for the Cubbies, fanatics grow restless and lash out at Indian-American professor and sports journalist Ratan. A more compassionate fan comes to the Professor’s aid, and when the mob turns its threats towards Ernie, a middle-aged Black peanut vendor, this fan reveals the vendor’s story of a dream deferred. Decades earlier Ernie been a Negro Leagues standout, set to ascend to the Major Leagues as a contemporary of Jackie Robinson. This encounter launches the Professor’s suspenseful investigative journey, an opportunity for the wronged baseball player to clear his record, a growing friendship between two unforgettable characters, and an informed scrutiny of the American justice system, with all its disappointments and possibilities.”
Angela Pneuman
Executive Director, Napa Valley Writers’ Conference
Writing Instructor, Stanford University and Sarah Lawrence College
Author of Lay It on My Heart, Home Remedies, and more