Michael Brick is one of those writers who never leaves your side, and what pleasurable company he provides.
In reading this collection of his newspaper and magazine stories from Brooklyn, Houston, and beyond, picture the man. Tall, and lanky, and so proud to be Texan, wearing a brown vest and cowboy boots, his narrow reporter's notebook in his back pocket slapping at his flat ass, as if urging him onward because these blank pages needed filling.
Brick's words breathe life into his subjects. Here is Willy, the world-weary lady bartender at a salt-air bar, and all you need to know is that "Her daddy was William, who wanted a son." Here is Minerva Ramirez, aging with Down syndrome, her hair tied in a floral bow, "pretty like Tinkerbell." And Danny Wimprine, a talented quarterback too small for the N.F.L., whose gorgeous touchdown throws for the New Orleans VooDoo arena football team makes women swoon. And Peter Carmine Gaetano Napolitano, the bartender at the Melody Lanes bowling alley in south Brooklyn, wearing suspenders and a red-trimmed cummerbund, "an insurance policy for pants."
Brick brings his characters to life, and brings them along with him to the party. Make room for the Coney Island mermaids, wearing green-sequined bras and knocking back Buds. Another round, please.
Proceeds from the book will benefit the Brick family.
About the Author: Michael Brick, a senior writer for the Houston Chronicle, is the author of Saving the School: The True Story of a Principal, a Teacher, a Coach, a Bunch of Kids and a Year in the Crosshairs of Education Reform, a narrative nonfiction account of the effort to restore a troubled high school to its place as the heart of an inner city neighborhood in Texas. He is also the author of The Big Race, the story of a transcontinental motorcycle rally.
His feature stories have appeared in Harper's, The New Republic, Newsweek and Sports Illustrated. He previously worked as a reporter and sportswriter at The New York Times, where his assignments included the construction of Torre Mayor in Mexico City, the collapse of Enron, the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, summer in a bar on Coney Island and a yearlong series on adventure sports.
Brick, who lived with his wife and children in Austin, died February 8, 2016, from colon cancer. He was 41.
