Home Game -- Michael Lewis ---------------- 1.5 Stars

As some of you may know, I am pregnant. Well, I guess if you want to get technical about it, my wife is pregnant. I am going to be a father in a few months, and in the continuing effort to learn as much possible about the new addition, I have been educating myself about being a dad/having a child. Most of the books tend to be the very information yet incredibly boring baby books about pregnancy, giving birth, the first year, etc. Nothing I read in full nor want to review. So, I was quite excited when my wife recently gave me Michael Lewis' new book Home Game.

As you can tell from my 1.5 rating, I did not enjoy this book. This means one of three things: either I am going to hate being a father, this book sucks or Lewis is a fairly terrible dad (or perhaps a combination of the second two).

Let me explain. The book is basically this guys diary of clever and interesting (or so he thinks) anecdotes about the birth/early years of his three children. Now, I can't judge since I have never experience fatherhood before, but he makes being a dad sound awful. I mean, really not fun at all. Now, perhaps I'm all doe eyed and excited because my child is not here yet but this guy makes it sound like you are in a perpetual state of no sleep and no enjoyment, constantly worried and always looking to get away. At one point, he felt that the idea of killing a child really isn't that bad (I think he was joking).

Anyway, that's the major reason I didn't like this book. Second, the stories really aren't that entertaining or funny. In fact, his humor style I find most similar to Dave Barry (that's not a good thing). I love Lewis' other books -- Moneyball and Liar's Poker. He really should stick with stuff like that.

I guess the book wasn't all awful. It was short and easy to read. Occasionally it would be humorous, though nearly always it was when one of his young girls curses. That's about it.

In the end, it mostly left me confused. I was assuming there would be some great message or idea at the end, but I think it was literally his last diary entry. After listening to him rip on the idea of being a father for 200 pages, I was expecting a bit more of a happy ending. So, my confusion exists not knowing if this is what real fatherhood is and everyone else is sort of lying or if this guy is just painting a picture of being a fairly pathetic and unhappy father. I guess in time I will find out. Until then, I will err on the optimistic side and assume being father will be awesome and this guy should stick to writing about baseball and Wall Street.