Calico Joe is a sports novel written by famed thriller-author, John Grisham. The book was published by Doubleday (US) on April 10, 2012.
The story is part factious as it stems from Grisham’s own love for baseball during his childhood and early adulthood. The story follows Calico Joe a promising baseball player who has his career destroyed by a beanball. The novel is loosely based on the real-life athlete, Ray Chapman, who was killed by a pitch. Grisham himself commented that he did not pursue a career in baseball after he found the players to be aggressive and have bad pitch-manners.
Grisham covers Joe’s career until the incident, which leaves him in a coma and later causes him to suffer a stroke, thereby preventing him from playing the sport ever again. The narration is told by the son (Paul Tracey) of the man (Warren Tracey) who threw the pitch, and how thirty years later he is intent on reuniting them to resolve their issues.
The Washington Post stated whilst it was "a sweet, simple story" it was "full of twists and turns and tension." However, the book was criticised by The Oregonian, for “not [being a] great baseball novel. ”
