This is the funny, poignant story of two brothers growing up in the early '60s. Manderino lightly approaches the underside of the middle American family in a tumultuous period of history.

Sam and His Brother Len

Literature & Fiction

Manderino, John

United States

Academy Chicago Publishers

At forty, Hank has decided he's through with baseball—a routine pop-up fell on his head and he got the message. Trouble is, baseball is the one thing that's given any meaning to his life. This is the painfully funny story of a man who decides to get a life, but isn't sure how. It's about fathers and sons, heroes and whiners, the wheel of fortune (and Vanna White), baseball and the decline of Western civilization—and why Nellie Fox always spat in his glove.

The Man Who Once Played Catch With Nellie Fox

In this comic, witty memoir, John Manderino shows us how the pivotal points of his life have been enmeshed with movie moments. "Crying at Movies" presents thirty-eight succinct chapters, each bearing the title of a film. It is at once a love-letter to an art form and a humorous appreciation of the distinctions between movie scenes and life's realities.

Crying at Movies: A Memoir

Biographies & Memoirs

Arts & Literature

This is John Manderino's second novel, a hilarious romp about a man in his forties who finally decides to get a life, but can't figure out how.

The Man Who Once Played Catch with Nellie Fox: A Novel

Humor & Satire

It’s Saturday, october 27, 1962, the darkest day of the Cuban Missile Crisis. Two children, Ralph and his little sister Lou, are searching for empty bottles in a vacant lot when they discover a rock which—to them, at least—looks quite a lot like Jesus. Ralph immediately declares it a Possible Holy Object. And, since his fondest wish is to be a “boy-in-a-story,” he earnestly places himself and Lou—now his “sidekick”—in a tale featuring the “sacred rock” as the key to nothing less than saving the world from nuclear annihilation.
But there’s another boy, Toby—older, shrewder, and quite a bit larger—who has very different plans for the rock, intending to use it as a lucrative sideshow exhibit, complete with fliers: Is it Jesus? Or just a rock? You decide! Hovering over the children and their small-scale war is the general anxiety and dread attending the most perilous moment in our history. As we approach the 50th anniversary of the Cuban Missile Crisis, John Manderino’sThe H-bomb and the Jesus Rock provides a unique, children’s-eye view of that near-Armageddon.

The H-Bomb and the Jesus Rock

Chicago Review Press

In the last column of a job application, there’s that tricky question: reason for leaving? John Manderino has apparently had to puzzle over that one often and long. His answers are collected here in this hilarious novel-in-stories tracing the history of a guy trying to grow up job by job. Delivery boy, altar boy, busboy, teacher, cotton picker, umpire, Zen monk—Manderino’s protagonist tries on one hat after another, from Chicago to Arizona to a South Dakota reservation where he longs to be given an Indian name, "something like Many Roads, or Many Jobs." Each story in this highly entertaining collection is complete in itself, yet Manderino has woven them into a seamless history that’s hard to put down. The author of Sam and His Brother Len and The Man Who Once Played Catch with Nellie Fox has once again given us a funny, moving portrait of a man’s journey of becoming. Becoming what? The answer lies behind all his reasons for leaving. John Manderino has a sharp eye for human foibles and his depictions of life in the workaday world will leave readers laughing long and loud.

Reason for Leaving: Job Stories

Humor & Entertainment

Humor

American novelist John Manderino's latest work is a sparkling, hilarious novella, Bopper's Progress. Told over the course of a day in the life of Bopper, a directionless young man who has found himself on a month-long Zen Buddhist retreat, Manderino probes life's most challenging questions with sharp observations, uproarious dialogue, and a clarity of prose rarely found. “Manderino's work is able to poke fun at the fear that so ably sparks our imaginations, while simul- taneously revealing a shared feature of humanity that is both reassuring and haunting in its own right." - Cory Johnston, Books Editor, The Literary Review

Bopper’s Progress

Wundor Editions

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Books by Manderino, John