A New York Times Notable Book: A moving glimpse of a life shrewdly examined Extra Innings follows a year in the life of Doris Grumbach, beginning with the release of her previous memoir and journal, Coming into the End Zone, and revealing that the devoted essayist, novelist, and critic possesses as keen an eye in her seventies as she did when she wrote The Spoil of Flowers thirty years earlier. Grumbach details each passing month and the trials and tribulations therein. Age and experience have tempered her anger, allowing her to view the world in a rosier light than she has before. In this eventful period that concludes with her move from Washington, DC, to Maine, Grumbach travels between signings and speeches, describes her home life in a new state, and deals not only with her own mortality, but with that of her daughter. Grumbach's wisdom and wit endure as she looks back on her own memories, seeing the world as only Doris Grumbach can.
"Immensely likable . . . There is a rhythm to this journal that is not unlike narrative poetry, a quality to the prose that is both vivid and passionate."
Los Angeles Times
"Such a commonplace book is to be cherished. . . . A document still too rare in literary history, an account of a woman who has lived by words. Ms. Grumbach wittily chronicles the absurdities and ambiguities of the modern American writer's life."
