Great Baseball Books

Where They Ain't: The Fabled Life and Untimely Death of the Original Baltimore Orioles
Solomon, Burt
Free Press, 1999

Fascinating account of the team led by Wee Willie Keeler ("Hit ‘em Where They Ain't) and John McGraw, who would go on to a Hall-of-Fame career as the manager of the New York Giants for three decades. The book captures the game and its colorful players and owners near the turn of the century, the "good ol' days" that really weren't that good. Like many of the books on this list, baseball does not exist in a vacuum, and the author provides a strong sense of the society surrounding it.