The Miracle of Castel Di Sangro - Softcover

9780751527537: The Miracle of Castel Di Sangro
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Through 1996 and 1997 Joe McGinniss followed the Italian football season from Castel di Sangro, a small town in the Abruzzi region of Italy. This is the story of a team and a town with no aspirations, just a passion for soccer, and how that passion enabled the di Sangro club to reach almost the top of the professional game in Italy. It is the story of how a a dot on the map was transformed into a place of sporting magic, miracles and wonder.

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Review:
We already knew Joe McGinniss could chill our blood (Fatal Vision) and arouse both our pity and distaste for the Kennedys (The Last Brother), but who knew he could be so funny? (Well, maybe readers who remember The Selling of the President back in 1968.) Even those who have no interest in soccer--the majority of Americans, he ruefully admits--will relish the author's vivid account of a team from Castel di Sangro, a tiny town in Italy's poorest region, that against all expectations made it to the national competition. Whether he's chronicling his ordeal at possibly the least-inviting hotel in Italy (the heat doesn't come on until October, no matter the temperature; he is assigned to a room up four flights of stairs though there are no other guests), or sketching a colorful cast of characters that includes the team's sinister owner and an utterly unflappable translator, McGinniss prompts roars of laughter as he reveals an Italy tourists never see. He also saddens readers with a shocking final scene in which he confronts the nation's casual corruption, which taints men he's come to respect and even love. Although not a conventional memoir, this stirring book reveals as much about the author's passionate character as about the nation and the players who win his heart, then break it. --Wendy Smith
From the Back Cover:
Master storyteller Joe McGinniss travels to Italy to cover the unlikely success of a ragtag minor league soccer team -- and delivers a brilliant and utterly unforgettable story of life in an off-the-beaten-track Italian village.

When Joe McGinniss sets out for the remote Italian village of Castel di Sangro in the summer of 1996, he merely wants to spend a season with the village's soccer team, which only weeks before had, miraculously, reached the second-highest-ranking professional league in the land. But soon he finds himself embroiled with an absurd yet irresistible cast of characters, including the team's owner, described by the New York Times as "straight out of a Mario Puzo novel, smoking huge cigars and trailed by bodyguards", and coach Osvaldo Jaconi, whose only English word is the one he uses to describe himself: "bulldozer".

As the riotous, edge-of-your-seat season unfolds, so, too, does McGinniss's transformation into a true Italian soccer fan, complete with the irrational and blinding passions for which such fans are known. Moreover his fervor for soccer intertwines and grows with his love for the courageous team, their village and its people, and their country. As McGinniss travels with the miracle team on the season-long tour that takes him from the isolated mountain region where Castel di Sangro is located to such gritty towns as Foggia and Cosenza, as well as to obscure nooks of such grand cities as Genoa, Venice, and Verona, he introduces us to an Italy that no tourist guidebook has ever described. The Miracle of Castel di Sangro is a spellbinding, true story of an Italy to savor.

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  • PublisherLittle Brown P/B
  • Publication date2000
  • ISBN 10 075152753X
  • ISBN 13 9780751527537
  • BindingPaperback
  • Number of pages416
  • Rating

Other Popular Editions of the Same Title

9780767905992: The Miracle of Castel di Sangro: A Tale of Passion and Folly in the Heart of Italy

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ISBN 10:  ISBN 13:  9780767905992
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  • 9780316557368: The Miracle of Castel Di Sangro

    Little..., 1999
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  • 9780316644730: The Miracle of Castel di Sangro

    Little..., 1999
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Book Description Paperback. Condition: new. Paperback. Through 1996 and 1997 bestselling author Joe McGinniss followed the Italian football season from Castel di Sangro, a small town nestled in the Abruzzi region of Italy. The motley crew that comprised the di Sangro soccer team in the early 90s masked an unparalleled prowess for playing soccer. This is the story of a team and a town with no aspirations, just a passion for the game, and how that passion allowed this team to rise to the top of the professional Italian soccer league. With the lust for life of Robert Crichton's THE SECRET OF SANTA VITTORIA and the sporting dreams of modern movie classic FIELDS OF DREAMS, THE MIRACLE OF CASTEL DI SANGRO is an ebullient story of how a two-hour game transformed a dot on the map into a place of magic, miracles and wonder. A modern football fairytale and an extraordinary story of an Italian village and its football team's rise to the top against seemingly impossible odds. Through 1996 and 1997 bestselling author Joe McGinniss followed the Italian football season from Castel di Sangro, a small town nestled in the Abruzzi region of Italy. Shipping may be from multiple locations in the US or from the UK, depending on stock availability. Seller Inventory # 9780751527537

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