Debut children's book illustrator Bing hits a home run with this handsome faux-scrapbook treatment of Thayer's immortal poem. The original verses about baseball star Casey and the ill-fated Mudville nine appeared in the San Francisco Examiner on June 3, 1888, and Bing captures the spirit of the age with pen-and-ink illustrations that look like carefully preserved newspaper clippings, complete with slightly torn and yellowed edges. He uses cross-hatching and careful shading to create the pages of The Mudville Sunday Monitor, which keenly resemble the newspaper engravings of the day. Columns of type (in historically accurate printers' fonts, as an afterword points out) run beneath each illustration to bolster the conceit. Bing also scatters other "scrapbook" items throughout, from game tickets (a bargain at 20 cents) to old-fashioned baseball cards and stereopticon images--many of them carefully keyed to the text. Full-color currency, for instance, accompanies "They thought if only Casey could but get a whack at that--/ We'd put up even money now with Casey at the bat," while an ad for Brown's Bronchial Troches appears with the couplet "Then from 5,000 throats and more there rose a lusty yell;/ It rumbled through the valley, it rattled in the dell." Endpapers reveal more items to delight baseball fans and history buffs, from Thayer's newspaper obituary to a fake bookplate wreathed with baseball motifs. Though Casey and the Mudville nine strike out in the end, this exceptionally clever picture book is definitely a winner. All ages. (Nov.) Copyright 2000 Cahners Business Information.

"The outlook wasn't brilliant for the Mudville nine that day"-but it certainly is for this robustly entertaining picture book, as Payne (Micawber) takes a swing at Thayer's beloved poem and knocks it out of the park. The tale of infield pomp and ignominy seems made-to-measure for Payne's statuesque characters, with their outsize noses and ears and florid faces. Standing head and broad shoulders above them all is the "mighty" (if overconfident) Casey; with his impressive porkchop sideburns and handlebar moustache, he looks every inch the Victorian gentleman-athlete. Payne injects a number of droll touches: a small inset of a gravestone enscribed "R.I.P. Cooney" accompanies the phrase "when Cooney died at first," for instance, while "defiance gleamed in Casey's eye, a sneer curled Casey's lip" occasions a batter's-eye view of a skinny and clearly terrified pitcher. For an ingenious take on Casey's approach to his at-bat ("Then from 5,000 throats and more there rose a lusty yell;/ It rumbled through the valley, it rattled in the dell"), Payne shows a spread of Mudville, and a farmer and his son listening to the uproar from where they are working on the mountainside. Entirely different in approach from Christopher Bing's starmaking turn with the same material, Payne's equally enjoyable outing is just the ticket for a front-row seat at literature's most famous ballgame. An afterword explains the poem's origin and history. Ages 4-8. (Mar.) Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information.

K-Gr 3-Thayer's famous poem, presented here in picture-book format, is still fresh and still filled with excitement and suspense. Fitzgerald's colorful, double-spread acrylic illustrations pit the greens and yellows of the field against the bright blue sky. The scenes are softened and blurred by the brushwork, which, along with the players' loose-fitting striped uniforms, infuses the book with the atmosphere of an old-fashioned, hometown game. Casey swaggers through the verses, a Babe Ruth-like figure in command of the crowd until the last terrible moment when he swings and misses. In his illustrations for Jack Norworth's multilayered Take Me Out to the Ballgame (Four Winds, 1992), Alex Gillman uses interesting facts from the history of the sport to add meaning to the poem. This new offering simply illustrates an old bit of popular culture, but it captures the thrill of the game, and baseball fans will enjoy it. It's pure entertainment.-Shirley Wilton, Ocean County College, Toms River, NJ

Of the making of Caseys there seems no end, but here the illustrator of John Lithgow's Remarkable Farkle McBride (2000) delivers the chestnut with such broad, satirical panache that only the dourest of spoilsports will be able to resist going along for the ride. From the rows of bowler-topped gents in the stands to the well-groomed hairs in Casey's handlebar, every detail is both larger than life, and painted with crystal clarity. A mighty figure indeed, Casey strides to the plate with lordly assurance, casually takes two strikes, then gears up for the next pitch; Payne zeroes in on Casey's suddenly-choleric face-steam blasting from his ears-then pulls back to depict a whiff so prodigious that the batter's whole body disappears into a swirling blur. But a whiff it is, and a view of a deserted, muddy street captures the forlorn tone of the final verse. Finished off with a detailed account of the poem's history, this may not supercede Christopher Bing's Caldecott Honor-winning rendition (2000) for period flavor, but it does capture the episode's epic scale and perfectly tuned melodrama. (Picture book/poetry. 7-10)