Roger Angell is a fascinating guy.  At 95, he’s been a long-time fiction editor at The New Yorker, the son of Katherine White and step son of E.B. White, married 3 times, recipient of the Spink Award at Cooperstown, Harvard Class of 1942, widely known and widely knowing.  This book, which arose from the eponymous essay in TNY, about reaching advanced old age, led to this compilation of his short pieces from TNY over the last 20 years.  What a fascinating life and wonderful writer.  He turns some spectacular phrases (e.g., the Hambergers belonged to “an artistocray of energetic attendance and Intense critical response.”; regarding V.S. Pritchett, “in life, indeed, books have always seems to be a form of life, and not a distraction from it.”.  His portraits of friends, authors, baseball players are superb etchings of individual characteristics and the quirks that make each of us unique and memorable.  He loves baseball (Duke Snider, Jackie Robinson, Ted Williams, Derek Jeter, Don Zimmer, Bob Feller, Earl Weaver), writers (Pritchett, Nabokov, Barthelme, Updike (whom he edited for 20 years), Bobbie Ann Mason, Ann Beattie), New York City, his wife Carol who predeceased him despite being 16 years younger, and his fox terriers.  I learned some wonderful factoids—Bob Feller, fresh from the Iowa farm, struck out 17 in his first start and fired a no hitter at the White Sox on opening day, 1940 providing the answer to the question:  In what game did all of the players finish with the same batting average with which they started?   Many of his reminiscences take the form of obituaries or eulogies for friends, co-editors, and even the handyman who watched his Maine home for years—Ellwood Carter of Brooklin, Maine. Death is a rather constant presence, though Angell seems to have come to terms with it, more so than when he was preoccupied with it in his 60’s and 70’s.   Angell is sui generis.   We’re fortunate to still have him with us.