“Emily Nemens’s magnificent debut is a masterwork of great empathy and detail.”
—J. Ryan Stradal, author of Kitchens of the Great Midwest
“Nemens finds a kind of attenuated hope along with melancholy in these sharply etched character studies that ‘end not with “out three” but “out maybe.”’”
—Booklist (starred review)
“For a book about the notoriously languorous sport of baseball, this is a quick and often thrilling read. For a debut novel, it’s remarkably self-assured.” –L.A. Times review
“The Cactus League is not just another baseball novel. I can’t think of another book that so carefully examines the complex ecosystem of professional sport.”
—Chris Bachelder, author of The Throwback Special
“As Nemens portrays the life of the team—a pitcher is in thrall to pain pills; players’ wives hold a lingerie party—it starts to seem almost an organism, each constituent part brushing against others in a larger story of competition, survival, and obsession.”
—The New Yorker
A New York Times’s Editor’s Choice
A LA Times Bestseller
One of NPR’s Best Books of 2020
One of Lit Hub’s Favorite Books of the Year
