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Paradise Found. Bill Plaschke.

 

 


Paradise Found.    Bill Plaschke.

A High School Football Team’s Rise from the Ashes.

 

The advance praise for the book includes terms like spirit, touching, heartwarming, empathetic, resilient, big hearted and devastating.    All of these words aptly describe what happened in this small northern California town in early November of 2018.    This is a story of heart break and devastation that ultimately results in perseverance of the human spirit.

Fortunately for the readers, the author, Bill Plaschke, is more than able to tell the tale of what happened in Paradise, California that day and throughout the next year.    Many characters are introduced in the book and each story is more depressing than the previous.    The main character, coach Rick Prinz, and his staff cajole the players to regroup and participate in the ensuing 2019 season.   It takes some doing since many players lost their homes, were displaced from family and now live and commute well out of the district.   Making matters worse, the school has limited facility use, no locker room and even struggled to find one football when practices got started in the coming months after the fire.   Little by little the players come together to form a cohesive team.

Each character has their story to tell.   None are particularly optimistic but the will to do something for the town motivates the team and coaches to keep going.    The town, "CMF" ---crazy mountain folks, rally around the season, each game home or otherwise.    Winning becomes infectious and none want to see the season end.

The book, while well written and researched, probably drags on a bit.   The characters are certainly interesting and inspirational but the reader gets the point early enough in the story.    One wonders what could have been had the book finished the story of the season sooner and then discussed in more depth what is to be of the characters, the school and the town itself.  

The author reveals that he suffered through his own personal travails along the way.   It is also mentions that he had an assist from his son in finding quotes to start each chapter.  These are not so easy to immediately process.   Indeed, they were written a few centuries in the past and taken from John Milton’s Paradise Lost.   Admittedly this does serve as an interesting dichotomy between two different books that share common ground beyond just the first name in the title.

You might like this book if you are a fan of reading Bill Plaschke columns and books.

You might like this book if you live in northern California or enjoy reading about its small towns.

You might like this book if you enjoy reading about high school football teams and their seasons.

You might like this book if you like reading about football at any level.

You might like this book if you are interested in reading about people that come together to overcome adversity. 

You might like the book if you enjoy reading about stories that feature inspiration, human spirit and perseverance among people and its community.

Read more about the author on Twitter:  https://twitter.com/BillPlaschke

 

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