John Krich was born in New York City and lived in San Francisco unti a recent move to Hong Kong, where he is a feature writer and food columnist for the Asian Wall Street Journal. His first novel, an imaginary autobiography of Fidel Castro, A Totally Free Man, shared the 1982 PEN/Ernest Hemingway Award. His other books include Music in Every Room, Why Is This Country Dancing?, Bump City, and Won Ton Lust.

A quirky, wry, and often hilarious odyssey through the baseball fields of Latin America—both sports book and travelogue, political reportage and meditation on New World identity. With wit and style, John Krich evokes a world where barefoot kids perfect their swings with stalks of sugar cane, midget mascots dance the merengue atop dugouts, and wily scouts compete with dictators for the souls of promising shortstops. "El Beisbol sparkles with keen observation and irreverent humor."—Washington Post Book World