On a rainy night at Fenway Park sometime during the storybook 2004 season, I stood huddled and cold with a friend in the concourse under the third base grandstands. We had a solid premonition that the game would be called, but you never leave a Red Sox game until you know for sure. We’d periodically go up the ramp and check the field, on one occasion walking into what was truly a beautiful lightning storm, which made the old yard look like a pinball machine after you hit the 500,000 point bonus.
Our conversation revolved largely around baseball and I asked my friend, an author, what he was working on. Among other things, he told me about a great idea for a book that he had – a set of fictional short stories revolving around Fenway Park or actual Red Sox players and/or events. Immeadiately my mind raced to my employer from 1995-1998, Rounder Records.
Rounder is one-third owned by Bill Nowlin and he also just happens to be one of the foremost collectors of Ted Williams memorabilia, a longtime Red Sox season ticket holder and a longtime writer about all things Red Sox and Fenway. At the time, Rounder Books was more or less in its infancy, headed up by Nowlin and an embryonic offshoot of the record company.
I told Adam it seemed like a most logical fit and that I’d reach out to Nowlin. Sure enough, Bill seemed interested in hearing more and a little over a year later, Fenway Fiction is now available in many bookstores, both online and off. I got someone a book deal! Naturally, in subsequent discussions with Adam, the capitalist pig in me started demanding a cut of the sales as soon as I heard it was going to be released! I was kidding of course, as I truly believe the best payment for this was simply doing something good for someone and having it prove fruitful. Good luck to Adam with it.
As a final note (or payment, I suppose), Adam does pay tribute of sorts to me in the introduction, where he writes:
“Special thanks to Bill Nowlin of Rounder Books, who spearheaded the publication of the book; to Jeff Copetas, who put me in touch with him and has been using the ominous phrase “agent’s cut” ever since.”
You know it!