Billy Lombardo's New Novel THE MAN WITH TWO ARMS Reviewed in Chicago Tribune

Book critic and author Alan Cheuse takes a look at The Man With Two Arms in the Chicago Tribune: "The man of the title, really a young man from Chicagoland, has two golden arms. His name is Danny Granville and his baseball-crazed father Henry raises him from infancy to play ball—and specifically to pitch both left-handed and right-handed. With “coach’s thoughts” in his head and Astroturf in his basement, Henry cultivates a champion, a “switch-pitcher” who grows up to become a beautifully trained athlete with a great talent for baseball. Through high school and college we watch Denny grow, and when he hits the majors—playing for the Cubs—his first season looks as though it’s going to be a triumph.

Lombardo sets his sights on writing a lovely homage to the game, and to what is undoubtedly modern America’s finest literary tribute to the baseball since Bernard Malamud’s novel "The Natural." Danny himself is something like a natural himself, with his game-obsessed father doing everything he can to enhance his son’s natural abilities. From the boy’s first year on the father directs him “steadily and scientifically toward balance…” As Danny’s art student girl-friend Bridget discovers when she gets him to undress in preparation for posing for her that early propensity for balance has produced in the ball-player an anatomical symmetry close to perfection.

Because of this, it seems perfectly appropriate that Danny begins his major league career by pitching several games as close to perfect as it gets when the pitcher bows out in a late inning. Denny sets an eighty pitch limit for each of his performances, whether right-handed or left. If he has any flaw it isn’t as a player, but as the care-taker of a great talent who eventually wants to try and experiment with his gift.

Baseball is a difficult game to predict. Novels are easier to figure, because the enjoyment at the higher levels comes from being confronted by questions about why things happen in life rather than just the suspense of waiting for them to happen. You won’t want to second-guess the author of this delightful new work of fiction. Lombardo’s one of a kind novel about a one of a kind ball player becomes as engrossing as a perfect game going into the late innings. If you’re in the stands, you don’t want to look away from the field, let alone leave the stadium early. Those who love to read about this great pastime will have the same feeling when reading about Danny Granville, on and off the field."