Ghosts of Mr. Baker


Poetry - General
42 Pages
Reviewed on 05/26/2023
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    Book Review

Reviewed by Deborah Stone for Readers' Favorite

Ghosts of Mr. Baker by Brian Zaffino is a tribute to a legendary ice hockey star whose life preceded and paralleled that of the author himself. After a brief and interesting history of Hobey Baker, the poetry and prose offer insight into the author’s feelings and provide an intuitive understanding of a man he never met. Zaffino’s writings are reflections that range from comfortable to intense and haunting. The author’s deep connection to Hobey Baker and his sense of sharing similar life experiences and common physical characteristics have allowed him access to common emotions and thoughts, despite living one hundred years apart. Zaffino lived in the same space, walked the same halls, skated on the same pond as the famous hockey personality, and even looked like the man who occupied his thoughts. Inspired by a ghost from the past, great emotion and suffering are poured out in this poetry.

Ghosts of Mr. Baker is a well-written reflection on the life of Hobey Baker by Brian Zaffino, the poet who seems to understand a time past. It is an interesting mix of history and insight through poetry and prose. The poems are introspective and hopeful, while at the same time full of loneliness and melancholy. Zaffino has managed to step back in time and connect with the emotions and longings of another human being and then put them on paper interestingly and compellingly. A partial quote from Zaffino’s girlfriend sums up the lives of these two men who seem so similar when she said they are “…sad about life.”