The Ortiz Curse and The Jeter Jinx

Posted on April 12, 2012 by Matthew Hutson

The 7 Laws of Magical Thinking goes on sale today. By (spooky!) coincidence, today is also the fourth anniversary of the incident that opens the book—an event asserting America’s belief in voodoo. On April 12, 2008, two men pulled a shirt out of a hole in the ground and lifted it before a mass of media. Somehow this shirt, and this hole, were kind of a big deal.

The shirt was a baseball jersey with the name and number of David Ortiz, a star player for the Boston Red Sox. The hole was a freshly jack-hammered void in the concrete of the New York Yankees’ expensive new stadium. In 2007 a mischievous construction worker had buried it there, and word had just got out. The Yankees, and their fans, wanted it gone. Continue reading →

Horoscopes in the East vs. West

Posted on January 22, 2012 by Matthew Hutson

I’ve been drinking Magic Hat beer more lately, in preparation for my book release. The undersides of the bottle caps have fortune-cookie-type sayings on them; sometimes they’re jokes, sometimes they’re bits of wisdom, and sometimes they’re like little horoscopes. I’m holding one I saved: “The Planet Has Needs For Your Deeds.” I thought, That’s so true!, which is the right attitude to have when you’re prepping to publicize your first book. But perhaps not everyone would have read as much into the lid… Continue reading →

Spooked by Shakespeare

Posted on January 8, 2012 by Matthew Hutson

A short piece by Tad Friend in the January 9 New Yorker demonstrates no fewer than three forms of magical thinking in one column of text.

The subject: John Logan, a playwright and screenwriter (recently: Hugo, Rango, Coriolanus). The scene: Bauman Rare Books on Madison Avenue. Continue reading →