Before Youtube, before IGTV and ahead of all eye-catching visualization, there was a simple and yet most effective method way to connect and collect. Books are the most traditional and wonderful means to connect with the subject and collect everything written around. We, at Female Cricket, got ourselves Stumped by Richard Harrison. Richard, being an umpire, narrates his journey as an umpire.
Interestingly, the first few pages will tell the reader that it was sheer chance that got Richard in the middle of all action. The book, for the delight of readers, stays away from the plain narration of numbers as is the case with many books based around cricket. One of the most intriguing aspects of Richard’s writing has to be sheer simplicity. However, alongside the use of simple words and expressions, the books seem successful in retaining its uniqueness.
The originality and the freshness in the text find their source in the author’s choice to refrain from any alterations to the tale as it stems from a very precious corner of his heart. As any ride would start, readers will see them traveling with the author to the early days when a commoner, having played the game two decades earlier, reads about the umpire training program and goes on board just for the love of the game and his monotonous routine tied in his flat around the television.
There are innumerable instances where readers will find themselves reading between the lines. Often words felt simple but were short-lived. The author, in his simple tone, writes that “Games have rules. Cricket has laws”. The statement will take the reader to the game itself and in the coming chapters, his training would further showcase the complexity and complications of the fascinating game of the world. There is more than cricket in the text. The book takes us to the life of England with a brief count of words.
Readers have Richard’s life while training and while umpiring with them. The unplanned journey of an Aussie from his flat to training and then write an exam in a city he’d never heard makes a gem of a read not only for cricket fans but for readers of all sorts. As cricket fans, Umpires have always been sidelined in our shows and their decisions are often criticized.
There is a mammoth degree of unawareness in masses around all the work that an umpire undertakes. Very few of us would really know the procedures before the first ball of the match is bowled. In this text, we have a multilayered richness of British life wrapped around the love for cricket in an Aussie and his life as someone who devoted the game not for fame but for sheer love.
STUMPED One cricket, umpire, two countries.
Available as an eBook and paperback from Amazon Get your copy today.
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