The best-selling author dropped in at Berkeley’s Mrs. Dalloway’s bookstore last night for a World Book Night event and, among other things, shared a secret or two about how he came to write “Moneyball.” Frances Dinkelspiel at Berkeleyside blogs that Lewis was concerned that A’s manager Billy Beane might be upset by some of the stuff in the book, but miscalculated the source of Beane’s concern. An excerpt:
But when Beane read Moneyball, he was more concerned that Lewis reported he often used the F-word than the revelation of his trade secrets. Beane was worried his mother would disapprove of his swearing, said Lewis.
And disapprove she did. When Lewis did a reading at a San Diego bookstore, a woman stood in the back and glowered at him. After the reading was over, she approached Lewis and said, “My son does not talk like that!” It was Beane’s mother. Lewis said he took her out to dinner to try to calm her down, but “two hours later she was still as furious.”
