Book sales
Calico Joe debuted at number 1 on the April 29, 2012 The New York Times Best Seller list in the Hardcover Fiction category for the week ending April 14, 2012.[5] The book also debuted atop the Publishers Weekly best-seller list for the week of April 19.[6] Calico Joe only debuted at number 6 on the April 19 USA Today best seller list.[7] It debuted at number 3 on The Wall Street Journal's April 15 Hardcover Fiction Best Seller list.[8]
Critical review
According to Bob Minzesheimer of Gannett News Service "In baseball terms, Calico Joe is...like a pleasant, mid-season afternoon at the ballpark, when the home team slowly rallies and wins."[2] In contrast to the typical Grisham novel that is "full of twists and turns and tension", this novel is "a sweet, simple story" according to The Washington Post's Steven V. Roberts.[3] Roberts describes the novel as a fable with a moral that "good can come out of evil; it’s never too late to confess your sins and seek forgiveness."[3] The story is also about relationships, such as the Castle brothers', the Father-son Tracey relationship, and the relationship between Joe and his hometown community.[3] According to Glenn C. Altschuler for The Oregonian, Calico Joe "...is not a great baseball novel. But it, too, uses America's national pastime to search for moral and cultural truths."[4] Altschuler notes that "As a ballplayer and as a person, Joe Castle is too good to be true." On the other hand, he also notes that "Warren Tracey, by contrast, is too bad to be interesting."[4] Altschuler opines that the ending "isn't all that credible".[4]
