Andrew S. Hughes | Jan. 26, 2014 | South Bend Tribune
Sayers is a professor of creative writing and literature and the current chair of Notre Dame's Department of English.
Valerie Sayers grew up a fan of the New York Yankees — in Beaufort, S.C., in the 1950s and ’60s.
“It was certainly a way to distinguish myself,” she says. “It was a quirky interest for a girl. I really liked statistics, and I really liked guys, so that worked. But I am so not like my sons or my brother in terms of the breadth, depth and specificity of my knowledge.”
Perhaps, if the subject is baseball in general, but Sayers made herself an expert on one Yankee, Joe DiMaggio, for her sixth novel, 2013’s “The Powers.”
“Baseball certainly propels it,” she says, “but I don’t think it’s a classic baseball novel in the way people looking for them think of them.”