Book Review: Just Cole from Mankato
Just Cole from Mankato. Jay Grochowski, Self-Published, January 1, 2022, Paperback and eBook, 340 pages.
Reviewed by Jose Nateras.
After the release of his 2020 debut novel, Kelli’s Pine, novelist Jay Grochowski wasted little time before continuing the story of the Blackburn family with his sophomore endeavor, Just Cole from Mankato. While Kelli’s Pine centered on the patriarch of the Blackburn clan, Eddie, the follow-up novel appropriately follows the journey of Eddie’s son, Cole. Taking after his mother, Kelli, Cole was also diagnosed with social anxiety disorder, making his attention-grabbing career as a star baseball player destined for the major leagues all the more fraught.
Grochowski is a graduate of Indiana University’s school of journalism and, during his time there, he was the captain of the baseball team and would go on to be a college baseball coach. Just Cole from Mankato serves as a perfect example of a novelist writing what he knows. Grochowski does a great job unpacking the interior life of a college baseball player taking his first steps on the road to the minor leagues with aspirations for the majors. He’s able to tap into the relationships between teammates and the pressures that come along with following your dreams.
Stylistically, Grochowski is able to provide an intimate and thorough look at the life of this young man as he navigates his path toward building a satisfying life. There’s something about Grochowski’s work that seems to transcend time. Despite references to TikTok and a story that culminates in 2022, Just Cole from Mankato feels a part of an older literary tradition. Though Cole is in his early twenties, he feels like an old soul. The upbringing Cole describes back in Mankato, Minnesota, reads with a sense of Rockwellian nostalgia.
Furthermore, perhaps due to his time studying journalism, Grochowski’s writing style is both economic and comprehensive. He moves through Cole’s life and memories with swift detail akin to that of an expert biographer. This allows for emotion and drama to unfold simply through the context Grochowski establishes, which ultimately serves a story devoid of villains and more concerned with how a life is made up of a long line of choices. As readers follow Cole’s journey, Grochowski is able to show how all of those choices, as well as the choices of his father before him, connect the various people in his life.
Just Cole from Mankato feels like an intimate conversation with a surprisingly fascinating stranger. At first glance, this stranger might seem like your run-of-the-mill young man from the Midwest, but the more he reveals about his life, the more he proves true the old adage: Still waters run deep. The simple complications that come with relationships—whether with family members, friends, or lovers—and the sacrifices made for loved ones imbue simple places and things with profound meaning—a quiet pier in rural Minnesota, a ribbon, a kiss on the forehead. The mundane is transformed into the invaluable.
With a huge cast of characters, a lot of heart and simple humanity, Just Cole from Mankato paints a masterful portrait of a young man first introduced in Kelli’s Pine. This portrait serves as a reflection on life in general, exploring the idea that no one is “just” anything; you don’t have to be a millionaire baseball player for your life to have meaning.