New York: Viking, 1983. dj. Hardcover first edition - African American writer's first book, a comic novel about a baseball player, an elephant he wins, and a 9 year old runaway who adopts them both. The three friends hole up in a cabin and outfox all intruders, including the local sheriff, a drug smuggler, and a taxidermist with his eye on Renoir, the elephant. Although Everett has received many awards - including an award for lifetime achievement by the National Book Critics Circle - and the Washington Post described him as one of the most adventurously experimental of modern American novelists. he remains not nearly as well-known or read as he should be - although the movie "American Fiction" based on his novel "Erasure" is beginning to change that. 171 pp. ISBN: 0-670-681105.