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When You Come to a Fork in the Road, Take It!: Inspiration and Wisdom From One of Baseball's Greatest Heroes | 
| Authors: Yogi Berra, Dave Kaplan
Publisher: Hyperion
List Price: $11.00
Buy New: $2.50
You Save: $8.50 (77%)
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Rating:  21 reviews
Sales Rank: 26061
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 192
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.3
Dimensions (in): 7.8 x 5.1 x 0.5
ISBN: 0786887443
Dewey Decimal Number: 796.357092
EAN: 9780786887446
ASIN: 0786887443
Publication Date: May 22, 2002
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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Amazon.com Review
Hall of Fame philosopher Yogi Berra's When You Come to a Fork in the Road, Take It! is another volume of musings and malaprops, and the advice implicit in the title is sound indeed. Just listen: "Throughout life you come to serious forks in the road--decisions," Yogi tells us. "Which path do you choose? Sometimes it's tough. People are always afraid of making the wrong choice." Not Yogi, who explains that tragedy lies in paralysis, not bad choices or regrets, and offers personal examples from on and off the field to prop up his profundity. Like its predecessor, The Yogi Book, Fork is essentially a collection of Yogi's well-traveled observations from out of left field, but it's much more than just déjà vu all over again. Instead of explaining, as he has before, what prompted a particular Yogi-ism or what he was really trying to say, Yogi does his best to go deep. The charm is that Yogi's so guileless, he makes it work--there's sagacity in his simplicity. Each Yogi-ism gets its own short chapter in which Yogi riffs off the phrase to dispense a bit of homespun wisdom and inspiration. "It gets late early out there"--we get old before we're ready, but here's how to cope with it. "If you can't imitate him, don't copy him"--we all need to be true to ourselves. With Yogi's latest career as a successful author, not only ain't it over for him, there's happily no end in sight. --Jeff Silverman
Product Description
Now available in paperback, "it's déjà vu all over again" with another New York Times bestseller -- more than 160,000 copies in print! Three-time MVP and Hall of Famer Yogi Berra hit home runs twice in a row with his two previous books, The Yogi Book and It Ain't Over. Now, his winning streak continues as the celebrated athlete and true American hero speaks about life, baseball, and "the forks in the road." Filled with the baseball legend's inimitable and unwittingly wise aphorisms from "It ain't over till it's over" to "You can't think and hit at the same time," these reflections focus on the valuable lessons he learned on and off the field.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 16 more reviews...
 America's Philosopher King June 22, 2008
When Yogi was 14 and was asked by his teachers, in a parent-teacher meeting called to decide his fate about whether to continue his schooling. In the presence of his parents, his teacher asked: "Don't you know anything?" Yogi's answer was: "I don't even suspect anything." And with that answer, he was allowed to quit school. And as they say, the rest is history.
This book is irreverent "blue collar philosophy" at its level best. Although we all joke about the apparent illogic and skilful logical disconnects and double entendres in Yogi's homespun aphorisms and jokes, they are not all to be dismissed only on their surface meanings alone. Most have a distinct deeper meaning, which if missed, gives the joker (Yogi) the last laugh.
Here, in their fullest glory are some of Yogi's best productions, interspersed between a brief biography of the high and low points of his life. That there were many more high points than low, itself makes one understand who Yogi was: Not just a ballplayer/philosopher, but a warm sunny deeply interesting human being.
Read and enjoy. Five Stars
Make the decision at once and stick with it May 7, 2008
In his famous poem, "The Road Not Taken" when "two roads diverged in a wood," Robert Frost "took the one less traveled by, and that has made all the difference." Yogi Berra, on the other hand, advises that "When You Come to a Fork in the Road, Take It" (the title of the book), and "you shouldn't look back." According to Mr. Berra, the "fork", is any decision.
Drawing from his baseball experience, Mr. Berra tells 40 different "stories" all packed with memorable wisdom and insights. The stories range from commonly cited quotations such as "Slump? I ain't in no slump ... I just ain't hitting," and "It ain't over `til it's over" to less common sayings like "I'd rather be the Yankee catcher than the U.S. President," and "The future ain't what it used to be."
For baseball fans, this little book is a necessary read. Each section (chapter) begins with a photo of defining moments in baseball. This book is inspirational. Read it for keeps.
Amavilah, Author
Modeling Determinants of Income in Embedded Economies
ISBN: 1600210465
Hilarious and pithy wisdom March 19, 2008
Yogi Berra is hilarious.
Each chapter is built around a Yogi-ism, and are delightful to read. A lot of folksy wisdom from this man who fought at Omaha Beach on D-Day AND who played in more World Series than any other baseball player.
The book emphasizes hard work, following your instincts, loyalty to friends, and the importance of laughter, family, and a lot of luck.
Berra was raised on "The Hill" here in St. Louis. I used to play church-league softball at "Berra Park", located a block from his boyhood homesite. His values are good ol' Midwestern, Catholic, and conservative.
Yogi is a national treasure, and he is as proud of American ways of doing things as he is of the Yankees baseball club.
p.s. Do you know how Berra made quite a bit of the money he now has? Baseball? Nope. After baseball, he made some timely investments in bowling alleys and YooHoo chocolate drink!!! He cashed out at the peak of interest in both.
Yogi-isms explained by Yogi October 14, 2007
While the basis of this book is a collection of some of the Yogi-isms, which always contain a great deal of truth, the best part is that Yogi explains his thoughts on each one of them, While he was a great player for a series of great Yankee teams, Berra was always thought of as a bit of a simpleton. His most famous sayings, where he used internal contradictions to make a point, are funny and seem to indicate a lack of knowledge of English and how it is used. However, it is that internal contradiction that makes the point so well. For example, some of the -isms explained in this book are:
*) It gets late early out there
*) We have deep depth
*) Always go to other peoples funerals, otherwise they won't go to yours
*) You can observe a lot by watching
After each of the -isms, Berra explains the context within which he made the statement and reveals a great deal of the history of his life, his thoughts about life in general and the directions that baseball is going. He comes across as a man who came from humble beginnings, yet has never lost contact with those roots and who was always in control of his actions. He harbors no jealousy regarding what modern ballplayers make, although he has some negative words concerning their off the field actions. He is also saddened by the decline in the popularity of young people playing baseball. It is a rare occasion when you see pickup games being played on the sandlots. He also laments the situation in organized youth baseball such as little league. Like all other youth sports, there is a fierce and counter-productive competitiveness that destroys the joy that children have the right to feel when they are playing engaged in sports.
This is a book about and by a man that is close to being the most quoted person in the American society. His phrases are used in many facets of our lives, from sports to politics. Hardly a week goes by when I don't hear one of his phrases and I often use them myself. It was fun to read Yogi's explanations of them.
 Come for the Wisdom, Stay for the Photos February 2, 2005
3 out of 3 found this review helpful
Yogi Berra has learned that when someone offers to publish your book, take it. Make the most of living, it can get late early out there. Better make your book forty chapters, the public may not be hungry for fifty.
More of a look into the thoughts, values and beliefs of the baseball legend than a biography, Yogi keeps things pretty straight. Unapologetic and proud of his life, Yogi is not above owning up to a character flaw or two. If he seems to occasionally contradict himself, he comes across as all the more human. This is certainly preferable to the self-service approach others have taken in this type of book, making it a cut above the "self-help from athletes" genre. Every chapter is titled with a piece of philosophical advice, virtually all from Yogisms or in one case a Dimaggioism. Sometimes the content of a chapter is shoehorned to fit the title, but most of the time they mesh.
The best part of the book are the photos that appear at the beginning of each chapter. Rarely seen family and career photos are incorporated with such gems as Yogi and Phil Rizzuto working during the off season at a men's clothing store. These photos tell more about the Yogi that you didn't know than the text does.
If this review doesn't make you want to read this book, I'm not going to try and stop you. Then again, if these type of books get too popular, no one's going to want to read them anymore.
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