FINDING A GIRL IN AMERICA
by Andre Dubus Godine; 183 pages; $10.95
About halfway through this collection of ten short stories and a novella, a Class C minor league baseball player named Rick Stanley hits a home run: "It would happen again, in other ball parks, in other seasons; and if Stanley had been able to cause it instead of having it happen to him, he would be in the major leagues." Author Andre Dubus, 43, specializes in such people, interested but hapless spectators of their own lives. Although many of his characters are physically rooted in New England mill towns, they...