Dimished Capacity by Sherwood Kiraly, author of three other novels including California Rush, Big Babies and Who's Hot, Who's Not, is a humorous story about an unlikely trio who hatch a plan to sell a rare baseball card, and is the basis for the motion picture starring Matthew Broderick, Alan Alda, and Virginia Madsen.

The townsfolk once voted him the strangest man in Missouri, but he turned the honor down, claiming it was "just a popularity contest." He has baited hooks connected to the keys of an old typewriter by the side of the Mississippi, so the...