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It's the winners we remember in baseball's most dramatic episodes. Bobby Thomson homers into the left-field stands in the ninth inning to beat Brooklyn and give the Giants the 1951 National League pennant. The Mets come from far back in 1969 to win the pennant and the World Series.
But baseball being a game of inches, it's often a fine line between victory and defeat. Losing is unexpected, unpredictable, frequently a consequence of fickle fate: the slider that wasn't far enough outside; the missed tag at home plate; the line drive that just sliced foul.
John Kuenster, the editor of Baseball Digest and executive editor of Century Publishing Company, replays baseball's 15 most thrilling games offering a fresh slant that can only be described as Baseball's Most Agonizing Defeats.
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The New York Times: "In ''Heartbreakers,'' John Kuenster, editor of Baseball Digest, has collected 15 legendary playoff and World Series losses from the last half-century, beginning with the 1951 playoff between the Brooklyn Dodgers and the New York Giants, which, of course, ended with Bobby Thomson's shot heard round the world."
Bookpage: "If you're old enough to have been a Brooklyn Dodgers fan, no game was more emblematic of that queasy feeling of having the floor pulled out from under you than the 1951 playoff game with the hated cross-town rival New York Giants. It was the contest in which Bobby Thomson hit his "shot heard 'round the world." One only has to look at the photo of Ralph Branca, the poster boy for bad sports karma, crying on the clubhouse steps, to understand the tremendous ups and downs athletes and fans face on a regular basis. John Kuenster deftly captures this attitude in Heartbreakers: Baseball's Most Agonizing Defeats."
Library Journal: "We tend to remember heartbreaks more vividly than triumphs. Here, Kuenster, editor of that library magazine staple, Baseball Digest, tells the inside story of some great upsets. He deftly includes two teams synonymous with heartbreak: the Boston Red Sox (featuring their near-triumphs of 1975, 1978, and 1986) and the Chicago Cubs (emphasizing their 1969 and 1984 immolations). Kuenster is a great storyteller who relates 15 tales in a captivating and insightful way. True baseball aficionados will enjoy."
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 "When you read Heartbreakers you realize that these players don't run on batteries. You'll like what you read." - former player Joe Garagiola
"The best stories are always about the losers. Heartbreakers is a must for any baseball library." - MLB historian Jerome Holtzman
"It's often said that the best stories in sports are found in the losers' locker room. And when the defeat is especially bitter, the story is often that much richer. In Heartbreakers, John Kuenster lets those who suffered in baseball's most epic defeats know that he feels their pain." - broadcaster Bob Costas
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