High school senior Lazarus Weathers wants out of the run-down trailer park where he lives with his mother and brother. When he receives an invitation to move in with a well-off family and pitch for a high-profile high school baseball team on the other side of town, it's his chance to impress major-league scouts and maybe become a professional baseball player. But it also means leaving his family behind. As his brother gets sucked into the trailer park's drug world, Laz has to choose between being a star pitcher and being there for his family.
In a small Iowa town in 1952, eleven-year-old Charlie Nebraska, whose father died in the Korean War, learns the meaning of both racism and heroism when he befriends Luther Peale, a young man who once played for the old Negro Baseball League.
In 1942 after the Japanese bomb Pearl Harbor, twelve-year-old Harry Yakamoto and his family are forced to move to an internment camp where they must learn to survive in the desert of California under the watch of armed guards. Includes section about the treatment of Japanese Americans during World War II.
This handsome guide to the language of baseball decodes the hilarious, clever phrases that pepper commentary about the sport. Packed with witty explanations of everything from "duster" and "rubber arm" to "up the elevator," this ballpark lexicon plays on a nostalgic love for the national pastime while covering ground from baseball's beginnings to today. This humorous mix of definitions and anecdotes is the perfect gift for both lifelong baseball fans and rookies working up the ranks.
"A look at the life and legacy of Jackie Robinson, the man who broke the color barrier in major league baseball, and became an American hero."--Publisher.
