New Perspectives and Appreciation

I am a fair-weather sports fan, particularly when it comes to team sports. I joke sometimes that I might have been adopted as I seem to lack the sport fan gene that my parents have when activities, both in and out of the home, must revolve around the times of the broadcast of a Vikings football game, or Minnesota (MN) Gopher basketball or football game, or MN Twins game. If the games are inaccessible via television, the radio voices will follow my parents from room to room on their handheld radios.

During high school, the only reason I attended football or basketball games was to perform as a flag twirler with the marching and pep bands. I loved performing with my silent (nonspeaking) activity of swirls and twirls, tosses and flows of color to the band music or piped in songs. The main reason I started watching baseball for a relatively short period of life was because it was impossible to not get sucked into the excitement of the MN Twins playing toward and in the 1987 and 1991 World Series games. Twins Fever was contagious throughout the state, affecting me for awhile. And then, it left.

When I look for books to read, generally, if a book has a sports theme, I reflexively feel disinterest. I don’t mean to close myself off automatically, but it happens. It also happens that sometimes when I take a chance on a story, the author presents the perspective that connects with me.

Here in MN, we have the Maud Hart Lovelace Award. According to the MN Youth Reading Awards website,

 “The Maud Hart Lovelace Book Award is a children's read and vote book award.  Its purpose is to encourage recreational reading among school age children.

Nominated titles are works of fiction of recognized quality selected by independent regional reading groups.”

There are two divisions. Division I for grades 3-5, and Division II for grades 6-8. Some books cross both divisions.Today's book is a crossover.

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Soar Written by Joan Bauer (c) 2016 Puffin Books, an imprint of Penguin Random House, LLC (Publisher)

I knew from the cover image and the synopsis on the back cover that the book had to do with baseball and a male protagonist. The baseball-thing led me to feel iffy; however, even though I’m not working in a media center this year, I set a goal to still try and read as many of the nominees as I can before the spring voting. My last post featured “A Night Divided”, a Division II book.

Soar, for me, is a true example of a “don’t judge a book by its cover” story. The main character, Jeremiah (approximately 12 years old--but you need to read the book to learn about the approximation factor) eats, drinks, sleeps, and breathes baseball. Unfortunately, he cannot play the sport. Being a heart transplant recipient limits one's physical activities, but for Jeremiah it places no restrictions on his desire to coach and manage a team. It places no restrictions on his ability to exude positivity and a sense of humor. And, when his father receives a consulting gig offer, Jeremiah pleads to join him for the two months in the town of Hillcrest, where baseball is life.

After receiving approval from his doctors, Jeremiah and his father move to Hillcrest. The people there live and breathe baseball thanks to the multi-year successes of the local high school team. But, when a tragedy strikes the team's star pitcher and then a scandal hits the team, many in the town wish to shun baseball for good. 

Enter Jeremiah. He may not be able to play baseball, and there may not be a current team at the middle school level, but through perseverance, a belief in the sport, a belief in the leadership and words of legendary coaches, and a belief in the kids who still have a desire to play the game, Jeremiah is determined to build a middle school team and bring baseball back to the people of Hillcrest for reasons that go beyond winning alone. 

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I loved this book! Joan Bauer developed well-rounded characters possessing distinct individual qualities involving their personalities, motivations, quirkiness (I love quirkiness), and heart. While reading, I recognized an emotional connection I had to the environment and characters central to the story. They touched me, from Jeremiah himself, to the local rabbi, to the robot who resides in Jeremiah's home, to Franny who lives next door with her mother, brother, and her grandfather known as El Grande, to Benny, the boy who has a cognitive disability and a full heart for baseball regardless of any scandal. Being a part of Jeremiah's community is definitely a world I could live in. The iffiness I felt toward the book initially, because of the baseball component, faded within the first few pages as I fell in love with Jeremiah's character. Told via present tense, first person point-of-view, Jeremiah's words, throughout, evoked laughter and sadness within me. More than anything, though, they evoked hope. Jeremiah even enriched my fair-weather love for baseball. There is something I admire about people who not only play the game for the love of the sport first, but also demonstrate their passion as they play.

Getting a new perspective,

today and tomorrow,

~Tamara