These Baseball Stories Can Help Children in the Game of Life

As the days grow warmer and the skies grow clearer--well, until recently at least--can there be any doubt that the seasons are finally changing? Soon we’ll be welcoming that special time of year that turns a young boy’s (and girl’s) fancy.

But we’re not talking birds and bees here; more like flies and line drives because next week marks the return of that annual rite of spring: baseball season.

The simple, timeless grandeur of the national pastime has provoked some of America’s top essayists, from Roger Angell and Roger Kahn to George Will and George Plimpton. It’s also provided inspiration for hundreds of children’s authors, who find the sport a useful vehicle for teaching the importance of fair play, teamwork and determination.

Among the newest writers to make the connection is Maureen Holohan, a three-time All-Big 10 basketball player at Northwestern University. In January, she released “Left Out” (Broadway Ballplayers Inc., $6.95, 164 pages), the second book in her self-published three-book sports-themed series “The Broadway Ballplayers.”

The paperback series--which also contains the basketball-based “Friday Nights” and the soccer story “Everybody’s Favorite”--features main characters from different ethnic backgrounds who live along Broadway Avenue in an unnamed city. In “Left Out,” 11-year-old Rosalinda “Rosie” Jones proves to everyone she’s one of the best baseball players in the city, but wonders if that will be enough to make her dad proud.

The inspirational, easy-to-read stories are aimed at middle-grade students (about fourth through ninth grades), but carry a message that can’t be confined to age groups. “This is more than just a series of books,” says Holohan, 25, who was a prize-winning journalist in college. “It’s a concept. It’s about giving girls self-esteem and giving them characters they can identify with.”

Holohan says countless studies have shown that the skills learned by competing in sports as a child play a critical role later in life. Society, however, has traditionally dissuaded young girls from sports by suggesting competition was unfeminine, something the Broadway Ballplayers’ series attempts to correct by offering a positive example of girls as athletes.

“You can only benefit from learning how to work with others and overcome obstacles,” Holohan says. “[These books] give girls a voice they never had.”

(For more information on the Broadway Ballplayers series, call [888] LETMEPLAY or consult the Web at https://www.bplayers.com.)

San Diego writer John H. Ritter touches on similar themes in his first novel, “Choosing Up Sides” (Philomel Books, $15.99, 176 pages), a dramatic and inspirational story for middle-grade students to be released next month.

Set in the rural Midwest of the 1920s, the book tells the tale of Luke Bledsoe, a boy who unwittingly discovers he has an uncommon talent for pitching baseballs. Problem is, his strict preacher father forbids him to go to “the devil’s playground” to display that skill, forcing Luke to choose between the expectations that bind him and the freedom to chase his dreams.

Fortunately young Audie’s father shares his son’s love of baseball in “I Remember Papa” (by Helen Ketteman, illustrated by Greg Shed; Dial Books for Young Readers; $15.99, 32 pages), which will also be released in April. A poor Ohio farm boy who dreams of someday seeing a big-league ball game, Audie is awakened one Saturday morning to find his father waiting to take him on a train ride to Cincinnati where the Reds are playing.

Once at the ballpark, Audie has an accident that helps expose a side of his father he will never forget.

Children’s books don’t always have to teach moral lessons or inspire lifelong memories. Sometimes just being fun is enough, which is certainly the case with “There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly” (by Simms Taback; Viking Children’s Books, $14.99, 32 pages). Winner of a 1998 Caldecott Honor for excellence in children’s literature, the book pairs the classic 1940s children’s poem about the hapless old lady with eye-catching artwork of mixed media collages.

Die-cut holes allow young readers to follow the old lady’s progress as her stomach fills with a menagerie of bugs and animals, the last of which is a horse, of course.

Young (and old) readers should have an equally enjoyable time with Tedd Arnold’s riotously witty “Parts” (Dial Books for Young Readers, $14.99, 28 pages), a rhyming tale about a 5-year-old boy who’s convinced he’s falling apart. When he encounters some bellybutton lint, he’s sure his stuffing is coming out, and when his nose starts running he suspects leaking brain cells.

Arnold, creator of the equally humorous “No Jumping on the Bed,” uses pencil and watercolor artwork to trace each new development until the young boy wraps himself in masking tape in an effort to keep himself together.

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Kevin Baxter reviews books for children and young adults every four weeks. Next week: book reviews by Times readers.