Fast Pitch
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- $9.99
Publisher Description
From #1 New York Times bestselling author Nic Stone comes a challenging and heartwarming coming-of-age story about a softball player looking to prove herself on and off the field.
Shenice Lockwood, captain of the Fulton Firebirds, is hyper-focused when she steps up to the plate. Nothing can stop her from leading her team to the U12 fast-pitch softball regional championship. But life has thrown some curveballs her way.
Strike one: As the sole team of all-brown faces, Shenice and the Firebirds have to work twice as hard to prove that Black girls belong at bat.
Strike two: Shenice’s focus gets shaken when her great-uncle Jack reveals that a career-ending—and family-name-ruining—crime may have been a setup.
Strike three: Broken focus means mistakes on the field. And Shenice’s teammates are beginning to wonder if she’s captain-qualified.
It's up to Shenice to discover the truth about her family’s past—and fast—before secrets take the Firebirds out of the game forever.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Black girl magic hits a home run in Stone's (Clean Getaway) latest novel. Twelve-year-old Shenice "Lightning" Lockwood has been playing "base-related ball" her whole life—just like her father, grandfather, and great-grandfather before her. Now captain of the Fulton Firebirds, the first all-Black team in Georgia's Dixie Youth Softball Association, her goal is to lead her team to the championship and send a message that "girls like us do belong on the field." When that goal sees a setback, Shenice's father gives her Great-Grampy JonJon's mitt "as a reminder of what's in you." But the item that truly captures her attention in JonJon's off-limits trunk is his leather journal—and his story. When Shenice meets her great-uncle Jack, JonJon's brother, in an assisted living facility, she learns that her great-grandfather was almost one of the first Black MLB players—until he was kicked out of the league for a theft that Jack insists JonJon was framed for. Considering her family legacy, Shenice struggles to maintain her focus as captain while following Jack's clues to clear JonJon's name. Fast-paced and heartwarming, this story captures the essence of familial duty through a warm family dynamic and a child protagonist with genuine agency. Ages 8–12.
