In the late 1940s, the minor league Milwaukee Brewers are foundering yet again and manager Arthur Murphy is desperate. When he sees 17-year-old Mickey Tussler throwing apples into a barrel, he knows he has found the next pitching phenom. But not everyone is so hopeful. Mickey’s autism - a disorder still not truly understood even today - has alienated the boy from the world, and he is berated by other players and fans. Mickey faces immense trials in the harsh and competitive world of baseball while coping with the challenges inherent to his disorder.

The Natural, Bernard Malamud's first novel, published in 1952, is also the first - and some would say still the best - novel ever written about baseball. In it Malamud, usually appreciated for his unerring portrayals of postwar Jewish life, took on very different material - the story of a superbly gifted "natural" at play in the fields of the old daylight baseball era - and invested it with the hardscrabble poetry, at once grand and altogether believable, that runs through all his best work.

Tristan will need to forge an uneasy alliance between his superpowered teammates if he hopes to survive. Can Tristan rally his teammates behind him, unlock his abilities, and discover what it means to be truly special before it's too late?

A star-studded cast of readers present unabridged tales of horror and suspense from Stephen King's classic best-selling short story collection.

It’s the summer of 1973, and Joe Castle is the boy wonder of baseball, the greatest rookie anyone has ever seen. The kid from Calico Rock, Arkansas, dazzles Chicago Cubs fans as he hits home run after home run, politely tipping his hat to the crowd as he shatters all rookie records.

A rising star in the weightless combat sport of zeroboxing, Carr "the Raptor" Luka dreams of winning the championship title. Recognizing his talent, the Zero Gravity Fighting Association assigns Risha, an ambitious and beautiful Martian colonist, to be his brandhelm - a personal marketing strategist. It isn't long before she's made Carr into a popular celebrity and stolen his heart along the way.

A disastrous error on the field sends five lives into a tailspin in this award-nominated tale about love, life, and baseball. At Westish College, a small school on the shore of Lake Michigan, baseball star Henry Skrimshander seems destined for big league stardom. But when a routine throw goes disastrously off course, the fates of five people are upended. As the season counts down to its climactic final game, these five are forced to confront their deepest hopes, anxieties, and secrets. In the process they forge new bonds, and help one another find their true paths.

Life in the small southern town of Sutter's Cross is comfortable and predictible until the homeless man shows up. Disheveled and bruised, he seems to have no past. But almost immediatly, the town is touched by his quiet presence. Who is this stranger? Sutter's Cross, a Main Selection of the Crossings Book Club, sheds new light on the nature of God's guidance.

Reporting for his first day as a Boston Red Sox player, Mickey Rawlings discovers a faceless body in the empty stadium. When police name him as their suspect, he knows he must clear his name or give up baseball and his freedom. But nameless foes are trying to silence him with warnings that become increasingly dangerous. A member of the Society for American Baseball Research, Troy Soos creates delightfully authentic ballplayers and places them in believable, colorful settings.

In 1940, at just 15 years old, small-town baseball star Gene Moore was signed to the Brooklyn Dodgers, who saw in him the potential to become one of the great catchers of all time. Before that could happen, though, WWII intervened. Gene's story, a surprising paean to the power and humanity of a game, is told here by his son, a first-time author who exhibits the confidence and pacing of a pro.

Kurt is a talented but emotionally damaged football player. Danny is a rising star on the gymnastics team, an outsider in a high school where the football team rules. But the two form an unlikely friendship, and when one member of the gym team is viciously assaulted by the quarterback and his cronies, Kurt rises to his defense and challenges the entrenched stereotypes of high-school sports. This is that rare book that authentically captures the voices, fierce loyalties, and harsh justice of teenage boys.

Joe Stoshack may be an awkward kid, but he knows baseball - and baseball cards. Since he was seven, he has been collecting them. So when his mother tells him he can earn five dollars by cleaning out an old lady's attic, Joe dreams of the cards he can buy.

In his third book on baseball, John Ritter takes the reader to Dillontown where, through a series of events, the fate of the town rests on the outcome of a baseball game. Tom and a newcomer, Cruz, convince a former Major-League Baseball player to coach the team. The team prepares for the big day by using unorthodox training methods. While the team wins the game, it still takes an unusual set of circumstances to save the town.

Jalen DeLuca loves baseball. Unfortunately his dad can't afford to keep him on the travel team. His dad runs a diner and makes enough to cover the bills, but there isn't enough to cover any extras. So Jalen decides to take matters into his own hands, and he sneaks into the home of the New York Yankees' star second baseman, James Yager, and steals a couple of balls from his personal batting cage. He knows that if he can sell them, he'll be able to keep himself on the team.

Shoeless Joe, the soul-stirring novel on which the movie Field of Dreams is based, is more than just another baseball story. Kinsella captures the spiritual dimension that baseball represents for its most determined devotees in this tale of love and the power of dreams to make people come alive.