{"product_id":"safe-at-home-isbn-9780142414606","title":"Safe at Home","description":"\u003cb\u003eFrom #1\u003c\/b\u003e \u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003eNew York Times\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e \u003cb\u003ebestseller Mike Lupica!\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNick Crandall feels like he doesn't belong anywhere. He doesn't fit in with his new foster parents. They don't know the first thing about sports - and he's not exactly the model student they want him to be. It's only a matter of time until they realize he's not the right kid for them. And Nick certainly doesn't belong playing varsity baseball. He's only twelve years old! His teammates want a catcher their own age. But Nick needs to prove that he belongs - to his parents, to his team, and to himself.\u003cb\u003ePraise for the Comeback Kids:\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e“Lupica portrays the action clearly and vividly, with a real sense of the excitement and unpredictable nature of the games. These are worthy additions to collections seeking to draw in middle-grade boys with an enthusiasm for athletics.” –\u003ci\u003eSchool Library Journal\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e“These should score big with middle-graders looking for alternatives to Matt Christopher's titles.” –\u003ci\u003ePublisher’s Weekly \u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e“This title is a good choice for reluctant readers with a background in baseball.” –\u003ci\u003eSchool Library Journal\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cb\u003eMike Lupica \u003c\/b\u003eis the author of multiple bestselling books for young readers, including \u003ci\u003eQB 1\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eHeat, Travel Team, Million-Dollar Throw, and The Underdogs. \u003c\/i\u003eHe has carved out a niche as the sporting world’s finest storyteller. Mike lives in Connecticut with his wife and their four children. When not writing novels, \u003cb\u003eMike Lupica \u003c\/b\u003ewrites for New York's \u003ci\u003eDaily News,\u003c\/i\u003e appears on ESPN's \u003ci\u003eThe Sports Reporters \u003c\/i\u003eand hosts \u003ci\u003eThe Mike Lupica Show \u003c\/i\u003eon ESPN Radio. You can visit Mike Lupica at mikelupicabooks.com\u003cbr\u003e \u003cb\u003e1\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003eMore than anything, Nick Crandall’s real family had always been baseball.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003eHe’d always felt that way about the teams he’d played on, since his first T-ball team. And he felt that way about the teams in the majors he followed, usually the ones with the best catchers, because Nick was a catcher, too.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003eBaseball was the only thing that made Nick feel like he really belonged. There were a lot of reasons why he loved baseball season, but that was the biggest.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003eMaybe everybody else on junior varsity at the Hayworth School, all the other sixth and seventh-graders on the team, looked at the calendar and thought the school year was coming to an end.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003eNot Nick.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003eAs far as he was concerned, everything was just beginning.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003eSchool baseball was for the spring, and that was his only team in the spring, because Paul and Brenda Crandall had one rule about sports: one team per season. Even that was all right with Nick. He got to play school ball every day except on the weekends, and he could look forward to playing in their town’s summer Little League from the end of June into August.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003eSo when he looked at the calendar, all he could see was baseball, practically all the way until school started again in the fall.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003eIt was the first week of tryouts for JV, even though hardly anybody thought of them as tryout tryouts, because everybody who came out made the team. Some guys did get cut off varsity, made up of eighth- and ninth-graders, depending on how many came out. But even those guys, no matter how old they were, got moved down to JV if they still wanted to play.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003eNobody moved up, though.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003eYou didn’t get to play varsity at Hayworth until you were in eighth. Nobody was sure if it was an official written-down rule. But if you played sports at Hayworth, and everybody had to play at least one, you knew that’s how things were done.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003eNick didn’t care. No way did he care. He was in no rush to play varsity, anyway. The varsity catcher, Bobby Mazzilli, was graduating with the rest of his class in June. So in Nick’s mind, a mind filled with baseball stuff the way his desk drawers were filled with baseball cards and magazines, next year he had a good shot at being varsity catcher.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003eThat was no sure thing, of course, even though things seemed to be set up just right for him. Because more than anything he knew about baseball, Nick knew this:\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003eThere were no sure things in your life.","brand":"Viking Books for Young Readers","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46302295195877,"sku":"NP9780142414606","price":7.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9780142414606.jpg?v=1742926955","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/products\/safe-at-home-isbn-9780142414606","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}