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“Out of the
Pocket” by Bill Konigsberg (Dutton Juvenile, $16.99, 9780525479963, for ages
14 and older)
Sports writer Bill Konigsberg became known internationally in 1994 for using
a computer simulation to report on the hypothetical remainder of that year’s
strike-shortened baseball season.
With “Out of the Pocket,” his new crossover novel for teens and adults,
Konigsberg again mixes sports and imagination by asking the question “What
would happen if the star quarterback of a high school football team came out
publicly as gay?” How would it change the sports world, and how, too, would
it change that one young man’s life?
Seventeen-year-old Bobby Framingham is a talented California teenager, one
of the most seriously recruited players in his state. Struggling with the
secret of his sexuality, he looks for someone in whom he can confide: his
long-term girlfriend? his kind but stern coach? his friends and teammates?
or maybe his parents, who seem distracted with problems of their own? Each
possibility carries with it own worries and its own potential to sidetrack
Bobby from his all-important senior season.
Life only becomes more confusing when a local newspaper spills Bobby’s guts
for him, creating a national sensation and making him an unwitting--even
unwilling--overnight celebrity. Bobby can’t give up playing football, or
stop being himself, so now he has to learn to be something new: a gay
football player in the public eye.
“But what if I accept it,” Bobby asks his high school counselor, “but the
world doesn’t?”
His mentor advises him: “I guess all you can do, then, is change the world.”
Review by
Mark David
Bradshaw, October 2008
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