Showing results by narrator "Johnny Heller" in All Categories

Patrick Lowe has always loved imagining his own fantastic stories of brave knights and dragons. Unfortunately, every time he tries to read, his father’s voice pops up in his head telling him he’s stupid, and the words on the page suddenly become too blurry to see. By his fifth grade year, Patrick has stopped trying to read altogether. He doesn’t think he needs any friends, but his new next-door neighbor Celina just won’t leave him alone.

After facing a flamethrowing Little League hurler, 13-year-old “Stosh” Stoshack time-travels back to 1942 to join Satchel on an unforgettable road trip to the Negro League World Series. With nobody out and the series on the line, Stosh watches as Old Satch intentionally walks three straight batters, waves all but his catcher off the field, and then challenges the best hitter in baseball.

Joe Stoshack lives for baseball. He knows everything there is to know about the game—except how to play well. His specialty is striking out. Stosh feels like a real loser, and when he takes a low-paying job cleaning a bunch of junk out of his neighbor's attic, he feels even worse—until he comes across a little piece of cardboard that takes his breath away. His heart is racing. His brain is racing. He can hardly believe his eyes. Stosh has stumbled upon a T-206 Honus Wagner—the most valuable baseball card in the world!

When Wiley and Grampa courageously set out upon Lake Putrid to catch the infamous Moby Fizz, they'll brave more disgusting dangers - particularly Gramma's homemade pimento and cheese - than Grampa's trusty fishing net can handle.

Fans are cheering Troy Soos for his absorbing mysteries packed with old-time baseball lore. In The Cincinnati Red Stalkings, he whisks you back to the summer of 1921 when life was simpler and the world was a safer place - or was it?

Jim & Me finds Stosh and his nemesis Bobby Fuller joining forces to help one of their heroes. Native American baseball legend Jim Thorpe was an Olympic champion - but then lost his medals due to scandal. Now only Stosh and Bobby have the power to change history and give Jim the legacy he deserved.

Thirteen-year-old Mic Parsons is surrounded by weird people. He has a deaf and blind sister who clunks noisily around the house. And Vern Chortle has moved onto his street. A truly strange kid who wears outrageous socks and a beeper watch, Vern has decided Mic should be his best friend. Mic has a bigger problem, though. He’s got to pass math, or his parents won’t let him try out for the baseball team.

When Jake follows his grandfather Taw to the Hopi reservation where Taw was born, he finds trouble. The Hopi are upset about a Mexican wolf. Since there are no wolves in Arizona, some believe it's a ghost. Others want to kill it because it's hunting their livestock. Jake is sure of one thing: he must help his grandfather save the lobo. It could be the last of its kind.

Sixteen-year-old Travis is looking for a good time. A vacation in Mexico with his mother and two siblings might cramp his style, but he’s willing to take that risk for a chance to cruise the beaches. Some things keep gnawing at him, though, like leaving Dad crying at the airport, and watching Mom disappear with a mysterious ‘headache’ every afternoon that they’re in Mexico.

High-school senior Patrick Sheridan has the job of his dreams. He’s left his small Texas town for Los Angeles, where he’s a television reporter on Classroom Direct. As his face is beamed into schools across the country, Patrick becomes a celebrity. The pay is great, his wardrobe is lavish, and soon Patrick’s mailbox overflows with fan mail.

Ever since his mother died and his father went to Brazil for a scientific expedition, 14-year-old Jacob Lansa has been staying with his grandfather in Poughkeepsie. He longs to join his father and help him set up a jaguar preserve in the rain forest, but he can't miss school. When his father invites him down over spring break, he jumps at the chance.

Jacob Lansa is an ordinary New York kid - riding his bike, fixing himself snacks after school, and anxiously awaiting letters from his father in Kenya. Then, suddenly, his mother is killed in a terrible accident. Pushed aside by his stepfather, Jacob makes an impulsive decision to set out on his own to find his father. In Africa, with minimal supplies and only his trusty mountain bike for transportation, Jacob faces wild lions, terrible grassland fires, and vicious elephant poachers.

When Joe Stoshack holds a baseball card, his hand starts to tingle. And if the card is old enough - like the rare Babe Ruth card his father gives him for his 12th birthday - Joe can travel back in time! One of baseball's greatest mysteries is whether or not the Babe actually called his fifth-inning home run in the 1932 World Series. With Joe's new card, he can solve that mystery once and for all. But when Joe and his father travel back in time, they find more than the answer to a baseball mystery.

What can beer teach us about biology, history, and the natural world? From ancient Mesopotamian fermentation practices to the resurgent American craft brewery, authors Rob DeSalle and Ian Tattersall peruse the historical record and traverse the globe for engaging and often surprising stories about beer. They explain how we came to drink beer, what ingredients combine to give beers their distinctive flavors, how beer's chemistry works at the molecular level, and how various societies have regulated the production and consumption of beer.

In The Politics of Petulance Alan Wolfe argues the core of our problem isn't Trump himself - it's that we are mired in an age of political immaturity. That immaturity is not grounded in any one ideology, nor is it a function of age or education. In 2016, many Americans were offered tantalizingly simple answers to complicated problems, and, like children being offered a lunch of Pop Rocks and Coke, they reflexively - and mindlessly - accepted. The good news is that we've been here before. Wolfe reminds us that we know how to grow up and face down Trump and other demagogues. 

When ex-con and novelist JA Kingsley loses everything he's ever cared about, including his wife and teenage daughter, he abandons his home in order to start anew, write a new book, and, most of all, restart his fractured life. Traveling to the Adirondack Mountains, he checks himself into The Loon Lake Inn, a peaceful lake-side resort. For a brief moment, he feels at peace with himself and a world that has seemingly turned its back on him. But what he doesn’t expect is the lurid attraction that ignites between him and the wife of the owner of the Loon Lake Inn.

In New York's Catskill Mountains before the American Revolution, a Dutch American villager named Rip Van Winkle falls asleep and wakes up 20 years later without realizing how much time has passed. Unaware that the Revolutionary War has taken place, he must come to terms with the changes he encounters.

Will Rogers - pithy, political, and plainspoken - was one of the finest entertainers of his generation. As a great American humorist, it was considered an honor to be made fun of by him. By the time of his death in 1935, he had traveled the globe three times, written some four thousand articles, and was one of America's highest-paid film stars. He began his act in Vaudeville by saying, "All I know is what I read in the papers," while idly swinging a lasso he used for rope tricks.

In Roadside Americans, Jack Reid traces the rise and fall of hitchhiking, offering vivid accounts of life on the road and how the act of soliciting rides from strangers, and the attitude toward hitchhikers in American society, evolved over time in sync with broader economic, political, and cultural shifts. In doing so, Reid offers insight into significant changes in the United States amid the decline of liberalism and the rise of the Reagan Era.

With examples from the more than 130,000 campaigns developed by mobile marketing leader Hipcricket, Mobilized Marketing breaks down how brands of all sizes have performed in their mobile efforts, why some have failed, and how others bravely turned to mobile.