Stealing Home: Jackie Robinson: Against the Odds [Hardcover]

Robert Burleigh (Author), Mike Wimmer (Illustrator)

Book Description

Man on third. Two outs. The pitcher eyes the base runner, checks for the sign. The fans in the jammed stadium hold their breath. Flapping his outstretched arms like wings, number 42 leads off again. It is September 1955, game one of the World Series, the Yankees versus the Dodgers, and Jackie Robinson is about to do the unbelievable. Attempt to steal home. In a World Series game. To race a baseball thrown from the pitcher's mound and win! Is it possible? Yes, it is -- if you are Jackie Robinson!

Editorial Reviews

From School Library Journal

Grade 1–4—This well-intentioned picture book tribute is marred by a disjointed narrative. While double-page paintings capture the intense excitement of the play as the Hall of Famer steals home, a few lines of free verse detail the action. Meanwhile, along with each painting and verse, a box of text introduces an aspect of Robinson's life and career. One, for example, briefly limns the segregated nature of baseball in 1946; others focus on the athlete's base-running skills, his family, his rookie season, his best season, the Brooklyn Dodgers' rivalry with the Yankees, and his early life. These snippets of information (two to three paragraphs each) are superimposed on facsimiles of old baseball cards; in small-sized font against a slate-colored background, they are frustratingly hard to read. Some of the factoids are interesting and Wimmer's oils are attractive and well done, but with its lack of a cohesive narrative, this effort falls short. Baseball fans will welcome the book despite its flaws; but for straightforward introductions, steer readers to Carin T. Ford's Jackie Robinson: Hero of Baseball (Enslow, 2006) or Sharon Robinson's Jackie's Nine: Jackie Robinson's Values to Live By (Scholastic, 2001).—Marilyn Taniguchi, Beverly Hills Public Library, CA
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist

Burleigh's text features vivid, sharp images ("number 42 dances his odd pigeon-toed dance off third base") that describe Jackie Robinson stealing home during a game in the 1955 World Series. In addition to the main story line, each two-page spread includes biographical and historical snippets, boxed and in smaller type, about Robinson's complicated and often difficult life--his years as a multisport star at UCLA, his role as the first African American in major league baseball. This pairing of the poetic main story and the expository backstory is potentially awkward for adults presenting the book to kids, but even the biographical segments are written with muscular energy. Wimmer's oil paintings are simply gorgeous--rich, thickly painted close-ups of pitcher, runner, batter, crowd (he chooses to focus mostly on black faces in the stands, which adds a powerful effect). GraceAnne DeCandido
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 32 pages
• Publisher: Simon & Schuster/Paula Wiseman Books (January 9, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0689862768
• ISBN-13: 978-0689862762
• Product Dimensions: 10.1 x 10 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,079,303 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #55 in Books > Biographies & Memoirs > People, A-Z > ( R ) > Robinson, Jackie

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars Does a great job with one long run-on sentence, July 29, 2011

By 

M. Heiss (USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Stealing Home: Jackie Robinson: Against the Odds (Hardcover)

This is a well done book...

...but the biographical information is printed teeny-tiny in a baseball-card-sized plate on the pages. The illustrations and the main text of the book (one lo-o-o-o-o-ong sentence) depict Jackie Robinson stealing home -- which should be impossible, but it became his signature achievement.

Check with your child's teacher. This is more inspirational book than biography.