Kirby Nickel has grown up in a town that is completely wrapped up in
basketball and their one outstanding basketball claim to fame: Brett
McGrew, who went on to become an NBA star. Now his university is
retiring his number and Kirby's seventh grade team has been invited to
play a scrimmage at half time with McGrew. Only Kirby's team and Kirby
himself have virtually no talent for actually playing basketball. So
their coach decides to try a new technique - practicing in their
underwear. This is supposedly so embarrassing that their basketball
can't be any worse, so they begin trying to actually prove that they can
play.
Kirby's other "secret" is that he is convinced
that Brett McGrew is his father. Kirby's mother is out of the picture
(dead?) and he lives with his grandmother. All of his life, he has been
trying to figure out who is father was and he sets about in the book
trying to amass evidence that it is, indeed Brett McGrew - only he looks
nothing like McGrew - now or when McGrew was younger.
This
isn't a deep book - it is about having confidence in yourself, but it
is entertaining. It will probably appeal to upper elementary school
boys, who are interested in sports, but aren't sure about where they fit
in.
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