Strike Three You Re Dead

An Edgar Award Finalist Lenny Norbeck is a die-hard baseball lover. Unfortunately, he's no player himself (according to him, he's "the worst there ever was.") But he'd make a heck of an announcer. He gets a lot of practice sitting with his best friends, Mike and Other Mike, watching Phillies games from their lawn couch—a sweet outdoor TV arrangement Mike's dad hooked them up with. Being a real announcer is his dream, and he gets his chance to prove himself when he enters an "Armchair Announcer" contest and wins. The prize: he gets to be the broadcaster, live, for one inning at a real Phillies game. The game goes very wrong, though. Before Lenny gets to do his inning, a young, promising pitcher fresh out of the minors literally drops dead on the mound. The official verdict is that he died of a heart attack, but Lenny has a hunch there's something more going on. So he and the Mikes set out to investigate. The suspects are many, and though the trio barks up the wrong tree a few times, they are always right on the heels of the real killer. . . .

Lenny Norbeck and his friends The Mikes set out to investigate the suspiciousdeath of a young pitcher at a Philadelphia Phillies game.

An Edgar Award Finalist Lenny Norbeck is a die-hard baseball lover. Unfortunately, he's no player himself (according to him, he's "the worst there ever was.") But he'd make a heck of an announcer. He gets a lot of practice sitting with his best friends, Mike and Other Mike, watching Phillies games from their lawn couch—a sweet outdoor TV arrangement Mike's dad hooked them up with. Being a real announcer is his dream, and he gets his chance to prove himself when he enters an "Armchair Announcer" contest and wins. The prize: he gets to be the broadcaster, live, for one inning at a real Phillies game. The game goes very wrong, though. Before Lenny gets to do his inning, a young, promising pitcher fresh out of the minors literally drops dead on the mound. The official verdict is that he died of a heart attack, but Lenny has a hunch there's something more going on. So he and the Mikes set out to investigate. The suspects are many, and though the trio barks up the wrong tree a few times, they are always right on the heels of the real killer. . . .

In this depression-era noir series debut, a politician's murder leads a Chicago crime reporter to a conspiracy involving the Cubs' race for the pennant. Chicago, 1938. A new mayoral candidate runs on a promise to stomp out organized crime. When he's gunned down, it seems clear that the mob cast their ballot with bullets. But Chicago Tribune reporter Steve "Snap" Malek senses more to the story. And his hunch is confirmed by none other than former syndicate kingpin Al Capone. Incurring his editors' anger, Malek ranges far beyond his beat, plunging headlong into a maverick investigation that soon spins beyond his control. In the process, he crosses paths with actress Helen Hayes, future Mayor Richard J. Daley, and pitching great Dizzy Dean, who was recently traded to the Cubs. And while Dizzy may be essential to a Cubs pennant win, he may also be the key to Malek's very survival.

Guy Langman can't be bothered with much. But when his friend Anoop wants Guy to join the forensics club with him in the (possibly misguided) hopes of impressing some girls, Guy thinks why not. They certainly aren't expecting to find a real dead body on the simulated crime scene they're assigned to collect evidence from. But after some girlish, undignified screaming, the two realize it is indeed a body. Which means they have stumbled across a real, dead murder victim. Meanwhile, Guy has been looking into the past of his father—a larger-than-life character who recently passed away. He was much older than Guy's mom, and had a whole past Guy never even knew about. Could his father's past and the dead body be linked? Does Guy want to know? He's going to need all his newfound forensics skills to find out. . . .

Lenny, Mike, and Other Mike are back in school for the glory that is seventh grade, and this year, Mike is determined to make catcher on the middle-school team. When Mike's hard work pays off and he wins the coveted postition, Lenny is a little jealous, but he'll settle for being the team's unofficial announcer. The team has a brilliant new pitcher, Hunter Ashwell, and though he's a bit of a jerk, he and Mike have a great pitcher/catcher dynamic that could make the team champions. But things take a strange turn when Hunter's perfect pitching streak goes downhill, and Lenny suspects foul play—specifically, someone stealing Mike's catcher signals. But who could be responsible, and why?

"Dust Bowl refugee Gloria Mae Willard finds herself uprooted and working on a California peach orchard, where she tries to join the secret, all-boys baseball team that she's desperate to play on"--

In 1881, the scrappy, rough-and-tumble baseball team in a California mining town enlists the help of a quick-witted twelve-year-old orphan and the notorious outlaw Billy the Kid to win a big game against the National League Champion Chicago White Stockings. Prequel to: The boy who saved baseball.