Deborah Hopkinson

Alta Weiss was born to play base­ball, sim­ple as that. From the age of two, when she hurls a corn­cob at a pesky tom­cat, folks in her small Ohio town know one thing for sure: She may be a girl, but she’s got some arm.

When she’s sev­en­teen, Alta hears about a semi­pro team, the Inde­pen­dents. Here’s her big chance! But one look at Alta’s long skirts tells Coach all he needs to know — girls can’t play baseball!

Faster than you can say “strike out!,” Alta’s con­vinced him to give her a chance. And so with the crowd buzzing and the big game up to her, Alta steps up to the pitcher’s mound, deter­mined to prove every­body wrong.

Inspired by the life of pio­neer­ing female base­ball play­er Alta Weiss, and dra­ma­tized by Ter­ry Widen­er’s bold illus­tra­tions, Girl Won­der tells the unfor­get­table sto­ry of a true Amer­i­can original.