Hometown Legend

July 16, 2001
The author of the blockbuster apocalyptic Left Behind series scores points here in his first novel for Warner's new Christian line, penning a homey, feel-good story about a small town's former championship football team. Athens City, Ala., is gasping for breath—businesses are closing, people are leaving in droves and Athens City High is playing its last football season before the school is consolidated. Assistant coach Cal Sawyer narrates most of the book in a comfortable, rambling drawl. He's raising his teenage daughter, Rachel, alone, while engaged in an uphill battle to keep the American Leather Football Company afloat. When Rachel befriends player Elvis Presley Jackson, she finds herself forced to address questions of faith and loss that she has only glossed over in the past. Jenkins relies more on dialogue than descriptive settings, but his trademark ability to bond readers with characters is in strong evidence here. Loose ends are wrapped up into a happy, made-for-the-big-screen ending—albeit with a bit of a twist—which should appeal to Left Behind readers who enjoy knowing that the end of the story is pretty much a foregone conclusion. The short epilogue, however, is anti-climatic. While there's nothing here that will pull readers out of their comfort zones, this is a pleasing read that should nimbly cross over between the general and Christian markets. (Sept.)Forecast:The Left Behind series hasn't sold 40 million copies for naught—this stand-alone novel will be promoted to the hilt. Print advertising is planned for
USA Today,
People,
Sports Illustrated,
Southern Living and various Christian magazines.
Guideposts plans a direct-mail promotion to 1.6 million homes, and Jenkins Entertainment has filmed a movie version that will have its theatrical release this fall.

July 1, 2001
The coauthor of the inspirational Left Behind series has another life writing about sports: he's the coauthor of Orel Hershiser's pitching memoir, " Out of the Blue "(1989), as well as the author of a fine baseball novel, " The "Rookie (1991). Here he tells a nostalgic football story set in the dying little town of Athens City, Alabama, home of local football hero Cal Sawyer, a widower and conscientious father of a teenage daughter, Rachel. He's also the owner of the American Leather Football Company, which so far has resisted the tendency of sporting-goods manufacturers to move their plants to Asia or the Caribbean. But Cal knows he can't keep the factory open much longer, and it looks like the Athens City high school is about to die, too, because of its declining tax base. Then Buster Schuler, the town's legendary football coach who retired when his own son died in a freak on-the-field accident, returns to coach one last season. As if to replace Buster's son, a hardscrabbling young man, Elvis Jackson, shows up, too, wanting to play football. Cal joins Buster as assistant coach, and the two guide their gawky team through a round of glory, which naturally climaxes in the last game. Rachel's witness for Jesus to Elvis may prove too strong for some readers, but otherwise this is a bittersweet, homey sort of tale, quietly affirming and bound to please not just readers of Christian fiction but also those who like to mix sports and inspiration.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2001, American Library Association.)