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Gunner, Football Hero

by James E. Ransome
32p. 978-0-82342-053-7.
COPY ISBN
PreS-Gr 2 Gunner loves football and dreams of playing quarterback in spite of being too short and too round. He devotes himself completely to the sport and with hard work lands a spot as third-string quarterback on the town's Pee Wee team. The watercolor cartoon illustrations, done in oranges, blues, and browns, beautifully capture the light and mood of autumn, putting readers in the football spirit, but Gunner seems to change size and shape from page to page, and many of the players look far older than Pee Wee team age. The story leads up to Gunner finally getting a chance to play in the big game, but the ending holds a blitz of surprises. Sometimes text and pictures conflict in a confusing way, such as on the last page, where the illustration shows the boy's father reading the newspaper while the text indicates that Gunner is doing the reading. Overall, this is a lively story, but it isn't one of Ransome's best.-"Julie Roach, Cambridge Public Library, MA" Copyright 2010 Media Source Inc.
"Too short and too round" to be a typical quarterback, Gunner nevertheless makes third-string QB for his PeeWee team. He warms the bench until the team's championship game, during which he improbably throws for two touchdowns. Though the team loses, Gunner is still a hero. Loose-lined watercolors in autumnal hues convey a sense of movement, but figures are sometimes rendered inconsistently.

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