E.L. Konigsburg is the only author to have won the Newbery Medal and a Newbery Honor in the same year. In 1968, From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler won the Newbery Medal and Jennifer, Hecate, Macbeth, William McKinley, and Me, Elizabeth was named a Newbery Honor Book. Almost thirty years later she won the Newbery Medal once again for The View from Saturday. Among her other acclaimed books are Silent to the Bone, The Outcasts of 19 Schuyler Place, and The Mysterious Edge of the Heroic World.

Mark Setzer thought studying for his Bar Mitzvah and having his best friend move away created enough aggravation in his life. But then his mother becomes the new manager of his Little League team and drags his older brother, Spencer, along as coach. Miraculously, the team thrives, but in the process Mark learns some unpleasant truths about someone he thought he knew.