Publisher's Synopsis
In 1891, Rory Fitzgerald's errant homerun ball lands two celebrities in Baltimore Harbor and the hapless baseball hero in hot water!"...a wonderfully interesting and romantic story. Any reader who likes baseball, American historical fiction or a good romance story will enjoy this book." --Karen Walpole for Readers' FavoritePlayer-manager Rory Fitzgerald's 1891 Richmond Elite Professional Baseball Club enjoys an abundance of talent but isn't exactly the most disciplined team in the league. When U.S. president Benjamin Harrison makes a surprise appearance at a game between Fitzgerald's club and the pesky Baltimore Schooners, the Elite let bad habits take hold and soon find themselves on the wrong end of a developing rout. Hoping to avert embarrassment in front of the president and his guests, the young manager inserts himself into the lineup.Fitzgerald indeed gets a hit, a fly ball that easily outdistances anything he has ever batted before. The dream hit, however, quickly turns into a nightmare. Fickle as ever, fate carries the ball over the right-field wall only to drop it--of all places--squarely on the rump of the snoozing horse hitched to the president's waiting carriage. And the carriage isn't empty. Having retired from the grandstand early, the president's daughter and her companion are sitting in the open coach, while their driver stands on the sidewalk nearby. The startled horse bolts, and everything goes downhill from there.Before Fitzgerald knows it, his unlikely hit lands him in the middle of a high-stakes contest for public opinion. Stoked by the press, unexpectedly fueled by politics, and heatedly debated by "polite" society, nothing less than the future of professional baseball hangs in the balance.When Fitzgerald's solution to the conundrum gets him booted from the sport--and livelihood--he loves, will anyone in high places go to bat for him?
