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By Barbara Clanton
Marlee is a junior in High School, and she's the pitcher for her softball team.
When she falls for Susie, the left fielder of an opposing team, suddenly her life gets really complicated...
My thanks to Ivanova for the recommendation. Add your review of "Out Of Left Field: Marlee's Story" in comments!
2 comments:
Hold on! Is this another story where a teen girl doesn't realize she's gay until she falls in love with a girl and has a brief romance that ends awkwardly without ever outing to anyone? And even if it isn't, may I indulge in a mini-rant about how teen girls in literature NEVER COME OUT? Just about every gay boy book includes an outing to the parents scene, but girls are either pre-outed from before the story, or fall in love (which is the only clue ever that they're gay?!) but stay in the closet. I mean, what's UP with that?
Yup, I love this one. It's a very sweet coming-of-age, coming out, first love story, but what makes it special is the awesome softball angle. Also the characters are very vivid and complex.
Marlee's father died when she was small, and she still misses him. One of the reasons she likes softball so much is that her father used to play ball with her. Marlee's trying to figure out what to do about her boyfriend. He really wants to have sex already and she can't figure out why she's not that into him. Then she sees Susie Torres, a player on a rival team, and she starts to feel something special for her. This is not one of those sad "dealing with homophobia" problem novels; it's just a great love story. Also I learned a lot about baseball (I had no idea, for example, that the catcher has so much responsibility. I thought all they had to do was catch the ball!) Apparently the author has written two other teen lesbian novels, one about an art chick and one about a dancer, so I'm looking forward to reading those too.
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