There's No Base Like Home
By Jessica Mendoza, Alana Mendoza Dusan
Illustrated by Ruth McNally Barshaw
Hardcover: $18.95
Ebook
Listen to a sample of the Recorded Books audiobook below:
This will be twelve-year-old Sophia Maria Garcia’s best year ever: she’s trying out for the same championship softball team her sister played on at her age, and she’s starting middle school. New school, new team, new Sophia!
But all does not go according to plan. Sophia does not make the Waves softball team and her best friend is suddenly more interested in boys than Sophia. As the middle school blues set in, and her family is pulled in different directions, Sophia must reach deep down and find a little UMPH—the difference between being good and great—to figure out her own place, on and off the field.
ESPN Major League Baseball analyst and two-time Olympic medalist Jessica Mendoza teams up with her sister Alana Mendoza Dusan for their first highly-illustrated novel for young readers, based on their own childhood softball adventures.
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Billie Jean King, Founder of the Billie Jean King Leadership Initiative and the Women’s Sports Foundation
Lisa Fernandez, three-time Olympic gold medalist in softball
Kerri Walsh Jennings, three-time Olympic gold medalist and professional beach volleyball player
Jennie Finch, two-time Olympic softball pitcher
Julie Foudy, two-time FIFA Women’s World Cup champion and Olympic gold medalist
Pablo Cartaya, Pura Belpré Honor-winning author of THE EPIC FAIL OF ARTURO ZAMORA
About the Creators

is a Major League Baseball analyst for Sunday Night Baseball on ESPN. She is the first female analyst in MLB postseason history and ESPN’s first-ever female MLB analyst. Jessica also serves as a contributor on ABC’s Good Morning America. She won gold & silver Olympic medals in 2004 and 2008, respectively, as a member of the US Women’s Softball Team.
Photo: Mibelle Photography

was a Division 1 softball player at Oregon State University. She currently teaches high school English and lives in Bend, Oregon, with her husband and two children.
Photo: Alisa Hayes

is the award-winning author and illustrator of the Ellie McDoodle series. She played softball for a summer league when she was twelve, but learned much more about strategy from this manuscript. She resides with her author-husband Charlie in Lansing, Michigan. See her work at ruthexpress.com.