''Keeper'' is a sports novel for

young adults A young adult is generally a person in the years following adolescence. Definitions and opinions on what qualifies as a young adult vary, with works such as Erik Erikson's stages of human development significantly influencing the definition of ...

Mal Peet Malcolm Charles Peet (5 October 1947 – 2 March 2015) was an English author and illustrator best known for young adult fiction. He has won several honours including the Brandford Boase, the Carnegie Medal and the Guardian Prize, British child ...

, published by

Walker Books Walker Books is a British publisher of children's books, founded in 1978 by Sebastian Walker, Amelia Edwards, and Wendy Boase. In 1991, the success of Walker Books' ''Where's Wally?'' series enabled the company to expand into the American ma ...

in 2003. It was Peet's first novel and the first of three (as of 2012)

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly c ...

stories featuring South American

sports journalist Sports journalism is a form of writing that reports on matters pertaining to sporting topics and competitions. Sports journalism started in the early 1800s when it was targeted to the social elite and transitioned into an integral part of the n ...

Paul Faustino. Cast as an interview with Faustino, the world's best goalkeeper, El Gato ("The Cat"), tells his life story. Peet won the

Branford Boase Award The Branford Boase Award is a British literary award presented annually to an outstanding children's or young-adult novel by a first-time writer; "the most promising book for seven year-olds and upwards by a first time novelist." The award is sha ...

, recognising the year's best

debut novel A debut novel is the first novel a novelist publishes. Debut novels are often the author's first opportunity to make an impact on the publishing industry, and thus the success or failure of a debut novel can affect the ability of the author to p ...

for children. Walker's North American division

Candlewick Press Candlewick Press, established in 1992 and located in Somerville, Massachusetts, is part of the Walker Books group. The logo depicting a bear carrying a candle is based on Walker Books's original logo. Sebastian Walker launched Walker Books fro ...

published the first US edition in 2005. Danish and Hungarian-language translations were also published that year and followed by German, Italian, and Spanish-language editions."Formats and Editions of Keeper"

WorldCat WorldCat is a union catalog that itemizes the collections of tens of thousands of institutions (mostly libraries), in many countries, that are current or past members of the OCLC global cooperative. It is operated by OCLC, Inc. Many of the OCL ...

. Retrieved 8 August 2012.

Background

''Keeper'' was Peet's first novel, undertaken at age 52 and completed three years later. When he won the 2009 Guardian Prize for his third Paul Faustino football novel, '' Exposure'', he told the sponsoring newspaper he had felt that 'football books for children were "pretty much crap"'. Also, "I used to play all the time. I would play football when it was light and read when it was dark. Now I get to play football vicariously." Peet described his creative occupation thus: "I come up here in the morning to a pleasant room in the roof of my house and imagine I'm a black South American football superstar, then I have to imagine I'm a female pop celebrity who's pregnant. It's a completely mad way to spend your time. If I did it in public I would be sectioned. Writing is a form of licensed madness."

Synopsis

Paul Faustino, a journalist for ''

La Nación ''La Nación'' () is an Argentine daily newspaper. As the country's leading conservative newspaper, ''La Nación''s main competitor is the more liberal '' Clarín''. It is regarded as a newspaper of record for Argentina. Its motto is: "''La Nac ...

'', is interviewing El Gato about his recent

World Cup A world cup is a global sporting competition in which the participant entities – usually international teams or individuals representing their countries – compete for the title of world champion. The event most associated with the concept i ...

win. During the interview, El Gato tells Faustino about his teenage years and his entry into soccer. When El Gato tells Faustino that he is coached by a ghost known to El Gato as "the Keeper," Faustino thinks El Gato is lying to him. However, El Gato seems honest and looks like he is telling the truth. El Gato continues to tell the interviewer his story. As a teenager, he secretly trains with the Keeper in an abandoned soccer field hidden in the rainforest. The young El Gato convinces his parents his time in the rainforest is the result of his fascination with nature. His family takes him for a naturalist, buying him collection materials and calling him "Professor."Peet, p. 54 The charade continues until El Gato turns 15, when he is expected to start working in the

logging industry Logging is the process of cutting, processing, and moving trees to a location for transport. It may include skidder, skidding, on-site processing, and loading of trees or trunk (botany), logs onto logging truck, trucks or flatcar#Skeleton car, ...

with his father. He does not tell the Keeper that he will no longer come to practice. His first Saturday at work he finds out that his co-workers play a game of soccer after work. His co-workers invite him to play as the goalkeeper and, in his first game since his training with the Keeper, he helps his team win. The next Saturday, he plays with a new player who the others call "El Ladron", meaning "the thief." In reality, El Ladron is a director for a soccer camp named DSJ. He also brings the owners of the team, Mr. and Mrs. DaSilva to the games. They want to sign El Gato for a two-year contract and give him 10,000 dollars. This begins his professional football career. Finally, El Gato reveals to Paul Faustino that he cheated in the second last penalty shot of the World Cup. El Gato tells Faustino that he wants the interview to be a book. Faustino hesitates because he has to give this interview to his boss. However, he changes his mind and helps El Gato turn his interview into a book. El Gato eventually quits soccer and becomes a naturalist, just as his parents had always imagined. At the end of the novel, El Gato explains the Keeper's history as a real player.

Characters

In ''Keeper'' there are three main characters. The first character that will be written about is El Gato, the protagonist of the story. El Gato is actually just a nickname. He is a huge man who normally is very quiet. He is a world cup winning goalkeeper, and throughout the story, he is telling a soccer reporter his past in an interview. El Gato's mentor was a mysterious man referred to 'The Keeper' and nothing more. The Keeper's actual name is never mentioned at all in the book. The Keeper was somewhat of a phantom, and one doesn't learn much about him until the end of the story. The last character was a reporter, whose name is Paul Faustino. He wants to do the interview to receive a big bonus from his boss, because Paul is obsessed with money. NB: The reporter, Paul Faustino, was the first character mentioned in the story. El Gato was the second, and the Keeper was the third.

Awards

Beside winning the Branford Boase Award, ''Keeper'' was bronze runner up for the

Smarties Prize Smarties are colour-varied sugar-coated chocolate confectionery. They have been manufactured since 1937, originally by H.I. Rowntree & Company in the United Kingdom, and now by Nestlé. Smarties are oblate spheroids with a minor axis of abo ...

in ages category 9–11 years and made the Hampshire Book Award shortlist.

References

;Citations Peet, Mal. ''Keeper.'' Candlewick Press: Cambridge, Massachusetts, 2005.

External links