About The Sticky Wicket series
Ewart Rouse is the author of a series of cricket-themed novels, new print and e-book editions of which are now available on Amazon at the following links: Watkins At Bat, Watkins Fights Back, Watkins’ Finest Inning, and Watkins’ Overseas Tour. The Kindle/ebook versions are here: Watkins At Bat, Watkins Fights Back, Watkins’ Finest Inning, and Watkins’ Overseas Tour.
For a tour of each book, read on.
VOL. I: WATKINS AT BAT — When cricket players from former British colonies come to America, they yearn to play their national sport. But first they must get past wives who think it’s time the men grew up and began accompanying them to religious services on weekends, as well as the Little League baseball organization with whom they must compete for use of the field. Trinidad native Freddie Watkins is determined to overcome these challenges on behalf of his immigrant community — at the risk of jeopardizing his own marriage.
(Ebook version is: Watkins At Bat)
VOL. II: WATKINS FIGHTS BACK — After pledging anew to his wife that he will give up his cricketing life and spend weekends with his family, Freddie Watkins gets some devastating news: His cricket club’s playing field has been reassigned to Little League baseball at the behest of his politically-connected adversary, Max Kruger. Watkins knows that asking Gina for another reprieve so he can fight the establishment on behalf of his immigrant community will be asking for trouble. But standing idly by while the club is forced to disband for want of a field isn’t an option.
(Ebook version here: Watkins Fights Back)
VOL. III: WATKINS’ FINEST INNING — Rebuffed in his efforts to find a playing field for his cricket club and to take the game of his youth to mainstream America, the intrepid Freddie Watkins marshals his forces — including an unlikely group of middle-school students — for a final confrontation with the anti-cricket, pro-baseball establishment.
(Ebook version here: Watkins’ Finest Inning)
WATKINS’ OVERSEAS TOUR … Another Sticky Wicket Inning — Fernwood Cricket Club leader Freddie Watkins finds himself batting on a sticky wicket when he organizes an off-season club tour of Jamaica and everything that possibly can go wrong goes wrong.
(Ebook version here: Watkins’ Overseas Tour)
THE CRICKET MATCH — Last season, reigning champs Jamaica Rebels Cricket Club failed to show up on time for the New Jersey Cricket League finals against the hapless Fernwood Cricket Club and Fernwood gleefully claimed the points. Not very sporting!
Today, in their first meeting of the new league season, the city-based Jamaicans, still seething over the championship loss by default, are out to give the suburban-based Fernwood a whipping they’ll never forget.
But, like they say, cricket is a funny game and the best team doesn’t always win. And, in this particular “grudge” match, it isn’t likely to win – not with Fernwood leader Freddie Watkins coming out of retirement to bat for his team, at the risk of breakup of his marriage. THE CRICKET MATCH is an updated version of WATKINS AT BAT, with new material.
THE STICKY WICKET COLLECTION — The cricketers’ way of life is upended when local officials, responding to complaints about “outsiders” who play a foreign game the locals don’t understand, reassign the cricket field to native-born Little Leaguers who play America’s pastime – baseball.
The Collection is a compilation of the four-book Sticky Wicket Series – Watkins At Bat, Watkins Fights Back, Watkins’ Finest Inning, and Watkins’ Overseas Tour. They are connected stories about Watkins’ ingenuity in dealing with a cricket-vs-baseball clash of cultures on the playing field, and in reconciling his two conflicting loves: his wife and cricket.
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“‘Sticky Wicket’ reaches across boundaries, bringing people together in a game of cricket. It addresses the longings, the challenges, and the nostalgia associated with migrating from one’s own country, yet desiring to hold on to the things of childhood days that we cherish.
Ewart Rouse manages to balance very delicately the needs of the ‘Boys’ and the obligation to surrender to family demands on a finely woven thread, while challenging the ‘you are outsiders’ racist syndrome in a poignant, funny and contemplatively successful way.
I was there. I lived through every scene and episode until I was through. I laughed out loud on the trains and buses and between classes. My students said, ‘Ms. Amedé, you’re really enjoying that book.’ My only sadness was that the story had ended.”