Snowboard Showdown: Out-of Control Competition Leads to Disaster

by Matt Christopher

Snowboard Showdown Out-of-control competition leads to disaster When Freddie Ruiz and his brother, Dondi, compete, it's like two mutts wrestling over the same bone-neither one is willing to give an inch. Unfortunately for Freddie, older, stronger, better-looking Dondi usually comes out on top in every contest. Except in one area: snowboarding. Here, Freddie is clearly king of the halfpipe. So when Dondi finally pushes Freddie too far, Freddie cooks up a snowboard showdown to make Dondi look foolish and himself the star. But will Dondi take the bait, or will he somehow turn the tables on his brother yet again?

144 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1999

About the author

Matt Christopher is the writer young readers turn to when they're looking for fast-paced, action-packed sports novels. He is the best-selling author of more than one hundred sports books for young readers.

Matt Christopher is America's bestselling sports writer for children, with more than 100 books and sales approaching six million copies. In 1992, Matt Christopher talked about being a children's book author.

"I became interested in writing when I was 14, a freshman in high school. I was selling magazines such as the Saturday Evening Post, Country Gentleman, and Liberty, and I would read the stories, particularly the adventure and mystery stories, and think how wonderful it would be to be able to write stories and make a living at it. I also read detective, horror, aviation, and sports stories and decided I would try writing them myself.

Determined to sell, I wrote a detective story a week for 40 weeks, finding the time to marry, work, and play baseball and basketball before I sold my first story in 1941, "The Missing Finger Points," for $50 to Detective Story magazine.

After writing and selling children's sports stories to magazines, I decided to write a baseball book for children. I was living in Syracuse, New York at the time, working at General Electric. I spoke about my idea to the branch librarian. She was immediately interested and told me that they needed sports stories badly. So I came up with my first children's book, The Lucky Baseball Bat. I submitted it to Little, Brown, and the book was published in 1954.

I'm sure that playing sandlot baseball and then semiprofessional baseball with a Class C club in the Canadian-American League influenced my writing. I had my own personal experiences, and I saw how other players reacted to plays, to teammates' and fans' remarks and innuendoes, to managers' orders, etc. All these had a great influence on my writing. My love of the game helped a lot, too, of course.

Out of all the books I've written, my favorite is The Kid Who Only Hit Homers. It's a fantasy, but the main character in it could be real. There are a lot of boys who would love to play baseball but, for some reason, cannot. The only difference between a real-life boy and Sylvester Coddmyer III is the appearance of a character named George Baruth, whom only Sylvester can see and who helps Sylvester become a good ballplayer.

I've written many short stories and books for both children and adults, and find that writing for children is really my niche. Being the eldest of nine children (seven boys and two girls), I've lived through a lot of problems many children live through, and I find these problems excellent examples to include in my books.

Sports have made it possible for me to meet many people with all sorts of life stories, on and off the field, and these are grist for this writer's mill. I'm far beyond playing age now, but I manage to go to both kids' and adult games just to keep up with them, and keep them fresh in my mind.Very few things make me happier than receiving fan letters from boys and girls who write that they had never cared for reading until they started to read my books. That is just about the ultimate in writing for children. I would never trade it for another profession."

Matt Christopher died on September 27, 1997. His legacy is now being carried on by his sons, Duane and Dale Christopher.

Reviews

[Kyleduke · Rating 3 out of 5]

this book was about a kid who made it to the big leagues in snowboard showdown and won

[Zachary · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was funny.People who will like it the most are people who like outdoors and like snowboarding.Their is a lot of action.

[Trevor McDonald · Rating 4 out of 5]

I would rate this book a 4/5
My first strongest reason is they say Freddie and Ruiz neither one will give an inch when seeing who can stay standing last on the half pipe. They just say one took the bait so that just describes one has fallen and lost. I like that because I like to fish so I know what that means.
My second is it was realistic..Everything they say I know because I have skied. Ruiz falls face first right into a ski lift. I have fallen by a ski lift.
My third reason it’s entertaining. They will race down a hill to see who’s the fastest and they will run into each other, Ruiz said a kid wanted to race and Ruiz and the kids made jokes on how Freddie will lose because he always does.
I don’t recommend this book. It gets boring after the first few chapters.
I enjoyed laughing at the stupid things the do.
It was interesting on how the did most of their tricks.
The author should of made it more exciting
It didn’t change my beliefs.
It wasn’t even difficult.
The book could be improved by more big words and more excitement. .

[Castro · Rating 5 out of 5]

this book is amazing! is about snowboarding.you should read it!