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Soup #11
Soup's Hoop
Swish! Soup and Rob have basketball fever. The entire town of Learning, Vermont, is psyched up for the big game against their archrival, Pratt Falls. But there's trouble. The Learning Groundhogs' star center, Shorty Smith, has sprained his ankle.
Soup and Rob have a plan. Their new friend Piffle Shootensinker, a seven-foot-tall European basketball star from Pretzelstein, has just moved to town. Piff has a problem. He's homesick, he misses his dog, and can sink a basket only when he hears the music of his homeland on the spitzentootle. What's a spinzentootle? It doesn't take Rob and Soup long to learn. Can they locate one (and also find a dog) in time to inspire Piff to lead the Learning Groundhogs to victory?
Soup and Rob have a plan. Their new friend Piffle Shootensinker, a seven-foot-tall European basketball star from Pretzelstein, has just moved to town. Piff has a problem. He's homesick, he misses his dog, and can sink a basket only when he hears the music of his homeland on the spitzentootle. What's a spinzentootle? It doesn't take Rob and Soup long to learn. Can they locate one (and also find a dog) in time to inspire Piff to lead the Learning Groundhogs to victory?
144 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1990
About the author
Robert Newton Peck
86 books82 followersRobert Newton Peck is an American author of books for young adults. His titles include Soup and A Day No Pigs Would Die. He claims to have been born on February 17, 1928, in Vermont, but has refused to specify where. Similarly, he claims to have graduated from a high school in Texas, which he has also refused to identify. Some sources state that he was born in Nashville, Tennessee (supposedly where his mother was born, though other sources indicate she was born in Ticonderoga, New York, and that Peck, himself, may have been born there). The only reasonably certain Vermont connection is that his father was born in Cornwall.
Peck has written over sixty books including a great book explaining his childhood to becoming a teenager working on the farm called: A Day no Pigs would Die
He was a smart student, although his schooling was cut short by World War II. During and shortly after the conflict, he served as a machine-gunner in the U.S. Army 88th Infantry Division. Upon returning to the United States, he entered Rollins College, graduating in 1953. He then entered Cornell Law School, but never finished his course of study.
Newton married Dorothy Anne Houston and fathered two children, Anne and Christopher. The best man at the wedding and the godfather to the children was Fred Rogers of Mr. Roger's Neighborhood fame.
A Day No Pigs Would Die was his first novel, published in 1972 when he was already 44 years old. From then on he continued his lifelong journey through literature. To date, he has been credited for writing 55 fiction books, 6 nonfiction books, 35 songs, 3 television specials and over a hundred poems.
Several of his historical novels are about Fort Ticonderoga: Fawn, Hang for Treason, The King's Iron.
In 1993, Peck was diagnosed with oral cancer, but survived. As of 2005, he was living in Longwood, Florida, where he has in the past served as the director of the Rollins College Writers Conference. Peck sings in a barbershop quartet, plays ragtime piano, and is an enthusiastic speaker. His hobby is visiting schools, "to turn kids on to books."
—From Wikipedia
For more information, please see http://www.answers.com/topic/robert-n...
Peck has written over sixty books including a great book explaining his childhood to becoming a teenager working on the farm called: A Day no Pigs would Die
He was a smart student, although his schooling was cut short by World War II. During and shortly after the conflict, he served as a machine-gunner in the U.S. Army 88th Infantry Division. Upon returning to the United States, he entered Rollins College, graduating in 1953. He then entered Cornell Law School, but never finished his course of study.
Newton married Dorothy Anne Houston and fathered two children, Anne and Christopher. The best man at the wedding and the godfather to the children was Fred Rogers of Mr. Roger's Neighborhood fame.
A Day No Pigs Would Die was his first novel, published in 1972 when he was already 44 years old. From then on he continued his lifelong journey through literature. To date, he has been credited for writing 55 fiction books, 6 nonfiction books, 35 songs, 3 television specials and over a hundred poems.
Several of his historical novels are about Fort Ticonderoga: Fawn, Hang for Treason, The King's Iron.
In 1993, Peck was diagnosed with oral cancer, but survived. As of 2005, he was living in Longwood, Florida, where he has in the past served as the director of the Rollins College Writers Conference. Peck sings in a barbershop quartet, plays ragtime piano, and is an enthusiastic speaker. His hobby is visiting schools, "to turn kids on to books."
—From Wikipedia
For more information, please see http://www.answers.com/topic/robert-n...
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
July 11, 2015
The early books of the Soup series are so dramatically different than those towards the end that it's hard to judge the later books fairly. In the early books the stories are believable, and have the charm of feeling like the kinds of things that happened to us all as kids. This and others towards the end give up the realism for silliness. We have the country of Pretzelstein, for example, a country where citizens are able to play amazing basketball anytime their made-up instrument is playing.
Again - this isn't bad in itself, but it's such a shift from the early books that it's strange to think they're in the same series. I miss the early vignettes with Rob looking for his football valve, or accidentally breaking a window by throwing an apple. Mostly, though, I miss Rob actually having a personality and not just blindly following Soup everywhere and wondering "what will he think of next?"
Again - this isn't bad in itself, but it's such a shift from the early books that it's strange to think they're in the same series. I miss the early vignettes with Rob looking for his football valve, or accidentally breaking a window by throwing an apple. Mostly, though, I miss Rob actually having a personality and not just blindly following Soup everywhere and wondering "what will he think of next?"
May 10, 2008
Gosh, but I'm influence by what I read! I think this book provoked me to join our school's basketball team (the results were less than stellar to say the least. I'm a veritable klutz and I DON'T like balls whizzing toward my head.)
April 5, 2026
3.5 stars -- #24 in the 2026 Search & Purge, this is the final Soup book in my library. This series has made me cringe & roll my eyes, but it has also made me laugh hysterically & cry. This particular one was not the best, in my opinion, but Soup & Rob's determination to help their hometown basketball team win their game against the neighboring town's team included their normal hijinx. And their story was so appropriate to read in March! Even though it is AR, it's last check out was in 2010, it is in only one other local library, and its pages are yellow with crumbling edges. Farewell.
April 25, 2018
B. fiction, children's fiction, 20th c., pranks, humor, series, (Soup, #11). Mom's stash, keep
May 23, 2012
Funny book. Fun to read.
July 24, 2013
Another funny adventurous tale! My son and I had many laughs together reading this book.
March 3, 2010
Not my favorite in the series, but still full of lots of laughs.
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews