Mark Stevens's "The Fireballer"

The son of two librarians, Mark Stevens was raised in Lincoln, Massachusetts, and has worked as a reporter, as a national television news producer, and in public relations. Antler Dust was a Denver Post bestseller in 2007 and 2009. Buried by the Roan, Trapline, and Lake of Fire were all finalists for the Colorado Book Award (2012, 2015, and 2016, respectively), and Trapline won. Trapline also won the Colorado Authors League award for best genre fiction. Stevens has had short stories published by Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, by Mystery Tribune, and in Denver Noir (Akashic Books). In September 2016, Stevens was named Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers’ Writer of the Year. Stevens hosts a regular podcast for Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers and has served as president of the Rocky Mountain chapter for Mystery Writers of America.

Here the author dreamcasts an adaptation of his new novel, The Fireballer:

I know full well that very few books get made into movies. Precious few.

But my editor at Lake Union told me she bought The Fireballer because she’s a big fan of baseball movies. Not the sport, but movies about the sport. And she could see The Fireballer on film.

Me, too.

It didn’t hurt that New York Times best-selling author William Kent Krueger offered a blurb that included this comparison: “The characters are beautifully etched, and pitcher Frank Ryder may be the most likeable hero since Gary Cooper gave life to Lou Gehrig on the big screen.”

That movie was The Pride of the Yankees.

Krueger called Ryder “likeable” and I certainly hope he is. Likeable, but not perfect by any means. He’s been carrying a heavy heart since the age of 12. But he’s also getting to do what he loves to do (pitching in the major leagues, for the Baltimore Orioles) and he’s got far more money than he knows what to do with. He’s also inscrutable on the mound when he pitches.

I think Lucas Hedges (Manchester by the Sea, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri) would be perfect for Frank. Hedges has got gravity and an earnest look. Whoever plays Frank needs a good pitchers’ stare on the mound and I think Hedges has got it.

Hedges is known for immersing himself in his roles and I think, as an actor, he would appreciate how much Frank Ryder drove himself to do one thing and do it better than anyone else has ever done it.

Plus, Hedges is about the right age. Hedges is 26 years old and Frank is 22. Critics noted that Gary Cooper was a bit too old (at age 41, when Pride of the Yankees was filmed) to play young Gehrig.

For Frank’s girlfriend Maggie, Zendaya would be no-nonsense and down to earth and for Frank’s potential love interest Oliva, Sophie Turner (Sansa Stark in HBO’s Game of Thrones) would be perfect, though she’d have to lose the English accent.

For Gail Johnson, the mother of Deon Johnson? I pictured Viola Davis when I wrote that key scene and it’s still true today.

Director? Either Bennett Miller, who brought a genuine sense of the corporate action and on-the-field athleticism to the movie Moneyball, or Stephen Soderbergh, who had his own visions for that movie before he was dropped from the project. Soderbergh’s talents with action movies (like Ocean’s Eleven) and big-picture issues (The Laundromat) would be a perfect combination.

Any way that The Fireballer reaches the screen, I know I would be, as Lou Gehrig once said, “the luckiest man on the face of the Earth.”

Visit Mark Stevens's website.

The Page 69 Test: The Fireballer.

Q&A with Mark Stevens.

--Marshal Zeringue