Ease Reading-Find Your Next Favorite Book

Hot Search

About the B'nai Bagels

e.l. konigsburg

... Show More
Mark Seltzer thought he had enough aggravation studying for his Bar Mitzvah and losing his best friend.  It's the last straw when his mother becomes the new manager of his Little League baseball team and drags his older brother, Spencer, along as the coach.



No one knows what to expect with a mother for a manager, but soon Mark and the other players are surprised to see how much they're improving due to coach Spencer's strategy and helpful hints from "Mother Bagel."



It looks like nothing can stop them from becoming champs--until Mark hears some startling news!

172 pages, Paperback

First published January 1,1969

This edition

Format
172 pages, Paperback
Published
March 1, 1985 by Dell
ISBN
9780440400349
ASIN
0440400341
Language
English

More editions

About the author

Profile Image for e.l. konigsburg

e.l. konigsburg

... Show More
Elaine Lobl Konigsburg was an American writer and illustrator of children's books and young adult fiction. She is one of six writers to win two Newbery Medals, the venerable American Library Association award for the year's "most distinguished contribution to American children's literature."
Konigsburg submitted her first two manuscripts to editor Jean E. Karl at Atheneum Publishers in 1966, and both were published in 1967: Jennifer, Hecate, Macbeth, William McKinley, and Me, Elizabeth and From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler. From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler won the 1968 Newbery Medal, and Jennifer, Hecate, Macbeth, William McKinley, and Me, Elizabeth was listed as a runner-up in the same year, making Konigsburg the only author to win the Newbery Medal and have another book listed as runner-up in the same year. She won again for The View from Saturday in 1997, 29 years later, the longest span between two Newberys awarded to one author.
For her contribution as a children's writer Konigsburg was U.S. nominee in 2006 for the biennial, international Hans Christian Andersen Award, the highest international recognition available to creators of children's books.

Readers also enjoyed

Community Reviews

Rating(3.8 / 5.0, 50 votes)
5 stars
13(26%)
4 stars
15(30%)
3 stars
22(44%)
2 stars
0(0%)
1 stars
0(0%)
50 reviews All reviews
Profile Image for Kimberly .
Coelestin
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 17,2025
... Show More
It's surreal reading a book that FEELS like it could be contemporary enough (boys playing Little League, getting into scraps as kids do, and older siblings/parents being overbearing), but realizing that this book was published in 1969 and that manned space travel didn't exist yet.

Mark (or Moshe, his Hebrew name) mentions that maybe the Russians will make it to the moon before the Americans, a moment that made my soul exit my body.

1969 must've been an exciting time. I happened to watch Fly Me to the Moon a couple of weeks ago. I hadn't realized what a Before and After moment the Moon landing was in history. To me, that was something known, given...it has always existed.

And...AND! Multiple characters in this book were like, "What's a 'bagel'? I've never had a bagel."

Bagels, yet another thing that are 100% a given in my life. They're mainstream and have always existed. Man, 1969 must've been WILD.

This felt like a nice time capsule of an age when life seemed more simple. Definitely hard to relate as a 42-year-old woman in 2024, but I enjoyed being in Mark's head and seeing his world, as well as how he saw/experienced it.
0 0 Reply
Profile Image for Kimberly .
Shuc49
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 17,2025
... Show More
Although it takes place in the late 1960s, this story is ahead of its time. Take a synagogue-sponsored Little League Team; the narrator's outspoken, baseball-loving mother as coach; a pair of gifted twins whose pitching talents literally mirror each other's, and .... Playboy Magazine. Yep, Hugh Hefner's publication figures in there as well, at a time when it cost only 75 cents an issue. Now take THAT salmon and smoke it!
0 0 Reply
Profile Image for Kimberly .
TheRealPepsi
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 17,2025
... Show More
I don't remember a ton about this book. But I remember thinking it was ok, and being shocked to read a book about a Jewish baseball team
0 0 Reply
Profile Image for Kimberly .
MrFaceToFace
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 17,2025
... Show More
The protagonist of this book is Mark Setzer who is a young kid. Mark has a lot of stuff on his mind. He is nervous about his upcoming bar mitzvah, and he doesnt see his best friend anymore. Mark's mother becomes a manager of a little league baseball team, which Mark is on. The team does well and they go onto the championship. Mark has a major secret, but he doesnt want to tell anyone.

I wouldn't really recommend this book to anyone, just by looking at the cover of the book i was able to predict what was going to happen.To me i dont really like those types of books.

If i were to rate this book out of ten, i would give it a five. Im being generous in giving it a five rating.
0 0 Reply
Profile Image for Kimberly .
critic
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 17,2025
... Show More
I love Konigsburg -- and this does have her trademark wit and sparkly style -- but I'm sorry to say I still couldn't get in to it. There's something about it -- the hippie college brother, the language -- that feels dated.
0 0 Reply
Profile Image for Kimberly .
RatataaxEryia
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 17,2025
... Show More
This book was a really fun story. I liked the boy Mark in the story and learning about him. The story did not have a lot of surprises, but thats fine. I did feel the story was a little too sporty for me but thats also fine. I did like how much education there is about Judaism in the book and you learn some Hebrew. It also had a great sense of humor. It did not feel slow and it’s a good length. Highly recommend.
0 0 Reply
Profile Image for Kimberly .
Raikers
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 17,2025
... Show More
Konigsburg does a great job with the family dynamic - and the complications of friendships, too. She has a wonderful way of leaving out information instead of explicitly stating everything - which actually relates to the story, I guess: what parents know, what they say about what they know (and to whom), what they don't say; what kids know and say and don't say.
0 0 Reply
Profile Image for Kimberly .
knightsquared
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 17,2025
... Show More
This is a great book that no one knows about. It's about a boy who's mother Nd brother coach his baseball team. The boy is 12 years old and is having a lot of problems in his live. People are making fun of him because his mom is coaching his team, he is always getting into fights with his brother and he doesn't have a lot of friends. Very realistic.
0 0 Reply
Leave a Review
You must be logged in to rate and post a review. Register an account to get started.