Through a Broken Window

"Through A Broken Window" is 12-year-old Jerry Epstein's coming of age story, set on the sandlot baseball fields and in the delis and diners of small town, 1964 New Jersey. Much of it takes place in Jerry's dad's luncheonette, in the mob-infested hamlet of East Orange. This is the era before McDonald's and other franchises sprouted up like weeds on the American landscape, wiping out many of the mom and pop greasy spoons that immigrant families relied on for their livelihoods. That's how the Epstein clan found themselves in the middle of a turf war with Nicoletti, a wannabe mobster, whose "Made" daddy bought him his own hamburger franchise, to keep him out of trouble and out of a life of organized crime. But Nicoletti only knows trouble. And soon finds it by opening his Hamburger Heaven joint across the street from the Epstein's little All Right Coffee Shop, threatening their livelihood.Our ambitious young Jerry has big plans for his life and doesn't cotton to the idea that it can all be taken away from him and his family by this scary man, just like that.One afternoon, while working at the store, Jerry's dad sends him to the market to buy some supplies. On the walk there, he passes the Hamburger Heaven place, still under construction, and is taunted and teased by a brutish Nicoletti. Jerry's response was to hurl a piece of brick at Nicoletti, who was standing behind a large plate glass window. As the window shattered, so did the safety and security of Jerry and his entire clan. Their lives were now in the crosshairs of a dark, dangerous and unpredictable ma?Meanwhile, always brewing at the heart of the story, is a fast pitch softball tournament between long-rivaled schools. Old rivalries are stoked, and new ones are made in almost every tension-filled inning. And poor Jerry, one day he's the, strong-armed starting shortstop, the next, to no fault of his own, he's left out of the lineup in the biggest, most important game of his life.How does he handle it?