n these nine stories of determination, seemingly ordinary people find themselves in extraordinary circumstances as they confront their fears and embrace their challenges on a near-future Earth or an alternate-history past or even on a far distant alien world.

• A single parent with a Down-syndrome daughter considers what his life and career might have been as a parent and a pro football player in some alternate reality.

• A young girl on an isolated Florida island discovers that her quirky grandparents are even stranger than she thought.

• A high-school basketball player confronts the ghosts of her past.

• A young woman struggles to make peace with the horrors of her forgotten childhood.

• An elderly woman slides into dementia even as she finds some essential truths that were lost in the hazy mists of her memory.

• A baseball player becomes a spy during an alternate-history version of World War II, where he plays a pivotal role in stopping the Nazi war machine.

A powerful and poignant collection of memorable stories from an award-winning storyteller, Rambunctious: Nine Tales of Determination is charming, action-packed, frightening, and thoughtful by turn.