Dick Randall, the Young Athlete

Dick Randall arrives at Fenton Academy nervous and homesick, a boy from nowhere trying to find his place among strangers. Then he discovers what the school truly worships: athletic glory. The Pentathlon looms ahead, and suddenly Dick has something to chase besides his loneliness. Harry Allen, a cheery classmate with easy confidence, pulls him into the school's fierce sporting culture, where reputation is built on muscle and will. This is vintage American school fiction from 1905, when boys' books meant something: discipline, rivalry, the painful algebra of winning and losing, and the friendships that form in the crucible of competition. Clark writes with Period punch about the forging of character through physical challenge. For readers who crave nostalgic coming-of-age stories, or anyone curious about where the American sports novel began.