Keeper (novel)

infobox Book |
name = Keeper
title_orig =
translator =


image_caption = First edition cover
author = Mal Peet
illustrator =
cover_artist = Yves St. Laurent
country = United Kingdom
language = English
series =
genre = Children's, Sports novel
publisher = Walker Books
release_date = 6th Oct 2003
media_type = Print (Hardback & Paperback)
pages = 240 pp (first edition, paperback)
isbn = ISBN 0744590256

Keeper is a fictional sports novel for children by Mal Peet, published on October 6, 2003 by Walker Books Ltd. The novel takes the form of an interview (Paul Faustino as the interviewer), where the character El Gato (meaning "The Cat") who is supposedly the world's best goalkeeper tells his lifetime story. Keeper won the Branford Boase Award in 2004 and was shortlisted for the Hampshire Book Award that same year.

The Keeper is based in South America, where the story's main protagonist, El Gato, grew up. He is the son of a wood cutter and yet he has very strong beliefs later on in the novel about preserving the forest. One day he decides to go in the woods and meets a mysterious person who teaches him the skills to be a great goalkeeper. Also, El Gato's father decides to take his son to work, and then, every Saturday after work, they would go to a field with the other workers and play soccer. As the mysterious person had taught him how to be a really good goalkeeper, he excelled on the field. Finally, the owner of the DSJ soccer team decided to talk to El Gato's father about giving him a contract to sign his son up for the DSJ soccer team as a goalkeeper. El Gato continues to play, becoming a great goalkeeper in the process. He loses his first shot at the World Cup at the Quarter Finals, but in his second try, wins the Cup in a shootout. He returns to his hometown village to find that much more of the forest had been taken down to put up new houses. While there, El Gato also visits his parents' graves. He returns to the jungle and finds the field, discovering beforehand that the Keeper was actually the ghost of the Goalkeeper of a team that was headed for the Cup, but their plane went down over a South American jungle (implied that the jungle was the same El Gato grew up in) So the ghosts lived on until El Gato returned the World Cup to them, so they could finally move on. When El Gato left the field for the last time, all the ghostly apparitions of the team were leaving, and the field disappeared with them. After the World Cup win, El Gato retires from football (soccer). Also (while El Gato is talking to the journalist) he decides not to have the story published in a newspaper, but instead to have it into a book. He hints at the name Keeper, which makes it implied that the book is a reprinted version of the story.