- "If you care about something you have to protect it. If you"re lucky enough to find a way of life you love, you have to find the courage to live it". Eleven-year-old Owen Meany, playing in a Little League baseball game in Gravesend, New Hampshire, hits a foul ball and kills his best friend"s mother. Owen doesn"t believe in accidents; he believes he is God"s instrument. What happens to Owen after that 1953 foul ball is both extraordinary and terrifying.