Soccer Sisters

Soccer Sisters: Out of Bounds By Andrea Montalbano
Published By SOURCEBOOKS Jabberwocky
Date: 1 April 2017

“Makena Walsh inhaled the smell of the sweet spring grass as a gentle breeze tickled her face and a crop of sweat rolled down her cheek. Soccer was an awesome and simple game, and there was nothing in the world she loved more than being outside, playing with friends, kicking and running free.”

So you have met Makena, she loves playing soccer with gentle breezes and sweat. In fact, her life is almost always about soccer.

Makena isn’t the only one who loves soccer, her close friends and soccer sisters Val, Jessie, and Chloe also love the game and they work together with coach Lily to bring their best to every game…that is until the arrival of the gritty Skylar. Skylar is different to the other girls, she is feisty, and a little bit of a rebel. She also likes to defy any sort of authority, particularly when it came to soccer and parents.

The book takes you on a journey about the changing dynamics of friendships, of sportsmanship, or truth and lies, and discovering your ethics and sticking to these. I believe this book will help young ladies think about what it means to have ethics in sport and being sportsmanlike. The book also teaches young girls to be strong women, showing them that no matter what choices you have made in the past that it can be turned around through honesty and forgiveness.

Each chapter is fairly short which supports the struggling reader to finish a chapter during a reasonable time period. At the back of the book are some questions and activities for book clubs along with definitions for soccer terms that are mentioned in the book, all of this an extension of the literacy experience.

I was not familiar with the Soccer Sisters Organisation before reading this book and now I understand that the organisation connects and inspires young girls and women through stories about sports such as this one. Being a Soccer Sister is about being leaders, change makers, creating opportunity, and cultivating healthy lifestyles across the world.

Not only is it a great read for middle school children, by buying this book you are supporting young women in their pursuit of soccer and the confidence to pursue sporting experiences. The author has done a great job at exploring the feelings and thoughts of young women and the exploration of sporting ability and challenges that creates.

I recommend this book and I look forward to seeing the Soccer Sisters making an impact on the sporting world for all young women of the world.

Stay tuned because there are more to come in the series…