Quiet, sensitive Faith starts middle school already worrying about how she will fit in. To her surprise, Amanda, a popular eighth grader, convinces her to join the school soccer team, the Bloodhounds. Having never played soccer in her life, Faith ends up on the C team, a ragtag group that's way better at drama than at teamwork. Although they are awful at soccer, Faith and her teammates soon form a bond both on and off the soccer field that challenges their notions of loyalty, identity, friendship, and unity.
The Breakaways from Cathy G. Johnson is a raw, and beautifully honest graphic novel that looks into the lives of a diverse and defiantly independent group of kids learning to make room for themselves in the world.
1 of 1 copy available
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Creators
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Publisher
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Release date
March 5, 2019 -
Formats
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Kindle Book
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OverDrive Read
- ISBN: 9781250249388
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Languages
- English
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Levels
- ATOS Level: 2.2
- Lexile® Measure: 460
- Interest Level: 4-8(MG)
- Text Difficulty: 0-2
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Reviews
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February 1, 2019
Gr 4-8-Faith has just joined the Bloodhounds, the middle school girls' soccer C team, made up of the least skilled players. But this isn't one of those heartwarming sports stories where an inspirational coach rallies the underdogs to victory. Instead, these Dogs lose every game and feud with one another while the coach spends most practices on his phone. Vignettes show the players' varied home lives, interests, and friendship dramas. Sketchy full-color artwork features characters with exaggerated expressions. Faith and her teammates are diverse in body type and ethnicity. One player comes out as trans and another as queer during the course of the story, and both have supportive friends. Readers who like a touch of romance will enjoy seeing two sweet relationships blossom on the page. Realistic scenes of school, soccer practice, and sleepovers are interspersed with Faith's daydreams about adventures on horseback with a handsome butch royal messenger named Mathilda, who inspires Faith to unite her misfit teammates, team or no team. VERDICT A down-to-earth friendship story for readers of Svetlana Chmakova's Awkward, Jennifer L. Holm's Sunny Side Up, and Raina Telgemeier's Drama.-Sarah Stone, San Francisco Public Library
Copyright 2019 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.
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July 1, 2019
Colors by Kevin Czap. On the first day of middle school, popular girl Amanda recruits fifth grader Faith for the soccer team. Faith winds up on the bottom-of-the-barrel C team, along with a bunch of misfits. The teammates slowly bond and--realistically--never improve at soccer. Johnson's expressive graphic-novel panels show a diverse cast with all sorts of body types, skin colors, and sexual and gender identities.(Copyright 2019 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)
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