Nazi England, 2014. Jessika Keller is a good girl–a champion ice skater, model student of the Bund Deutscher Mädel and dutiful daughter of the Greater German Reich. Her best friend, Clementine, is not so submissive. Passionately different, Clem is outspoken, dangerous and radical. And the regime has noticed. Jess cannot keep both her perfect life and her dearest friend, her first love.
Paulina, nicknamed Feather, leaves her piano to take up boxing, showing her father and brothers that she will stand up for herself.
Andrew Larsen’s simple yet evocative story sets the right tone for the youngest children, who can relate to the boy’s disappointment about missing the exciting nighttime game and his fears that he won’t be able to fall asleep. Jacqui Lee’s illustrations in soothing greens and blues are done in a blend of nostalgic and contemporary styles that suit the story’s timelessness. This book provides all of the appeal of the perfect bedtime story: the reassurance of caring parents tucking the boy in and then coming back later to check on him, the bedtime routine, the atmospheric winter night outside while it’s cozy and snug inside, and the promise of dreams come true.
When Matt’s online friend, Free Throw, finally comes to Bragg Creek for a visit, the first thing they do is get a team together for the summer basketball league. Unfortunately, Matt’s archenemy has had the same idea.
I am Lou Brown: Social outcast, precocious failure, 5’10” and still growing. I was on the fast track to the Olympic superstardom. Now, I’m training boys too cool to talk to me. In a sport I just made up. In a fish tank. My life has quickly become very weird.
African-American football player Chuck Ealey grew up in a segregated neighborhood of Portsmouth, Ohio. Against all odds, he became an incredible quarterback. But despite his unbeaten record in high school and university, he would never play professional football in the United States.
With every boy in a small Quebec town wearing the sweater of the Montreal Canadiens to play hockey, one child is horrified when, because of a mail order mix-up, he is forced to wear a Toronto Maple Leafs sweater.
An orphaned girl in a Ugandan refugee camp. A former child soldier in the Sudan. When survival is the priority, something as simple and normal as play seems to be a luxury that these children can do without. But Right to Play is changing that perception. Founding in 2000 by Norwegian Olympic medalist Johann Olav Koss, Right to Play begins at the grassroots community level, using sports and games to teach at-risk and underprivileged children around the world important values like self-esteem, empathy, and peace.
“Where there’s a ball . . . there will always be someone who wants to play soccer. Whether in Tanzania or Togo, Burma or Brazil, children love soccer. GOAL! celebrates the sport’s power to bridge cultural divides and bring together the many and diverse people of the world. Filled with fun facts and striking photos, this book is a poetic snapshot of soccer around the globe.
9-year-old Gabe (Gabriella) Murray lives and breathes hockey. She’s the youngest player on her new team, she has a nifty move that her teammates call “the Gabe,” and she shares a lucky number with her hero, Hayley Wickenheiser: number 22. But when her coach hands out the team jerseys, Gabe is stuck with number 9. Crushed, Gabe wants to give up hockey altogether. How can she play without her lucky number? Gabe’s grandmother soon sets her straight, though–from her own connection to the number 9 in her hockey-playing days to all the greats she cheered for who wore it, she soon convinces Gabe that this new number might not be so bad after all.