The Breakaways by Cathy G. Johnson

Summary from Goodreads:

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 is a portrait of friendship in its many forms, and a raw and beautifully honest look into the lives of a diverse and defiantly independent group of kids learning to make room for themselves in the world.

Review:

As I mentioned on Goodreads, If a Raina Telgemeier book and a Lumberjanes book got together and had a love child, it would look something like this. I read this in one sitting. It was sweet, but also believable. I guess my one complaint is that I wish it was longer and I had more time to get to know the characters. There were so many characters, and not enough individual development for me to really care about any of them besides the main character. Maybe I need more installments.

Unlike the last graphic novel I’d read, I actually enjoyed this one a lot more than I thought I would. I usually don’t love middle school novels, but there was something so appealing to me about a misfit group of underdogs on the soccer team…And I’m glad there was because this book was adorable.

I loved Faith. I loved her fantasy story that she was working on throughout the whole thing, something I was not expecting. She has such an imagination. And I of course liked all the misfits on the soccer team. I wish I got to know the characters more because I wanted to love them all. I just didn’t have enough time/focus on the individuals to really get to know them. Hopefully, more installments will happen, so I’ll get this chance.

I love that soccer really was just the background/setting. The center point was friendship and middle school. And every now and then I need a good friendship story. It just so happened that I just finished a book about awful friends, so I guess I needed a good one about good friends to equal that balance for me.

I loved the art too. The whole story is in color, which in itself is awesome. And while the characters looked slightly cartoonish, they also looked real. There was hair, sweat, and zits in all the places they should be in kids hitting puberty. So it was both cartoonish and authentic. I also love how diverse the cast is. Each character was totally different from the next. All in all, this was a lot of fun. I give it an 8/10.