Category: Sports

Total Suplex Of The Heart by Joanne Starer & Ornella Greco

About halfway through this slice-of-life graphic novel, I realized that what I was reading felt too deeply personal to be anything less than semi-autobiographical. So when I got to Joanne Starer’s afterword, discussing how this story was based on her own life, I was both unsurprised and deeply moved by the grace and honesty she …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2024/06/27/total-suplex-of-the-heart-by-joanne-starer-ornella-greco/

Big Shot (Diary Of A Wimpy Kid #16) by Jeff Kinney

Jms really wanted to read this installment of the Diary Of A Wimpy Kid series together, and I was happy to continue the sports theme here and oblige! I’m actually really glad we got a chance to, and for more reasons than just one. In Big Shot, our hero Greg Heffley details his various disastrous …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2023/07/28/big-shot-diary-of-a-wimpy-kid-16-by-jeff-kinney/

Fuzzy Baseball Vol. 5: Baseballoween by John Steven Gurney

Between watching Arsenal play in person (twice!) and the Women’s World Cup, it has been a satisfyingly sports-mad week for me. Why not keep the streak going with this adorable graphic novel featuring anthropomorphic animals getting together to play baseball? The Fernwood Valley Fuzzies are enjoying the start of their off-season before they figure out …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2023/07/26/fuzzy-baseball-vol-5-baseballoween-by-john-steven-gurney/

The Tryout: A Graphic Novel by Christina Soontornvat & Joanna Cacao

Author Christina Soontornvat wasn’t sure whether anyone would care about her experiences with middle school, but was eventually persuaded to write about one of the most cringe episodes of her own pre-teen career in this wryly moving graphic novel. I’m so glad she did. It’s not easy being one of the few Thai people in …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2022/09/09/the-tryout-a-graphic-novel-by-christina-soontornvat-joanna-cacao/

World Class by Jay Sandlin, Patrick Mulholland, Rebecca Nalty & Justin Birch

Adrian “The Colombian Cannon” Molina is obsessed with football and dreams of being recruited to Nottingham FC. He knows he has talent, but he also knows he has a lot of work to do despite being a part of the Bogota Condors, Colombia’s premier U17 football team. During an exhibition match against England’s Regents United, …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2022/04/12/world-class-by-jay-sandlin-patrick-mulholland-rebecca-nalty-justin-birch/

Why We Fly by Kimberly Jones & Gilly Segal

Oof, this is a gut punch of a book, that tackles not only how racism affects high school athletes but also how relationships fade away as graduation and college loom nearer. Eleanor “Leni” Greenberg and Chanel “Nelly” Irons are best friends and members of their high school’s competitive cheerleading team. In the summer leading up …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2022/04/08/why-we-fly-by-kimberly-jones-gilly-segal/

Like Other Girls by Britta Lundin

A coming-of-age novel with a queer country girl narrator playing sports and learning to interrogate her internalized misogyny while embracing who she is despite the opposition of certain members of her small town, including her nearest and dearest? I was wholly on-board even before I started reading Britta Lundin’s terrific, lived-in prose, and now I …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2021/08/12/like-other-girls-by-britta-lundin/

Above All Else by Dana Alison Levy

When I was younger, I loved a good climb. Mostly of trees and free-standing structures, tho if I’d had a shot at a climbing wall, I’d have totally been up for that, too. So when my college roommates invited me to join the hiking club, you’d think I’d be all in. Unfortunately, club hiking required …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2020/10/26/above-all-else-by-dana-alison-levy/

Every Reason We Shouldn’t (Every Reason We Shouldn’t #1) by Sara Fujimura

As a teenager who never really “fit in” but who got along just fine with my peers because I was happy with myself and didn’t really care about what other people thought, my number one favorite kind of novel was about protagonists who didn’t fit in and didn’t really care either. You know how rare …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2020/03/03/every-reason-we-shouldnt-every-reason-we-shouldnt-1-by-sara-fujimura/

The Silver Linings Playbook by Matthew Quick

Y’all, that was delightful. Ngl, I totally pictured Bradley Cooper and JLaw in the roles (and had to suffer the cognitive dissonance of her being way too young to play Tiffany) but that aside, I was incredibly moved by this surprisingly gentle tale of lost love, mental illness and sports fandom. Pat Peoples is not …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2019/02/11/the-silver-linings-playbook-by-matthew-quick/