Rating: 
Summary: The Beautiful Game
Review: An inspiring story for young female soccer players and their parents. A true example of commitment, desire, and undying dedication from 16 girls, their coaches, and parents and their love for soccer. Also a great story for any young female in middle school.
Rating:
Summary: Best Soccer Book Out There
Review: As a 13 yr. old soccer player on a travel, middle school team and aspiring to play high school and college soccer as soon as I picked up this book I could not put it down. Not only could I relate with the majority of topics in this book but whenever I've had a bad practice or game I read this book and it encourages me over and over again. I've read so many soccer books and this is the best one I've ever read.I could relate to Shauna and Kim because I had a knee injury this yr. and even though I couldn't play or run or even touch a ball I worked on my hand-eye coordination and watched all the soccer I could soak up. Like other reviews said, I would like to know where these players went to - whether they quit or played college soccer, etc.
Rating:
Summary: Great insights for anyone involved in girls athletics
Review: As a father and long time girls soccer coach, the author has provided me with great insight into girls and their reaction to a demanding woman coach with the highest expectations for her players. Its always difficult to know how hard to push, how demanding to be and how high your expectations can be without turning off your players. Especially as a male coaching females, that question is expecially difficult. The book answers that question and provides much food for thought. I think there are many similarities between this book and John Feinstein's "A Season on the Brink". Great story, well told!!
Rating:
Summary: A good book for the players and parents of youth soccer.
Review: As a parent of a soccer family, I truely appreciated this book. It's about more than just soccer, it's about how we live. The book gives insights into the team's players and parents and the struggles and joys they (and we) share. If your children are involved in youth soccer, this book will touch them and you.
Rating:
Summary: Timely and Topical
Review: As the Women's World Cup fills stadium seats and 6 to 7 million girls are now playing organized soccer, Littman's chronicle of a U-14 girls A level soccer team is somehow exquisitely timely and topical. This is a good book. Not just because you can't wait to see whether the team and it's members are going to meet each succeeding challenge, but because it reflects something new: the girls are defining new roles as the country embraces an old sport. The Beautiful Game not only has the tradition of great sports melodrama, but is also reminicient of the guts and determination of Halberstam's The Amateurs. A great snapshot of a work in progress--women to be, in athletics.
Rating:
Summary: fantastic
Review: considering that i hate reading and i read this book in under two days shows something! It inspired me so much that I am thinking about quitting my soccer team and joining ODP. A book that can do that is obviously powerful.
Rating: 
Summary: THIS IS A BAD BOOK!
Review: DO NOT BUY THIS BOOK! I MEAN YOU
Rating:
Summary: I was there.
Review: I am a girls high school and club coach and I had high hopes for this book, maybe for inspiration, maybe for insight or ideas on how to train my players. I came out with neither. This is a typical story of undisciplined kids that get someone to discipline them and then they become successful. It is very, very close to the same story line and tactics in the movie Hoosiers, only with a young girls soccer team. It does throw in some interesting perspectives about club team rivalries and California soccer, but they are not relevant to other states soccer experience. The types of teams and seasons overlapping do not happen in any state around me. I agree with a previous post that if it was told 5 years after the season and through the eyes of the players it might be a little better. But we never relly know how it affected the kids. How did it help them? How did it help them mature as adults? Where are they now? Most important to me is the impression this might leave for other coaches. This is not necessarily the best way to deal with a girls team. Sometimes it works, others it doesnt. I hope this does not encourage all coaches to do this with girls teams... The positive about his book is in the things parents could learn from this book. I did think the dealing with parents and the attitudes of some parents was humorously accurate. I would suggest all soccer parents read this book and I would suggest players might learn some from this book. But it really could have been alot better...
Rating: 
Summary: Disappointing Beauty
Review: I am a girls high school and club coach and I had high hopes for this book, maybe for inspiration, maybe for insight or ideas on how to train my players. I came out with neither. This is a typical story of undisciplined kids that get someone to discipline them and then they become successful. It is very, very close to the same story line and tactics in the movie Hoosiers, only with a young girls soccer team. It does throw in some interesting perspectives about club team rivalries and California soccer, but they are not relevant to other states soccer experience. The types of teams and seasons overlapping do not happen in any state around me. I agree with a previous post that if it was told 5 years after the season and through the eyes of the players it might be a little better. But we never relly know how it affected the kids. How did it help them? How did it help them mature as adults? Where are they now? Most important to me is the impression this might leave for other coaches. This is not necessarily the best way to deal with a girls team. Sometimes it works, others it doesnt. I hope this does not encourage all coaches to do this with girls teams... The positive about his book is in the things parents could learn from this book. I did think the dealing with parents and the attitudes of some parents was humorously accurate. I would suggest all soccer parents read this book and I would suggest players might learn some from this book. But it really could have been alot better...
Rating:
Summary: an amazing book
Review: I am from Santa Rosa, (where most of this book is based in), and heard it was a good book, so I bought it. I have had to keep myself from reading it at times, because it is a very addictive read. From living in the area and already hearing alot about the team before reading this book, I can personally tell you that this is a very accurate insight. The book is written extremely well, and I think it is an extremely fast read because you get drawn into it very easily. Much of it is thought-provoking, and it is extremely interesting, especially Emiria's coaching style, and the reactions certain players had to other players and certain situations, as well as Emiria. All in all, it is one of the best books I have read in a long time, and it's one I wouldn't mind reading again.....
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