Review Detail

Valeria Salomón lives in Utah with her grandmother (Lita) and grandfather, who is also her soccer coach for the Overlords. Her parents were very young when she was born, and her father has only visited her five times, since he lives on the east coast and travels a lot as a photographer. Val loves soccer, and is a very good player. She's played with the Overlords for years, and her best friend, Sasha used to be on the team as well. Now, however, Val is the only girl on the team. Her grandmother and father are supposed to come to a crucial game, but the family is devastated to find out that her Tia Antonello in Argentina is not doing well at all. Lita packs up to go, and Val's father joins her. Val isn't feeling well during the game, and realizes too late that it's because she's gotten her period. A time out is called, and the entire team changes from white to black shorts. Distracted, Val blows a play and feels embarassed and awful... until she finds out that Abuelo found out during the game that her aunt has died. Since he's had a tumultuous relationship with the aunt, he doesn't handle things well, and Val decides to stay next door at Sasha's house, where her mother gets her period supplies and tries to help her through the difficult days. Eventually, Lita comes home... with Antonella's son Maxwell in tow. Since it's summer, he has time to settle in to living in Val's father's old room, and even starts to play with the Overlords, since Val was kicked off. Val thinks it's unfair, but her grandmother points out that if she wants to be considered for the Olypic Development Program, she needs to play on a girls' team. The best coach out there is Linda Blume, but when Val calls her, Coach Blume tells her that her team is full, and she's just missed the try out period. Undaunted, Val goes to her house and explains why she didn't go through the tryouts. She gets on the Amazon team as the 19th player on the roster. Still stinging from being kicked off the boys' team, Val doesn't do well at first. Eventually, she starts to realize that she's not playing WITH the team, but is just trying to showcase her own skills. Once she figures this out, she starts to play better, and Sasha helps her connect socially with her teammates. Lita jumps in to full soccer mom mode, bringing her knitting and sitting between Maxwell and Val's teams. Abuela may be struggling with his daughter's death, and letting the other coach, José, work with the team, but Maxwell is slowly acclimating to his new home situation. When both Maxwell and Valeria have a big tournament, Val's dad comes in, and there's plenty of team drama as the Overlords and the Amazons play for their respective league trophies.