Astrid and Nicole have been best friends since fifth grade, but now they're 12 and cracks are beginning to show in their friendship. After a night at the roller derby to see Portland's Rose City Rollers, Astrid is obsessed with it, including a star skater named Rainbow Bite. Now, she wants to go to derby camp. There's just one problem - Astrid doesn't know how to skate. Nicole, on the other hand, is a great skater, but couldn't care less about roller derby. Her interest is in ballet...and boys.
But because they are best friends, Astrid automatically assumes that Nicole will want to go to derby camp, too. So you can imagine Astrid's disappointment when Nicole tells her she doesn't want to do that for the summer, but is going to ballet camp instead. Not only that, but Nicole has a new close friend, Rachel, who used to be their enemy. Meanwhile, Astrid's mom, Mrs Vasquez, has signed Astrid up for the Junior Derby Camp, believing Nicole is also going and that her mother will be picking the girls up after camp.
Derby camp is rough, tough and stressful, particularly since Astrid doesn't know how to skate and is the only real beginner there. Yet, despite the bumps and bruises, and the very long, hot walk home to keep up the charade that her friendship with Nicole is fine and that her mother is driving them home, Astrid sticks with it. It's really hard, tiring work, but when her coach sees Astrid walking home, she tells her to take her skates home to get more practice and build up her confidence, she hesitates. The next day, her coach suggest that they practice skating outdoors. It's Astrid's first good day, and she even works up the courage to leave a fangirl note on Rainbow Bite's locker.
Thought things begin to look up for her, there are still some difficult lesson for Astrid to learn before school begins, including trying to reconcile with Nicole, some mother-daughter problems when she is caught in her lie, and accepting just who she is and that it's OK to be different. But the most important lesson is learning to be a good sport and a team player, whether it's roller derby or personal relationships.
Roller Girl is such a wonderful coming of age story, and the graphic format is the perfect medium for it. The colorful panels done by author Victoria Jamieson are all clearly and distinctly illustrated and really capture Astrid's broad range of moods and feelings (and they are broad, she is 12, after all). And roller derby is the perfect metaphor for the ups and downs of Astrid's life the summer before she begins junior high school.
The bumps and bruises Astrid gets while learning to skate and then learning to skate competitively mirror the themes Jamieson explores in the novel, like identity and experimentation (Astrid's blue hair and fake nose ring), perseverance and failure, old and new relationships, change and acceptance. The angst of being that age really rings true to tween life, and isn't so different than when I, or for that matter, my Kiddo, was Astrid's age. And Astrid is such a multi-layered, fully dimensional character that she is someone readers won't easily forget, even if they have not interest in roller derby.
If you haven't read Roller Girl yet, I highly recommend it.
This book is recommended for readers age 9+
This book was an eBook borrowed from Libby by Overdrive
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