Good book, Cinderella from a Canadian slant.
Cindy Winters loves hockey. Her teammates the Blister Sisters and Coach Blister keep her busy on the bench and she doesn't get to play. Her fairy goaltender helps her try out for Coach Prince's team.
Great selection for all ages of the Blue Spruce audience
Recommended ( )

Cindy loves to play hockey but it is an expensive sport to play and her family is poor. Showing great determination and resourcefulness, Cindy is excited to finally join a neighbourhood team. Unfortunately, at the rink, Cindy encounters three nasty Blister Sisters who make playing hockey very unpleasant. Thank goodness Cindy has a fairy goaltender watching out for her and Coach Prince is determined to match the shiny skate to the player who wore it during the tryouts.

A really delightful "spin" on the Cinderella story. I like the idea of using this as inspiration for creating "original" takes on well known fairy tales and/or making connections.

This book led to a great discussion between Jake and I over books that really aren't our thing. He took one look at the book and said -- Mom -- this book is for girls and I am NOT A GIRL. We talked about him reading it and rating it based on the merit of the book and not on the subject matter or who the book is directed towards. I told him to pretend he was his friend Brianna (that led to an entirely different discussion, which I will not print here) and to review it based on her perspective. Anyway -- here is our review. Please take into consideration that I had no sleep last night while reading my part of the review : )
Suggested Reading: FOR GIRLS (and Mom says boys too - LOL) Ages 6 - 9



Jake's Review: Mom this is a girls book (mom's note: read note at beginning of post) Ok I am going to pretend I am Brianna and tell you what I think that she would think about it. It's a funny story that is like the author was telling Cinderella using a girl hockey player. I love the pictures and want to read some BOYS books with the same pictures. The story was sort of sad, because Cindy really was a good hockey player and the mean coach and her daughters wouldn't let her play. (Mom's note: this again led to a great discussion about parents coaching and showing preferences for their own kids). I think girls Brianna's (8.5) age and younger would really like it. It's cool that girls get to play hockey. I thought (and so would Brianna I think) that the Fairy Goaltender and the Zamboni parts were really funny. I didn't like the coach who was also the mom of the two bully hockey players, she was really mean and the picture of her was scary.

Jake's Rating: 9/10 (But only if it was a girl reading it, cuz it's a girls book you know)

Mom's Review: Can I tell you how much I loved this book. I LOVED this book. It was a delightfully fun modern twist on the Cinderella story. I loved the fact that the coach was the mom of the two Blister Sisters. Trust me if you are a parent you will or have already dealt with parents who coach and show preferential treatment to their own kids. I loved the character of Cindy, a smart and resourceful girl who saves up her own money to play, because her parents cannot afford it. Slight dry humor and the authors' fabulous illustrations also really add to the story. I am a fan of Kevin Sylvester's books and met him at the OLA conference last year. He just really knows how to write/illustrate books that kids will love. We will keep this book in our collection and pass it around to some young girls who I know will adore this book as much as I did.

Mom's Rating: 10/10

We won this from Talking with Tundra and we didn't have to review it, we just wanted to -- well Jake wasn't really into it this time around, but you know what I mean : ) ( )