I mentioned Friday that I’ve been intentional to diversify my reads. So, I was delighted for a chance to listen to #Furia on #netgalley (swipe for goodreads synopsis)

This was a #reesewitherspoonbookclub YA pick and Reese almost never steers me wrong! This is no exception.

I might not be the intended audience of @yamilesmendez (mid 30s, white, stay at home mom, never played a sport), but I loved listening to Camila’s first-person perspective on combating her culture and family to achieve her dreams. I loved the narration (totally recommend listening!), and really loved hearing the little flex between English and Spanish here and there.
There are major girl power ✌️ vibes, and a really great underlying romance wrapped up in this story. ⭐️⭐️⭐️💫

This audio was incredible!!! I love that the narrator was from Argentina herself and did an amazing job with the accent and the voice of the characters. The narrator also sang the fútbol chants and it was so so fun to listen too!! I high recommend the audiobook version of this novel!

I LOVED this #ownvoices contemporary YA novel set in Rosario, Argentina. This story follows rising soccer star, Camila Hassan, as she follows her passion of playing soccer and dreams of earning an athletic scholarship to a North American university. She juggles all of this while dealing with the complications her disapproving family and life in Rosario presents. Because her parents believe women aren’t allowed to play soccer, that it’s a man’s sport!! There’s also a little of romance thrown in the story! But more than anything, this story is about Camila “La Furia” Hassan growing into the badass soccer star she is!

I loved how this story shows us about life and culture in Rosario! I loved the representation and the diversity shown within the Latin American community! Furia herself discussed her Russian, Palestinian, and African roots. The author also discusses heavier topics like feminicidos “feminine homicide”, domestic violence, sexism, and social inequalities. She also mentions Ni Una Menos, a feminist movement which started in Argentina and aims to end violence against women.

This has been my favorite YA sports fiction book of the year and I couldn’t recommend it more! Thank you to @yamilesmendez for writing such a powerful story and to @algonquinyr for the gifted copy!

Thank you Workman Audio and NetGalley for an audio ARC of Furia by Yamile Saied Mende. This is about the love of futbol and being a young girl growing up in Argentina. Furia loves futbol but only boys can play it and the family has put their sights on Furia’s brother Pablo. He plays and is very good so the family puts all their energy into him succeeding and rescuing the family from their poverty. Another local boy, Diego, has already made it into professional fit ok so they know it can happen.
Furia is a quiet, good girl that is very careful not to ruffle the waters. When her father gets angry he becomes abusive so everyone does everything to not let that happen. But Furia loves futbol and so sneaks away when she is suppose to be studying to become a doctor and plays on the evening league of a women’s futbol team. When she becomes La Furia, she realizes she could go further than expected but only if she keeps her focus on futbol. That becomes difficult when her childhood friend, Diego, comes back to town.
I listed to this book and the narrator, Sol Madariaga was very good. The recording itself was very scratchy and sounded like the narrator was talking in a tunnel but I loved the story and was able to listen through that.
I would definitely recommend this for anyone that loves YA, coming of age books. Especially those that show a strong culture story of having to change that culture to be what you want to be.
#Netgalley #WorkmanAudio #Furia

Oh my goodness, what a wonderful surprise this book was!

The first thing you need to know about Furia is this - if you’re a soccer fan, this book was made for you… and if you’re not a soccer fan, well hold on to your cleats because you’re about to become one!

Meet Camila, a hardworking, ambitious teenager with big dreams, from Rosario, Argentina. She also has a secret alter-ego - LA FURIA, one of the most talented up-and-coming fútbol stars of her generation… her family just doesn’t know it yet.

Camila dreams of playing soccer professionally, ideally in the United States where her heroes and favorite fellow-women players play… but there are a lot of obstacles standing in her way.

Not only is women’s soccer not respected in Rosario, but her family does not support Camila’s dreams of being a “futbolera” either …despite their avid support of her brother’s professional soccer career and her father’s own sporting past.

To make things even more complicated, Diego, her first love and international soccer star of the legendary Juventus FC, is back in town and looking to reconnect. But should she give their relationship another chance? Or will it distract her from her upcoming soccer tournament, a huge opportunity where talent scouts from around the world will be searching for new players for their teams?!

Furia is such a fun, inspiring story, especially for young women… but it also has a lot of depth. Important topics like feminism, misogyny and machismo, and violence against women (including domestic violence and femicide) are prominent throughout this story, as well as discussions about socio-economic stability, opportunity, and financial privilege.

I listened to this book on audio and it was a fantastic listening experience - Sol Madariaga is a spectacular narrator whose engaging storytelling style made me laugh, cry, rage, and cheer! She gave so much to her narrator and even sang the book's fútbol chants and cheers! I hope to find more audiobooks narrated by her in the future because she is officially one of my new favorite narrators!

I absolutely adored this book and I wish I knew more young women to share it with. I highly recommend this one to anyone who could use a genuine, uplifting, and inspiring story right now.

I loved this book! What an excellent Reese YA book pick. Family drama, a sweet romance and a strong character.
I enjoyed learning about this characters experience growing up in Argentina as well as women in sports.

My goodness, I loved this book so much! Camila, is a 17-year-old girl living in Rosaria with her parents and her talented fútbol-playing brother, a rising star on the local team. However, she is living a double-life, on the one hand playing the role of the dutiful daughter and sister at home, and a fútbol star in her own right (aka La Furia) outside of the house. She keeps that life secret from her family, knowing they would either use her talent for monetary gains (her abusive father) or they would stop her from playing because it is not right for a girl to play soccer once they hit puberty (her mom and much of the town). Additionally, her childhood best friend and first love returns to town. Diego has now made it big in Italy and still loves her. She realizes she never stopped loving him, but she also knows her love and passion for the game and her dreams of playing for an International team cannot be stopped. This book covered the plight of women and girls in Argentina, as well as domestic abuse, the kidnapping of females, especially young girls, teen pregnancy, some of the complicated nuances of race in Argentina (she is on the darker spectrum in terms of skin color), and being able to have more than one dream and finding the strength to not give up on the ones that allow your heart to sing. I loved Furia so much and really appreciated this #ownvoices novel. I did listen to this novel and loved hearing the gentle accent of the narrator, as well as the correct pronunciation of the names and occasional Spanish words. For me, personally, I felt that it added to the #ownvoices feel of the story, but I know I would have enjoyed this story regardless. Some tears were definitely shed for this book, but it was not all sad, and the ending was both inspiring and uplifting. I highly recommend this story!

Special thanks to the author and publisher, and also to Netgalley for this advance review copy in exchange for my honest review.

No one is bringing down Furia! A talented young woman who vowed to prove herself to the world and did exactly that despite all the challenges and discrimination she encountered. She may be young, but she is full of compassion, courage, and determination. I find her very relatable because not only is she pursuing a sport that is male dominated but also not having the support from the people you expect will be there for you is difficult. Unfortunately, there are still places that focus on being prejudice rather than see the person as a human and equally talented and intelligent. I love that the author tackles different family structures and dynamics and gender equality. There is also romance in this book, which is so cute and inspiring. But I am drawn how empowered our young woman lead, and I highly recommend this book if you are into sports-themed (futbol), cute romance, charming characters, and inspirational read.⁣

I loved Furia so much! This was one of my favorite books of the year so far. I love a good YA and an #OwnVoices novel, even better! Camila/Furia was such a strong and independent female lead. She has one dream, to make it out of Argentina and reach the US to play soccer professionally. With an overbearing father, a dangerous town, and numerous setbacks, Camila does everything it takes to make her dreams happen.

I did a combo of audio and ebook for Furia. I did enjoy the audibook narrator however I think I liked reading this story even more. I usually listen to audibooks at a faster speed than 1.0 and I found myself wanting to read the words and not rush through them. Overall, such a great read and listen!

I've seen this book going around on my social media and had to get my hands on it. I've never read a book or seen a movie where the protagonist was from Argentina. This was something that excited me to learn about. I'm not a sports fan so it was also interesting to learn about soccer and those who play it. It was a great story, although the ending felt rushed. Looking forward to reading more from this author.
Thank you to NetGalley and publisher for providing the audiobook.

I have received this ARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Furia brought me back to my soccer days. Oh man, my ninja self scoring left and right on the field. Was I a rising star? Psh - no. Was I good enough? Probably in my mind. Did I enjoy it? For a while but then I definitely started to hate the sport. I don't even watch soccer on TV anymore.

Back to the book, now Camila is good - like really good - at soccer. She was unapologetically herself in every way, shape, and form. Even if she had two personalities, she was amazing in my eyes and definitely someone to look out for. Unfortunately for her, she has to hide this secret bad ass side of herself because her family doesn't seem it to be valuable to or for her.

It's a shame when someone makes a decision for you and that's that. Which is why I loved that she never gave it up and stuck with it. Camila worked hard every day and put over one hundred percent into it as well. She was very dedicated and it showed. It was mesmerizing to read/listen to because one should never want to squash a kids dreams.

In the end, I adored this book. I loved getting to see what her family life was like and just for her to grow throughout the book as well. Definitely recommend this one!

4.5 stars

CW: [On-page domestic violence and emotional abuse. Discussion of murder and misogyny in society (hide spoiler)]

I’m crying so hard right now. This book isn’t perfect and the end needed more time to breathe (too much happened in a rush), but I have ALL THE FEELS. Gah. I am incoherent.

Going into Furia I had high expectations because of all of the good reviews it was getting. I was actually let down immensely. I actually really enjoyed the setting of Argentina, I don’t think I have read a book set there so that was refreshing for me.

Now for Camila as a person, she got on my nerves a lot. She has the “not like other girls” syndrome. Her feelings for Diego were very wishy washy to me, one day she would be in love with him and then the next she would tell him to leave her alone and then she would go back and forth and her that got so old. Because of that I felt like the romance didn’t add much and Camila liked the concept of Diego rather than actually have feelings for him. She also felt like she had to hide this romance from her best friend and claiming that she wouldn't understand her so that was really odd to me and bugged me a LOT.

For all of the hyped up talk claiming that this book was extremely feminist-yes, it did have it’s points but for the most part I didn’t actually see much of that. Camila doesn’t stand up for herself, lies A LOT to her family and friends, and she doesn’t tell people what is on her mind or how she’s feeling. It drove me insane that she just lied to everyone, including her best friend. I felt that she was a little petty too. I expected a much stronger character with Camila. I did like some of the topics that were covered but I felt they were breezed through.. I’m happy with the ending, I actually liked the last maybe 20% of the book but as for the rest of it, nothing really happens and was quite a drag to read. The narrator did do a great job though so I did enjoy that.