[Review] Winger - Andrew Smith

Title of Book : Winger
Author : Andrew Smith
Publisher : Simon & Schuster

A teen at boarding school grapples with life, love, and rugby in a heartbreakingly funny novel.

Ryan Dean West is a fourteen-year-old junior at a boarding school for rich kids. He’s living in Opportunity Hall, the dorm for troublemakers, and rooming with the biggest bully on the rugby team. And he’s madly in love with his best friend Annie, who thinks of him as a little boy.

With the help of his sense of humor, rugby buddies, and his penchant for doodling comics, Ryan Dean manages to survive life’s complications and even find some happiness along the way. But when the unthinkable happens, he has to figure out how to hold on to what’s important, even when it feels like everything has fallen apart.

Filled with hand-drawn infographics and illustrations and told in a pitch-perfect voice, this realistic depiction of a teen’s experience strikes an exceptional balance of hilarious and heartbreaking.

I read Winger for free at Pulseit.com.

Winger is a term for one of the player’s position in Rugby. Wingers are usually the fastest players on the team. This book is about a boy who plays rugby and is a winger on the team. This boy’s name is Ryan Dean West. He’s genius, but always calls himself a loser. He has best friends, and one of them he hopes could be more than best friends.

At first, I thought I would not like this book, because of the rugby references and I don’t know anything about rugby. I also thought that this book is intended for male readers, kind of sport theme book. But no, I was wrong. Winger is a coming of age book. Although probably Ryan Dean is hardly relatable because of him being genius and all, but I feel that I hear almost realistic voice of teenagers. Almost, because I’m a girl and I’m not sure what’s going on around boys’ head his age.

I like most characters in this book. Each one has their own way to make me feel connected to them. But one of the characters that I love most is Joey. He’s Ryan Dean’s new friend. He’s a great character, I got really sad knowing how he ends up in the book.

This book is funny. Ryan Dean is funny. Sometimes I even laughed while reading Winger. Reading this book makes me feel like I was reading his diary. There are also some illustrations in the book which was ‘drawn’ by Ryan Dean.

All in all I love this book. Oh I also think that Ryan Dean is adorable. Younger-brother-adorable kind. But psst! don’t tell him, because he doesn’t like it.