Book Review: “We Ride Upon Sticks” by Quan Barry

You don’t need to be a field hockey player from the 1990s to love this book, nor do you need to have a keen interest in the lore of the Salem Witch trials. If you can check those boxes, the Stantons can pretty much guarantee you will LOVE this book. The rest of you will have to take our word for it. The Stanton family has spent many years in the singular world of field hockey as a player, coach, and supportive family on the sidelines, so we are no strangers to the lengths a team will go to in order to boost morale and grab that “W”.  But we have NEVER seen the likes of this team. The premise of a desperate field hockey team at UNH summer camp signing a lined notebook named “Emilio” (yes, Estevez) – maybe making a pact with the Devil – in order to rise to fame and glory is too good to pass up.  You’ll root for the characters, laugh at the spot-on nineties references, and ache for the teenage girls trying to find their way in an often indifferent world. But they have each other. And the book. And maybe some magicked sticks…

Review by Johnna and Brian Stanton. 

Click here to request a copy.

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