Kick

Product Information

Meski begitu, Budi tidak serta merta kehabisan akal, dengan kepolosannya dia mulai melancarkan aksinya.

Mitch Johnson has skilfully used football as a vehicle to present many deeper issues. By doing so, the theme of football will grab the attention of many readers and gives a tangible way into the more complex strands of narrative.

LoveReading4Kids Says

The book begins and we also meet his friend Rochy who is, like Budi, a massive fan of football and there is a lot of focus in here on their mutual dreams and their connection of friendship through this shared love of football. Unfortunately the reality of Budi’s life is very different. He lives in Jakarta in a cramped dwelling with his extended family. He works in a sweat shop producing football boots for a company of ‘white men’. His uncle is in prison and soon his father finds himself on the wrong side of the law. The last thing Budi needs is to inadvertently become involved with The Dragon – the most feared man in Jakarta. For that reason, part of me does understand why the cover has been done that way. However, forgetting about the target audience and doing my job as a book reviewer, I would certainly say that the merits of this book are so much higher than that cover.

I’m conflicted as a reader. I rooted for Budi through the entire story, hoping that he would get his big break into the footballing world but the reality is that only a tiny percentage of dreamers get that opportunity. I was pleased with how Mitch Johnson reached a conclusion to the story.Budi works in a footwear factory in Indonesia, making the football boots he longs to wear but is unlikely to ever afford. His ambition is to be a famous football player for a team like Real Madrid, but Budi’s reality is rather different. The conditions in the sweatshop are appalling, and instead of the luxurious life enjoyed by his idols, Budi has to go without food to manage on his tiny salary and live under constant threat of abuse and intimidation from the factory foreman. And when Budi attracts the notice of the dangerous Dragon, it seems less and less likely that he will ever achieve his dream. This debut comes out this month in September; it is a book primarily for teenagers (though this is fairly compatible with a certain type of adult reader!) and it follows a boy named Budi in who lives in Indonesia with his parents and his paternal grandmother; the family are very poor and they cannot afford to send Budi to school so he works in a factory which makes football boots for professional players. It is focused on ambition; it's focused on following dreams; it's focused on the injustice of a legal system, among many other things. The main focus of the novel is Budi's strong ambition to become a professional footballer and there are disadvantages barring that dream: 1) because of his poverty and therefore that situation being, at first glance, next to impossible and 2) Budi also has a genetically passed down condition which prevents his blood from clotting properly so not only does a cut need to be tended to a lot so as to prevent constant bleeding but also, he could potentially start bleeding internally due to an injury and not be aware of that until he dies suddenly. On the front of the book, it has the quote: "The Only Thing Standing In His Way Is Everything" and that is really symbolised through the telling of this story. Whilst 'training' with his friends, his football crashes through a window of The Dragon's house, in trouble and with nowhere to go he follows one of the Dragon's brothers into the house where he is tasked with theft or finding his family out on the street and struggling to survive. The real cover will be different to my proof cover (the proof is just yellow!) but it is the real cover I have a problem with. It's not a bad cover but it makes it look like a children's book. Apart from the quote, there are barely any hints there to do with the themes it discusses in terms of Indonesian poverty and the ridiculous justice system there (this book goes into really great detail on those points!), nor does the cover indicate the genuinely deep emotional story that this book has.