Bend It Like Beckham

Author: Narinder Dhami

Genre: YA

Publisher: Hodder Children's Books

Year April 2002

Blurb: If you're 18, love Beckham and can bend a ball like him then the world must be your oyster, right? Wrong. If you're Jess - 18, Indian and a girl - forget it.

Jess just wants to play football but her wedding-obsessed parents have other ideas so she hides it from them. But when Jess and her friend Jules join a ladies team and get spotted by a talent scout, it all kicks off...

The Bend it Like Beckham movie was a box-office hit, starring Parminder Nagra, Kiera Knightley and Jonathathan Rhys Meyers.

Sample