• Age: 12 to 18
• Grade: 4
• Reading age: 9 to 10

This book highlights the achievements of Canadian women sports stars — the role models of today's young female athletes. They fought for the right to compete in sports traditionally dominated by men and proved that women's sports are just as competitive and exciting to watch as men's. Spanning decades, Breaking Through focuses on seven sports and the women who made them their own, including well-known legends such as soccer player Christine Sinclair, who brought women's soccer in Canada into the limelight, and hockey player Hayley Wickenheiser, the longest-serving member of Canada's National team and five-time Olympic medalist. Readers will also see basketball, bobsleigh and rugby represented and learn the stories of less well-known athletes such as Indigenous Cross-country skiers Sharon Anne and Shirley Firth, who faced down prejudice, and Carol Hunyh, who brought home Canada's first Olympic gold medal in women's wrestling.

SUE IRWIN is a teacher and author. Her writing has been published in a variety of children's publications and won several awards. Her Lorimer Recordbook Safety Stars was nominated for the 2017 Non-fiction Silver Birch Award, was on the Canadian Children Book Centre's Best Books for Kids and Teens list, and won the EFTO's Curriculum Development Award. A lifetime sports fan, Sue lives in the Niagara region with her husband.

Sue Irwin's profile page

"[Breaking Through is] a book that encompasses the spirit of female athleticism in Canada, and it contains a number of stories that are important to tell."

CM: Canadian Review of Materials