Customer Reviews

Pretty Good for a Girl: The Autobiography of a Snowboarding Pioneer

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I bought this book for my 16 year old cousin and read it myself before I mailed it. Basich has a great story to tell and the book is a joy to read. With her affable tone and clear joy for life she'll make you feel like a skater-girl pro-snowboarding insider, even if you're a grandpa or a businesswoman. Great fun!

I don't know anything about snowboarding and wasn't especially interested in it, but the title of this book caught my attention. God knows I heard "pretty good for a girl" often enough when I was growing up. Once I started Tina Basich's book, I was hooked.

She tells of growing up in a Sacramento suburb and going to an alternative school where art and music were stressed. Her parents kept the TV in a closet only to be brought out for special occasions, such as the Olympics. Basich and her younger brother entertained themselves by drawing, composing and playing music, staging shows, skateboarding, and reading. By the time she went to high school (a public high school), she was accomplished in a number of fields and her hero was Nadia Comaneci.

Basich tells of discovering snowboarding, becoming a pro, losing a friend to breast cancer and organizing snowboarding events to raise money for cancer research and education, and having several close calls of her own on the slopes. She talks about competitions, travels, and romances. She has a easy-to-read conversational style and the book is filled with photos and drawings.

Snowboarders will enjoy the story of how she perfected the backside 720 over a 60-foot jump, as well as the descriptions of competitions and the name-dropping. And everyone who has heard (or said) the words "pretty good for a girl" will enjoy the success story of a focused young woman.

This book is awesome. I opened it and finished it in its entirety in one sitting. It was such an exciting read. I just recently started snowboarding and am totally psyched about it. Tina's changes in life are definitely relatable. She is an inspiration to me because there are so many girls who side-track themselves due to heartbreaking, intellectually debased boys. I've seen it happen all too often and has happened to me as well. To stay focused on your own goals and not let life get in the way is so difficult. Guys seem to have no problem doing it, but she proved that girls can pull it together too.

oh yeah, the foo fighters suck.

I just finished "Pretty Good for a Girl" by Tina Basich. Really an inspirational read for anyone interested in sports and good life lessons.

I can't wait share it with my 14 year old niece. Fun, easy read...highly recommended!

I would say book came in great condition but little late. I guess because of X-mas time.

I have never been snowboarding and I loved the book. The author is an accomplished snowboarder who tells her personal story in an entertaining, personal, and humorous way. At times the book reads as if the author is talking to you as a personal friend sharing her adventures. There are some very funny stories in the book. I highly recommend it.

I read this after reading P3: Pipes, parks, and powder. At first, I thought of it as the girl version of Todd Richard's book (P3) and didn't want to read it. But I read it, it's not just for girls. Any boarder will enjoy it. Maybe the pink cover turns off guy readers, ha, ha.

Review of the book Pretty Good For a Girl by Tina Basich
I loved this book, January 7,2004
Reviewer: Ashton Leutner
I absolutely loved this book! I could relate to Tina in so many ways. I also like the story of her becoming a pro-snowboarder. She is one of my female snowboarding idols. I also look up to her for making a "boarding for breast cancer" campaign that raises thousands of dollars every year that goes to researching breast cancer. Her life as being a professional snowboarder is exactly what I want to be when I grow up. I feel like her in many ways, such as not fitting in and always hanging out with a group of skateboarding guys. I also respect her for being one of the main snowboarding pioneers , not to mention one of the first girls to get up and do competitions against guys. I loved the truth in this book and how she knows what its like not being the most popular kid in school. You should really check out this book!

Having graduated college, I think I was too well educated to read this book. It was so, like, 7th graderish. This book isn't very well written. It jumps around a bit, leaving the reader confused. For example, Tina talks about how she got a car soon after getting her drivers license, but then mentions that she crashed it a year later. So after reading about how she crashed it, she continues talking about how she drove everywhere. Fortunately, you can tell that Tina starts to mature a little bit as a writer near the end of the book. The other problem that I had with this book is that she tries to make women seem more disadvantaged than they really are. While there are 10x less professional women snowboarders, there are 10x as many male snowboarders, so it all evens out. Women have been a big part of snowboarding since it's inception, so I am therefore not convinced of her adversity. She does get credit back, though, because of her participation in the Boarding for Breast Cancer program. Overall, I'd skip this book and read "Hawk: Occupation: Skateboarder" if you are into the "Action" sports books or "Swimming to Antarctica" if you want a women-pushing-the-sport type of book.