"Rich, poignant. Don't think of this as just a Hoosiers in the tundra. It's a heartfelt homage to a proud, indigenous people."
--People Magazine

"Captivating, spirited, sensitive, exhilarating. D'Orso has a gift for bringing ball games to life."
--The Washington Post

"More than a sports story, a striking portrait of a community. With a ghostlike presence, D'Orso lends a voice to a place that deserves to be known."
--Publishers Weekly (starred review)

"The best book on Alaska since Jon Krakauer's Into the Wild."
--The Orlando Sentinel

"A look at a part of America few people know."
--The Wall Street Journal

"A masterpiece; not to be missed."
--Native Peoples Magazine

"A pleasure from start to finish."
--The Arizona Republic

"A fascinating book..."
--The Portland Oregonian

"Brilliant."
--The Denver Post

"An engrossing, often nail-biting, lump-in-your-throat portrait of a place that, once you've read the book, doesn't seem so desolate after all."
--Forbes Magazine

"D'Orso's writing soars,not a word is wasted."
--The Newport News Daily Press

"D'Orso makes it easy to imagine the boys from Fort Yukon on the silver screen."
--The San Francisco Chronicle

"Even for non-sports-page readers, the human drama both on and off the court will resonate."
--The Christian Science Monitor

"D'Orso finds (that) transcendence lies in a game well played...He makes a convincing case that hoops is the kids' best hope."
--Outside Magazine

"At one point in Michael D'Orso's book Eagle Blue he quotes a fan of the Fort Yukon, Alaska, high school basketball team as saying the team is 'like that movie "Hoosiers," only better.' The same could be said of D'Orso's book."    
--The Seattle Times

"Heart-stopping thrills and agony...riveting and thrilling...D'Orso manages to refrain from yanking at our heartstrings by portraying the players and their families without excess sentimentality."
--The Portland Tribune

"If Eagle Blue were about basketball alone, it'd be worth the read. D'Orso enhances the sport's built-in drama and explosive actions with vivid prose that's funny, tragic and dead-on from any range."
--The Anchorage Daily News

"Masterful...memorable... a compelling, well-told story by someone who sees beyond immediate events to the fundamental truths they illustrate."
--The Virginian-Pilot

"A thoroughly fascinating mix of sports and cultural anthropology... an inspiring, sometimes disturbing portrait of a culture in crisis."
--Booklist (starred review)

"An intimate look at how a high-school basketball team carries the flame of ethnic pride for the native citizens of an Alaskan bush village."
--Kirkus Reviews

"Michael D'Orso's Eagle Blue is a beautiful book -- haunting, tender, touching. I have read numerous books about sports, but D'Orso's is at the top of the list. Like all great sports books, it isn't about sports at all, but about manhood and hope and dreams."  
---H.G. Bissinger, author of Friday Night Lights

"A vivid, compassionate portrait of modern Native life combined with an edge-of-your-seat sports thriller. In Eagle Blue, Michael D'Orso delivers championship stuff."
--Daniel Coyle, author of the New York Times bestseller Lance Armstrong's War

"In a harsh place where rivers freeze routinely and daytime disappears for months on end, you expect wolverines and ancient spirits and caribou and permafrost, but what you don't expect are the high hopes Michael D'Orso documents in his gripping and memorable account of a group of native Alaskan kids who love basketball and who would neither take no for an answer nor accept obscurity as a fate."
--Madeline Blais, author of In These Girls, Hope is a Muscle

"Eagle Blue is full of heroes and heart. Michael D'Orso tells the story of a basketball team that holds together a town, and the town that holds together a team. These are modern day Arctic warriors fighting for far more than points on a scoreboard."
--Tom Bodett, author, NPR radio commentator, and longtime Alaskan