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A review by mjsam
Slammed by Lola Keeley
4.0
ARC provided by Ylva in exchange for an honest review.
I was a little worried about this one, I loved Music and the Mirror but wasn’t blown away by Major Surgery. Not being a huge tennis fan, I was also worried I wouldn’t enjoy the sports side of it that much.
Turns out I didn’t have to worry on any accounts. While there is a lot of tennis and/or discussion of tennis, I found pretty much all of it interesting. This features MC Elin, a Swedish tennis player who is top of the women’s field and going for the grand slam record. She takes a side trip to a bar before a major game and meets Toni, another lower ranked player from Mexico. This sparks a friendship turned relationship between the pair, but since this is told in first person, we really only see Elin’s perspective of what happens, Toni isn’t anywhere near as fleshed out.
The two do have great chemistry and it’s a nice romance, though tennis plays a bigger part than the romance itself. There’s also some other interesting secondary characters in Elin’s family and some of the other tennis players, especially Celeste, Elin’s ex. I thought she was going to be either a bitch or sketchy but she was lovely which was a nice surprise. Elin’s sister Alice is trans, but one of the few flaws in the book was that much of her story was only hinted at, I would have liked more detail and depth there.
There’s also some sports politics and a bit of a scandal thrown in, as well as a few ups and downs in the romance department and Elin’s path to glory. I also liked that though her mother was her coach/manager, she was not the domineering character I had first thought her to be. Most all of the characters had layers. I might have enjoyed it more had both mains been given equal POV time, but it’s a minor quibble, Elin’s pretty damn interesting as the main POV.
If you love sports books, then this should be a hit for you, but even non-tennis fans should like it. I know I did. 4 stars.
I was a little worried about this one, I loved Music and the Mirror but wasn’t blown away by Major Surgery. Not being a huge tennis fan, I was also worried I wouldn’t enjoy the sports side of it that much.
Turns out I didn’t have to worry on any accounts. While there is a lot of tennis and/or discussion of tennis, I found pretty much all of it interesting. This features MC Elin, a Swedish tennis player who is top of the women’s field and going for the grand slam record. She takes a side trip to a bar before a major game and meets Toni, another lower ranked player from Mexico. This sparks a friendship turned relationship between the pair, but since this is told in first person, we really only see Elin’s perspective of what happens, Toni isn’t anywhere near as fleshed out.
The two do have great chemistry and it’s a nice romance, though tennis plays a bigger part than the romance itself. There’s also some other interesting secondary characters in Elin’s family and some of the other tennis players, especially Celeste, Elin’s ex. I thought she was going to be either a bitch or sketchy but she was lovely which was a nice surprise. Elin’s sister Alice is trans, but one of the few flaws in the book was that much of her story was only hinted at, I would have liked more detail and depth there.
There’s also some sports politics and a bit of a scandal thrown in, as well as a few ups and downs in the romance department and Elin’s path to glory. I also liked that though her mother was her coach/manager, she was not the domineering character I had first thought her to be. Most all of the characters had layers. I might have enjoyed it more had both mains been given equal POV time, but it’s a minor quibble, Elin’s pretty damn interesting as the main POV.
If you love sports books, then this should be a hit for you, but even non-tennis fans should like it. I know I did. 4 stars.