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A review by hyms
Game On by James LaRosa, Monica Seles
2.0
I rarely read books about sports - I’m not big on sports so it’s not really my kind of books. Yet something made me want to read The Academy: Game on and I’ve got to be honest: It was the cover. Seriously, just look at it - it’s so pretty and it had this whole easy-summer-read to it which was just what I was looking for.
Maya started out like the greatest protagonist; she’s sweet, nervous and very determind. She makes friends easily and she’s easy to like eventhough she makes a fool of herself and makes mistakes - really, she’s the perfect teen protagonist and very easy to relate to (I should think - I’m not really a teen anymore). Unfortunately she turns out to be insanely naïve. Like REALLY!! She can figure out even the most obvious things and she trusts everyone she meets. Most of the time I just wanted to shake some sense into her.
Maya doesn’t really develop as a character - it’s more like she takes a step back and becomes an entirely different person and then, in the end, she turns back to being who she was in the beginning, only with a slightly different outlook on guys. It does, however, make a promise to make the next book more interesting regarding Maya.
The story has surprisingly little sports in it, considering it takes place at a sports academy and Maya shows very little interest in training through most of the story. During the second half of the book she shows some interest, but even then it’s for an entirely different reason than the love of tennis. It seems to me that Monica Seles wanted to write a young adult book and just chose the sports academy as her setting, because she knows a lot about tennis. She doesn’t really use it, which I think is a shame (and keep in mind that I don’t even like sports!).
The YA part of the book is quite good though. Seeking your identity, wanting true friendship and being in love for the first time - all of this is very important and even if the plot is weak and easily figured out, I still liked it. It’s cute and would work pretty well as a summer read for young teenage girls. I might continue the series to find out what happens to Maya, but it’s not a must-read at this point.
Maya started out like the greatest protagonist; she’s sweet, nervous and very determind. She makes friends easily and she’s easy to like eventhough she makes a fool of herself and makes mistakes - really, she’s the perfect teen protagonist and very easy to relate to (I should think - I’m not really a teen anymore). Unfortunately she turns out to be insanely naïve. Like REALLY!! She can figure out even the most obvious things and she trusts everyone she meets. Most of the time I just wanted to shake some sense into her.
Maya doesn’t really develop as a character - it’s more like she takes a step back and becomes an entirely different person and then, in the end, she turns back to being who she was in the beginning, only with a slightly different outlook on guys. It does, however, make a promise to make the next book more interesting regarding Maya.
The story has surprisingly little sports in it, considering it takes place at a sports academy and Maya shows very little interest in training through most of the story. During the second half of the book she shows some interest, but even then it’s for an entirely different reason than the love of tennis. It seems to me that Monica Seles wanted to write a young adult book and just chose the sports academy as her setting, because she knows a lot about tennis. She doesn’t really use it, which I think is a shame (and keep in mind that I don’t even like sports!).
The YA part of the book is quite good though. Seeking your identity, wanting true friendship and being in love for the first time - all of this is very important and even if the plot is weak and easily figured out, I still liked it. It’s cute and would work pretty well as a summer read for young teenage girls. I might continue the series to find out what happens to Maya, but it’s not a must-read at this point.