Book Review | Playing for Pizza by John Grisham
5:10 PM
What better location to finish a book set in Italy than on a vineyard.
This read was on recommendation from my dad, who is a longtime John Grisham fan. Although Grisham is known for his legal thrillers, this is a story about a quarterback who couldn't make it in the NFL, so he is offered an opportunity to play in Italy.
I did enjoy the descriptions of food and drink, randomly long descriptive scenes of parking a small stick shift Fiat, and travels around Italy. I even enjoyed the football scenes, which I thought were written simply enough so that even readers that don't watch a lot of football can follow along. I was perusing the reviews on Goodreads and the descriptive scenes were actually negatives for some readers. To each their own!
Now for the cons. I unfortunately didn't love this book. I do enjoy how simply Grisham writes -- no frills, no fancy words. His books are generally easy reads. This book, however, was too easy to where it didn't keep me engaged. The main character, Rick, was bland and a cliche stereotypical football player with minimal character growth and sex or football always on his mind. I would joke that this is a book written by a man for men, but it's sadly how I felt reading it.
Overall, I give this 3/5. Don't regret reading it, but I wouldn't be quick to recommend it. But, it was also my first dip into sports fiction, so we'll see if it's just not my thing! Will have to try more.
Happy reading
<3 Vivian
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