Review ~ After Wimbledon by Jennifer Gilby Roberts

ebook received from the author in exchange for an honest review

Release Date: 29th November 2013

Publisher: Self-published

Description:
After 12 years on the pro. tennis tour and four years with her sort-of boyfriend, Lucy Bennett has had enough. She wants real life… and real love.

Her life, her decision. Right? Well, no one else seems to think so. With opinions on all sides, Lucy’s head is spinning. And she’s stumbling right into the arms of long-term crush and fellow player Sam. Shame her boyfriend – his arch-rival – would sooner smash a racquet over their heads than agree to a simple change of partners.

As the Wimbledon Championships play out, Lucy fights for her life on and off the courts. The question is: what will she be left with after Wimbledon?

My Opinion

After Wimbledon was an enjoyable read, one that I found myself enjoying more than I expected. I'm not really a fan of tennis, I find it one of the most boring sports to watch and have never gotten into it--even if my family members forces me to watch Wimbledon every year--but it was the romance element that interested me.

I found the setting to be interesting, with the characters being surrounded in Wimbledon and having a sort of behind-the-scenes quality to their lives. It made this book different from the standard romance I read. As well as this I liked the relationships with the characters. This book had characters you love and characters you love to hate. Lucy and Sam's relationship built nicely, with their friendship moving towards something more at a believable speed. I also liked the flirting--especially over Oscar the kitten. To sum up their relationship I would use the words: cute and sweet. This isn't a book full of hot, passionate sex and I don't think it needed it. The author struck a nice balance of character development that kept things interesting in the relationship with their story.

I can't say the same for Joe. He was possessive, rude and controlling and he was the perfect "villain." You love to hate him, he makes you feel sorry and sympathise with Lucy and because Sam in the total opposite, it makes you fall in love with him even more.

There were also a few twists and hidden secrets about a few of the characters' pasts which I didn't see coming. They kept me reading as I wanted to know what was going on and were a nice surprise as they added another layer to the book.

I did have a few issues I had with After Wimbledon though. The first was that I didn't really enjoy the tennis matches. I'm not sure if it's because I don't like tennis, but to me they weren't exciting enough. I felt the writing was a bit bland and there wasn't enough action at these sections. I also felt that they were a bit repetitive with the same thing happening over and over again. 

As well as this, I didn't really understand the scoring. I know the character was a tennis pro, but I felt the author could have maybe explained how the scoring worked slightly better. I found myself reading numbers a lot (e.g 6-1 6-7 7-5 6-4) and in the end I had to ask my brother to explain what they meant--a concept that took a while to grasp as I have never understood tennis.

The only other issue I had was that the chapters were a bit long. I hate stopping mid-way through a chapter so it wasn't a book I could just dip in and out of as I had to stick with chapters that were normally 10%, but that's just personal preference for reading. There were sections of the book that were well crafted (character interaction moments) but I will admit that I found the pacing varied a lot in this book and I did sometimes feel that a few scenes weren't necessarily needed or needed to be re-done to improve the pacing, which I feel may help the chapter length.

Overall though, After Wimbledon was a sweet, enjoyable read. It had it's good moments, a nice romance and was easy to get into. The characterisations were great and the setting is unique--I liked the Britishness.