Review: Love Match

Love Match by Monica Seles
Published by Bloomsbury
Series: The Academy #2
Format Reviewed: Paperback
Publication Date: 13th February 2014
Genre: YA Contemporary
Pages: 216
Reviewed by: Eugenia
My Rating: 3 of 5 Stars
Buy It

The Academy is the sports school everyone is talking about. But for Maya, it seems getting in was the easy part. It’s staying there that’s tough. To succeed it takes more than just talent. You need fame . . . 

After a star performance in the semi-finals at a tennis competition, Maya is labelled The Next Big Thing and books a high-profile modelling job. The only problem is her co-star in the campaign is her super-hot ex-boyfriend, Jake Reed – and this is a job that her rival, Nicole, wants! Maya’s only just put the betrayal by Jake and Nicole behind her and now Maya is being drawn back into a circle of jealousy and desire. Luckily, she knows Nicole’s latest secret and gossip is a powerful weapon at The Academy! 

If you adore Gossip Girl, Pretty Little Liars and Ally Carter’s Gallagher Girls, you’ll be mad about the sassy new series The Academy

Thank you to Bloomsbury Australia for sending me a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review

Even though I love to read a good book that is really deep and meaningful, sometimes it's nice to have something a bit more lighthearted and fun. Love Match focuses on the social side of an elite sporting academy where there are threats everywhere: from the paparazzi to other peers who really can't be trusted. Add that to a bunch of relationship dramas and you get a story that may be superficial on the surface, but is still a quick and entertaining read.

This book is part of a series (the follow on from The Academy: Game On), I read it as a standalone and think that it explained most things pretty well. Although I'm sure that reading the first book would be great to set down some background information on the characters and some of the other relationships that had developed, this book still stood well on its own. In terms of the plot in general, yes - for the most part it was pretty light and melodramatic. However, what did save this book was the fact that it tackled with some real issues such as bullying, navigating relationships and being comfortable in your own identity. These nice little pieces of 'realness' in the storyline made the book seem a lot more relatable to.

Maya as our main character was also well developed. She stood the moral high ground on most points, supported her friends and didn't let other people bother her. Always looking out for others and a determined tennis player, she was an interesting character to read about. The one thing that I would have liked to see more of was her playing sport and that aspect of the school in general. While we definitely got front-row seats to all the social drama going on, I expected to see more sport explained in a book where this was the main focal setting.

CONCLUSION

In conclusion Love Match was a light, quick read about the dramas of winning a match and not letting others get you down. Although it might seem completely superficial on the outset, it was nice to see that it did make a note of some social issues that do face teens in the real world today.