Playing for Pizza | John Grisham | Great read, even if you are not a sports fan

Playing for Pizza | John Grisham | Not what I thought it was...BETTER!

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Playing for Pizza

	Playing for Pizza John Grisham Dell, 2008 - 320 pages average customer review:based on 37 reviews view larger image
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Rick Dockery was the third-string quarterback for the Cleveland Browns. In the AFC Championship game, to the surprise and dismay of virtually everyone, Rick actually got into the game. With a 17-point lead and just minutes to go, Rick provided what was arguably the worst single performance in the history of the NFL. Overnight, he became a national laughingstock?and was immediately cut by the Browns and shunned by all other teams. But all Rick knows is football, and he insists that his agent find a team that needs him. Against enormous odds, Rick finally gets a job?as the starting quarterback for the Mighty Panthers . . . of Parma, Italy. The Parma Panthers desperately want a former NFL player?any former NFL player?at their helm. And now they?ve got Rick, who knows nothing about Parma (not even where it is) and doesn?t speak a word of Italian. To say that Italy?the land of fine wines, extremely small cars, and football americano?holds a few surprises for Rick Dockery would be something of an understatement. . . .

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Great read, even if you are not a sports fan

I was a bit worried when I saw this book because it was about a football player, and I'm not much of a sports fan. However, I really like John Grisham; so I decided to give the book a try. Somewhat to my surprise, this book turned out to be one of Grisham's best. It's a really great story about a man overcoming adversity and finding that niche in life where he can find fulfillment.

A nice bonus was that Grisham really brought Italy alive: its people, culture, food, and cities. Oh, and guess what! Not a murder was in sight! I suspect that's what turned off some of the reviewers, but the lack of bodies personally was a delightful change from my substantial diet of mysteries and thrillers. I hope Grisham writes more books of this kind!

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Not what I thought it was...BETTER!

I read a review on Amazon (that is what you get when you read just one) that said something about Grisham putting his political leanings in this book and knowing he leans left I decided not to buy it. I ended up buying it later though and must say there was nothing political in this book. I do love football but this shows it at it's purest state and the way he describes the italian meals and lifestyle made me actually want to travel outside the USA. A great book.

Not a romance novel, but I liked it.

REVIEWER'S OPINION:
About 95% of my reviews are on romance novels. This is off genre for me. This is sports fiction plus some human relationships fiction, but I liked it. I also happen to like movies about underdog sports teams and athletes winning or doing something positive. Lovers of romance novels who also like this kind of movie might enjoy this book. I did not understand some of the football jargon, but I still enjoyed the story. As a side note, I believe this author is best known for his mystery/thrillers, so this genre is not typical for him.

STORY BRIEF:
Rick is an NFL backup quarterback who rarely plays. His weakness is that he does things to avoid being tackled rather than make the best play of the moment. He has had three concussions. He had terrible luck in one game causing his team to lose in the last 11 minutes when they had been ahead. No US team wants him, and the press ridicules him. His agent finds a job for him as quarterback for the Parma team in Italy. It doesn't pay much. In fact, most of the team members are Italian and don't get paid at all. Rick hadn't had a serious female relationship in the past and usually found companionship with cheerleaders. He was disappointed that there were no cheerleaders in Parma. The story is about Rick's life in Italy, the food he eats, and his relationships with the team members. He has trouble parking his stick-shift car. He goes to the opera, which he had never done before. Prior to Italy he didn't seem to have outside interests. His life was football practice, games, being on the road and dating cheerleaders. In Parma some new things happen including meeting a couple of (non-cheerleader) women which was fun to watch.

MORE REVIEWER'S OPINION:
On his first night in Parma, the coach takes Rick to a local restaurant. The description of Rick eating wonderful food actually caused me to go to two Italian restaurants to eat the same things. Unfortunately, the restaurants didn't have the same food Rick ate. I'm still looking. The book starts out a little slow, but Rick grew on me. He did some neat things for the team, and I liked his female experiences. The story had a feel good ending, but I was a little disappointed because I didn't want it to end.

DATA:
Story length: 306 pages. Sexual language: none. Number of sex scenes: none. Setting: current day U.S. and Italy. Copyright: 2007. Genre: sports fiction and human relationships fiction.

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Ho-hum. Maybe 3.5 stars.

I have read nearly everything by Grisham, and really enjoy his writing. I knew that this was not a lawyer story, so I tried to think of it as just a book, not as a Grisham book. For the most part, this book is interesting, but I found the main events to be far too predictable. I don't want to give anything major away, but I found the whole "pattern" of win-or-lose was simply too predictable. The descriptions of events other than the games were interesting, and the descriptions of the games were also somewhat interesting, but the general storyline just was not original at all.
Also, while it was somewhat interesting to read about Rick's first full meal in Italy, the page-after-page description of every part of the meal soon became boring. Later meals were better, yet Grisham seemed to put a lot of emphasis on what people ate, like maybe he was trying to prove that he actually knew something about Italy.
Another thing that annoyed me some was the constant "thoughts" of girls and all the attention placed on finding girls. Some of it was helpful to the story, but it could have been toned down a little without ruining the book.
One other minor point is that it seemed to only take a few games for Rick to go from a relatively inexperienced QB to one who could read the other team and know exactly what to do to beat the other team. I thought that this was stretching things a bit.

Overall, underneath all the flaws, there is actually an interesting read. While there was things that I found distracting about the story, it was still an interesting book. There was a good amount of clean humor, plus I liked the part near the end where Rick showed that he had matured by actually sticking with his contract rather than following more money. Basically, I would still recommend this book. If you are a die-hard Grisham fan, don't expect much Grisham-style writing here. If you have enjoyed Grisham's writing and just want another good Grisham book, then this may not be the one for you.

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