ShortBookandScribes #BookReview – Game on by Matt Cain #QuickReads
Game On is one of this year’s Quick Reads selection from The Reading Agency. More information can be found on The Reading Agency’s website. I purchased my own copy for just £1.
Toddington FC defender Tom Horrocks is never happier than when he’s on the football pitch, but when it comes to love, he’s hiding a big secret. Worried about his young daughter and sick father – and with his team finally in the Premier League – he avoids all media.
Journalist Cosmo Roberts wants to change the world, so is angry when he’s sent to a quiet northern town to cover a sport he sees as anti-gay. Then something about Tom catches his eye.
Cosmo hates football. Tom hates journalists.
Perhaps this time they’ve both met their match.
Game On is one of this year’s Quick Reads selection. Some are abridged versions of an already published book and some are stories written especially for Quick Reads, which includes Game On.
I love Matt Cain’s books so I had to get this book (and at only £1, why wouldn’t you anyway?). It tells the story of Tom Horrocks, who plays football for Toddington FC, and Cosmo Roberts, a journalist. When they meet they really hit it off, but Tom is very firmly in the closet and Cosmo is openly gay. Knowing what the world of football is like, Tom is afraid of coming out.
Despite being a short book, Game On is a fully rounded story that I enjoyed reading very much. It tackles (excuse the pun) a difficult issue in an uplifting way and towards the conclusion I was feeling quite tense for the characters and hoping they would be able to work out all the problems they were facing. Doing so in the full glare of the public eye is really challenging for Tom and I was so pleased with the way the story ended. I spotted a mention for another of Cain’s much-loved characters which was a lovely surprise and which made me smile, just like this whole book did.
Game On is a feel-good story which is full of Matt Cain’s inimitable joy and enthusiasm shining through on every page.
Matt Cain is an author, a leading commentator on LGBT+ issues, and a former journalist. He is currently a presenter for Virgin Radio Pride UK, was Channel 4’s first Culture Editor, Editor-In-Chief of Attitude magazine, and has judged the Costa Prize, the Polari Prize and the South Bank Sky Arts Awards. He won Diversity in Media’s Journalist Of the Year award in 2017 and is an ambassador for Manchester Pride and the Albert Kennedy Trust, plus a patron of LGBT+ History Month. Born in Bury and brought up in Bolton, he now lives in London.
