The Courting Lives of an Ageing Tennis Player: A Book of Matches (Confessions of Ageing Sports Players)

A gloriously absurd tennis comedy about delusion, desire and one man’s unstoppable sense of his own greatness.Lord Andrew John Paul George Ringo Murray of Kirkintilloch is back. In the first book, he won Wimbledon, became Sports Personality of the Year, and rose — in his own imagination — to the summit of club tennis power. In reality, he ended up rescued from a raft of burning tennis rackets and facing charges of aggravated arson. This sequel begins there.The Courting Lives of an Ageing Tennis Player follows Lord Andrew from the wreckage of his club ambitions to a fresh assault on the Australian Open, all while fan letters, romantic confusion, club politics and public humiliation gather around him. The preface makes clear that this second volume takes on “the second Grand Slam” and “the mysteries of the heart,” and the book delivers both with relentless self-belief, comic invention and glorious unreliability.Absurd, clever and laugh-out-loud funny, this is a novel about tennis, ego, fantasy, love, and the dangerous power of never admitting defeat. You do not need to play tennis to enjoy it — but it helps if you appreciate pompous heroes, unreliable narrators, and sporting ambition inflated to magnificent proportions. Readers quoted in the book call the earlier volume “a riotous, rolling, rollicking read” and “a rollicking good read that had me laughing out loud,” which is exactly the note this sequel continues.Perfect for readers who enjoy:Tennis humour and sporting satireUnreliable narratorsComic novels about ambition, ego and romance Read more