Book Review ~ Shut Out by Kody Keplinger

Title:  Shut Out
Author:  Kody Keplinger
Series: N/A
Genre: Contemporary YA
Format: ARC from ATW Tours
Release Date: September 5, 2011

Rating: 5/5, Awesome Sauce Award

Synopsis:

Most high school sports teams have rivalries with other schools. At Hamilton High, it's a civil war: the football team versus the soccer team. And for her part, Lissa is sick of it. Her quarterback boyfriend, Randy, is always ditching her to go pick a fight with the soccer team or to prank their locker room. And on three separate occasions Randy's car has been egged while he and Lissa were inside, making out. She is done competing with a bunch of sweaty boys for her own boyfriend's attention.

Lissa decides to end the rivalry once and for all: she and the other players' girlfriends go on a hookup strike. The boys won't get any action from them until the football and soccer teams make peace. What they don't count on is a new sort of rivalry: an impossible girls-against-boys showdown that hinges on who will cave to their libidos first. And Lissa never sees her own sexual tension with the leader of the boys, Cash Sterling, coming.

Inspired by Aristophanes' play Lysistrata, critically acclaimed author of The Duff (Designated Ugly Fat Friend) Kody Keplinger adds her own trademark humor in this fresh take on modern teenage romance, rivalry and sexuality.

First Line: "There is nothing more humiliating than being topless in the backseat of your boyfriends car when someone decides to throw an egg at the windshield."
Review:

I really enjoyed Kody's first novel The Duff but I think that I like Shut Out even more than The DUFF. I really liked the concept that this book is inspired by the Greek play Lysistrata. Kudo's to Kody for using a piece of Classic Literature for inspiration.

The story starts out with our main character Lissa "parking" with her football player boyfriend Randy. Then someone or according to Randy a soccer player decides to egg his car. There has been a rivalry between the football and soccer teams at Hamilton High School for about 10 years and it has finally gotten to the point that it has started taking it's toll on the relationships of not only the players but their girlfriends (for the players that have them anyway). Lissa is tired of coming in second to this rivalry so she comes up with a plan to end the feud and enlists the help of the other girlfriends on both teams. The plan? Without sexual favors.

In the beginning the strike is pretty harmless but once the boys catch wind of the plan they up the ante....the boy, Cash, that leaves Lissa all hot and bothered takes up the reins and leads the boys. This is were things start to go awry. See Cash and Lissa have history and Lissa views Cash's tactics as a way to manipulate her into ending the strike. Then it isn't so much about ending the team rivalry, it turns into an all out battle of the sexes. Feelings get hurt, relationships end, friendships are formed and heck even new relationships blossom. Do the rivalry end? You'll have to read the book to find out.

Overall, I really liked Lissa. She's had a tragedy come up in her past that has made her into something of a control freak. At times I thought these tendencies controlled her too much. I really didn't like her with Randy at all...A little too toxic for my liking. I did enjoy her relationship with Chloe. Chloe is freaking hilarious in my mind. I also liked watching her relationship with Cash and all the back and forth banter between them. Her relationship with her dad and brother were pretty sweet to read about too.

Oh my goodness! Let's talk about Cash. I think I'm in lust with a fictional character! He's the kind of guy that just when you think you have him pegged...it turns out your COMPLETELY wrong about him. He's also that talk, dark and athletic type that I have a thing for.

I really enjoyed the secondary characters too, well with the exception of Randy. Even though they were secondary characters Kody wrote them in a way that made them just as important and special as the main characters. I really like when an author does that. To me it says that the author left no "rock" (detail) unturned when planning out and writing their book.

Overall, I highly recommend this book. I literally received it in the mail Saturday morning and finished it early Sunday morning (after a few hours of sleep of course). Another book I can across that once you start it, it sucks you and doesn't let go! This book is also being awarded the coveted and seldom given out "Awesome Sauce Award."