Review: Shutout

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After a sudden cross-country move, I’m stuck crashing with my older brother and two of his hockey teammates for sophomore year. I'm not thrilled about shacking up with three athletes and their stinky gear, rotating door of hookups, and tendency to inhale every snack in the house. Just one reason of many that hockey players aren't my type.

When I walk in the front door with an armload of boxes, however, I'm faced with another problem.

My anonymous fling from two months ago is Tyler Donahue, the superstar goalie for my brother’s team.

We both agree to pretend it never happened, but it quickly becomes clear neither of us can forget. Before I know it, we're exchanging heated glances from across the room, sending spicy texts at all hours of the night, and stealing kisses behind closed doors.

Since my overprotective brother would freak out, we decide to keep things between us a secret. There’s no point in rocking the boat when I don't want a boyfriend, and Tyler doesn't have time for a girlfriend with his grueling hockey schedule. But as our no-strings arrangement turns into something deeper and more meaningful, I begin to see a softer side of the broody, closed-off goalie. He's gentle, protective, and giving in every sense of the word. Despite what I told myself going in, I'm falling hard and falling fast.

We said we'd keep things casual, but hearts have a way of breaking all the rules.

Genre: contemporary romance

Publication date: June 2023

Mature content: yes

Review: Shutout was not an easy read for me, and it's even harder to rate. There were parts I loved very much, but there were several others I really disliked. Overall, however, it's not a book I would want to re-read anytime soon and not one I would actively recommend either, hence the three stars rating.

What I liked:

• the whole hockey/sports environment 
• the main characters' private nicknames (Hades and Tinkerbell)
• the cancer related subplot and how both characters deal with it (although additional details in the epilogue would have been nice, since we never get to know what Sera's choices ended up being)
• the happy ending

What I didn't like:

• the way the characters party, drink and, in one case at least, use drugs. These are supposed to be college students and still for the most part underage: It doesn't paint a good image and doesn't pass on a good message
• the excessively explicit sex scenes. While I'm not against them per se, in this particular book and with these particular characters, I wish the content and the language had been toned down a bit

Shutout is book two in The Rules of the Game series. I didn't read book one and I didn't really miss it, but now I'm curious about the previous story so I may give it a try one of these days.

Happy readings otherwise!

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