Title: Play Me
Author: Laura Ruby
Release date: September 1, 2008
Publisher: HarperTeen
Pages: 320
Source: Bookstore

Eddy knows how to play the game of love.

He has all the tricks down cold, and his favorite girls are the ones with cherry lipstick and long legs in fishnets. They know he doesn’t make any promises.

But as graduation looms, the game begins to shift for Eddy. He never expected unattainable and perfect Lucinda Dulko to walk into his life. For the first time ever, Eddy’s not in control. To be with Lucinda, he has to play on her terms.

But what happens to a player when the rules suddenly change? Will Eddy find a way to win it all? Or will he get played?

I don’t know that I have ever given a book a D before but this one, I hate to say, deserves it.  I barely made it through this book and I only did because I hoped it would get better.  It didn’t.

Let’s start with the characters.  I didn’t like any of them.  They were impossible to sympathize with and pretty impossible to like.  Eddy was a greedy cheating jerk.  Lucinda was a bitch.  Joe was a terrible friend.  Rory was an idiot.  Eddy’s family was quirky but not in a fun way.  His bird, Tippi Hedren, may have been the best character in the book.

The writing itself was juvenile.  It made it seem like the book was written for a younger audience even though the characters were 18 and the book contains sex and alcohol.  It was very contradictory.

The book also had no real conclusion.  It just ended.  It was a terrible way to end the book.

Overall, I don’t recommend this book at all.  Definitely give this one a pass.  If you want to check out a better book by this author, go with Good Girls.

Rating: D