Private by Kate Brian

Title: Private

Author: Kate Brian

Pages: 227

Rating: 4/5

Summary(from Amazon): Tradition, Honor, Excellence...and secrets so dark they're almost invisible

Fifteen-year-old Reed Brennan wins a scholarship to Easton Academy -- the golden ticket away from her pill-popping mother and run-of-the-mill suburban life. But when she arrives on the beautiful, tradition-steeped campus of Easton, everyone is just a bit more sophisticated, a bit more gorgeous, and a lot wealthier than she ever thought possible. Reed realizes that even though she has been accepted to Easton, Easton has not accepted her. She feels like she's on the outside, looking in.

Until she meets the Billings Girls.

They are the most beautiful, intelligent, and intensely confident girls on campus. And they know it. They hold all the power in a world where power is fleeting but means everything. Reed vows to do whatever it takes to be accepted into their inner circle.

Reed uses every part of herself -- the good, the bad, the beautiful -- to get closer to the Billings Girls. She quickly discovers that inside their secret parties and mountains of attitude, hanging in their designer clothing-packed closets the Billings Girls have skeletons. And they'll do anything to keep their secrets private.

Review:

Dear Glass-Licker,

Oh Reed Brennan, what am I going to do with you? Why are you so delicate and oblivious? Still, I've got to give you props for sticking to your goal of fitting in at the ever-so prestigious Easton Academy. But what's with all the self-demeaning stunts you've pulled this semester? That is so not cool Reed. I know that you are ashamed of what you used to be (and pretty much still are), but that is no excuse. You have the potential of being much, much more.

XOXO,

Emily

So if all you readers out there put the Private series in the same category as books like The Clique, or A-List, I think you pretty much hit the nail on the head. Maybe they aren't exactly the same, but the similarities are definitely present. While the characters were very different, the plot and setting were pretty close. Actually, Private was slightly reminiscent of Ally Carter's I'd Tell You I Love You, But Then I'd Have to Kill You. And in my mind, that is a HUGE compliment.

When it comes to characters,  I felt like Reed was not very complex at all. I mean come on! She was sniveling half the time, and when she wasn't, she was merely trying to get by on what little composure she did possess.

The only people who actually captured my attention were, of course, the Billings girls. What I really loved about them was their individuality. They weren't your obnoxious popular girls. They weren't the overdone stereotypical group of high-status snobs. It always kept me reading as I waited hungrily for their next move.

Absolutely fascinating.

Well done Kate Brian. Well done.

Well excuse me, I need to go. I have an appointment with the next book in the series, Invitation Only, that I simply can not miss.