I'd Tell You I Love You But Then I'd Have To Kill You (Gallagher Girls #1)

Reader reviewed by Stephanie

The title is intriguing, and so is the concept: a spy-in-training at an all-girls spy school falls in love with a normal boy, whom she can never tell her true identity. But this story failed to live up to my expectations.

Cammie Morgan is a sophomore at the Gallagher Academy for Exceptional Young Women, which is a spy school posing as an elite all-girls private boarding school. Her normal course load includes PhD-level chemistry, Countries of the World, and hardest of all, CoveOps, which is taught by a ridiculously hot but severe Joe Solomon. Its almost a good thing that the Gallagher Academy doesnt train guys to be spies, because in between work for her classes and trying to put up with her new suitemate, Macey McHenry, a rich delinquent-like wannabe rebel who takes pleasure in others pain, Cammie has no time to worry about guys.

That all changes when, in the midst of a failed Covert Operation, she is seen by Josh. She, Cammie Morgan, nicknamed the Chameleon for her ability to blend in anymore, is seen by a cute guy. Josh is a normal townie who lives the perfect suburban life. He believes that Cammie is homeschooled, has a pet cat, and likes the same things he does. What he doesnt know, however, is that Cammie is not who she says she is; shes fed him a web of lies about herself because she cannot tell him who she really is.

Trying to keep up her relationship with Josh without her headmistress mother or Josh finding out her secrets while struggling to please Joe Solomon in CoveOps class is almost too hard to do. Something has got to give. What will Cammie choose: her love for a normal boy or her loyalty to her lifes calling?

This book makes for a quick and light read. More than a few times, the author seems to try too hard with her random humor, which doesnt succeed in making the story funny. That being said, there IS a decent amount of advice on guys that girls might like to read about.

Reader reviewed by Jocelyn

I'd Tell You I Love You But Then I'd Have To Kill You is definitely an interesting title. Doesn't it just have you itching to know more? I sure was intrigued by this title, and I'm happy to say that, while on a train headed for Philadelphia last Wednesday, I had an opportunity to read this book that's been calling to me from my to-read shelf. I was not disappointed; Ally Carter's book is awesome!

Cammie Morgan is a student at the Gallagher Academy For Exceptional Young Women. It is a school for geniuses, technically, but everyone in the building (and very, very few people outside it) knows what's really going on. These girls are being trained to be spies.

Of course, no one's forcing them to take up epsionage for a living once they graduate, but it's pretty easy to figure out what they're meant to do; they study code breaking, martial arts, and, once they're sophomores (like Cammie and her friends), Covert Operations. And it's not every school that had an alert system for when visitors come that hides every trace of what people do there every day and turns it into a regular boarding school for rich girls (the way the people in the surrounding town think the Gallagher Academy is).

Speaking of the people in town, Cammie actually meets one of them on her first Covert Operations mission! The mission does not go as well as it could, but something miraculous does happen: Cammie, who hasn't really known any boys for years, and is known for her ability to become invisible at school (a compliment at a school like hers), is noticed by a boy.

Josh is a rather cute boy, too. And the fact that he notices Cammie makes them practically soul mates already! Of course, things are never as simple as they seem. Even though Cammie and her friends can hack into Josh's email and implant a tracker in his shoe to make sure he's not trying to infiltrate the school through her, there's something Cammie isn't sure she can pull off: being a normal girl, especially when Josh can't find out the truth about Cammie's life. Can she and Josh be together, despite all of the obstacles in their way?

Ally Carter has written a fun page-turner in ITYILYBTIHTKY (wow, even shortening the title is really long), with a pretty awesome idea behind it, too; spies are inherently interesting (like pirates or superheroes), and teenage girl spies, also struggling with the dilemmas facing normal teenagers even without the added problems caused by the whole secret life thing, are even cooler! Ally Carter's book is a quick and funny read that lives up to the expectations set by the revelations made by the jacket copy, with its interesting characters, cool gadgets, and romance. The book is one of the best kind--set up for a sequel (and who wouldn't want more about Cammie and her friends and family?), but still a great story by itself. And readers are in luck--the next book starring the Gallagher Girls, Cross My Heart and Hope to Spy, will be out sometime next fall!