Private (Book 1)

Reader reviewed by Alexis

This was an amazing book! I thought that I liked the IT Girl series, but this is just as good. Reed tries to fit in with the Billings Girls. She gets a boyfriend and makes a few friends. She convinces her dad to stay home over Parents weekend. She has it made. Until her boyfriend wants her to meet his parents. She agrees and when the time comes he is no where to be found. Where did Thomas go is what I want to know! I can't wait to read the next book!

Reader reviewed by Mary

Reed's has finally got the chance of a lifetime. She's got into a private boarding school. Reed wants to be someone. And being someone, in Reed's eyes, means becoming friends with the Billings girls. And she will do anything for that chance....


Reed is an interesting character but at times the story seems unbelievable as Reed goes to such enormous lengths to be friends with the Billings girls. The book seems almost like a satire. It's very entertaining...

Reader reviewed by Maggie

Reed Brennan, a 15 year old girl, gets a scholarship to a school called Easton Academy. This was her way to get away from mother. Once Reed gets their she feels different from everyone because she doesn't have the money that everyone else does and she thinks she is not as pretty or sophisticated.

Reed is included as one of the outsiders. Until she meets the Billings Girls. They are considered royalty at the school and to be friends with them would make you accepted with everyone. This is what Reed figures so she vows to do whatever it takes for her to be accepted by them.

Reed changes herself to be just like them. And before she knows it, she hangs out with them frequently. Sooner then later does she realize that these girls are not the nicest people in the world and has done some pretty bad things to get what they want.

Reader reviewed by Jocelyn

PRIVATE is the first in a series about a bunch of teenagers attending a posh private school in New England. It doesnt sound like a particularly smart or original book, and that first impression would be, for the most part, correct. Its not as fun to read as I would have expected, either, but it did get me hooked on the series--enough so that Ill probably read INVITATION ONLY, book number two!

Reed Brennan is a scholarship student at Easton Academy eager to leave her dull suburban life, drug addicted mother, and complete lack of a social life behind in Croton, Pennsylvania, and Easton Academy looks like her ticket out. Reed will do anything to fit in with her overprivileged classmates, especially when the Billings Girls take notice of her. Theyre the most popular and powerful clique on campus, and, being the new girl, joining their ranks seems, to Reed, like the perfect way to finally find her place at Easton Academy.

No part of this book is exceptionally wonderful, but its all good enough to pass a few hours reading it. None of it is exceptionally bad, either. The characters are rather flat but not terribly so, and the story itself is rather unoriginal but not horrible. The writing, too, is decent but not wonderful. I expected more from Kate Brian after reading her wonderful book MEGAN MEADES GUIDE TO THE MCGOWAN BOYS, but this book serves its purpose--its enough to get readers hooked on the series!

Reader reviewed by Ash

This book to me was a book about a girl who just wants to fit in, but with a drug addict mother and a deppressed father that is some what inpossible. So she thinks if she gets to go to a private school away from her parents she might have a chance. But she has know idea what is about to come her way. So she meets this boy Thomas Pearson he is her soon to be Boyfriend, all his secrets will affect her life big time though. She also needs to get into The Billings House, she thinks that is the best way to gain popularity. But her life is about to be turned around by the next book.

Reader reviewed by K. H.

This book is very much like "Prep." Too much in fact. I think the writer was trying to hard to write like Gossip Girl & Prep combined with a bit of the Clique thrown in. It's an ok book, but why must all boarding school books throw some creepiness into the mix? They all hint that all girls' schools invite the girls to experiment w/being gay, and that scholarship students might as well be invisible outcasts.

I liked the drug dealing boyfriend in the book, because that to me was very real-the rich guy trying to rebel. I saw a lot of that where I went to school, but their relationship didn't feel real to me. also, I kept wondering if she'd worry about getting pregnant & that didn't happen, which seemed odd since she was bascially taken advantage of.

All in all, a good read, but too much like so many other books on the market for it to stand alone.

Reader reviewed by Stephanie

A new series emerges out of a world already full of Gossip Girls, A-lists, and Cliques. Sophomore Reed Brennan has been accepted into the prestigious Easton Academy on scholarship. Getting out of her depressing hometown and her emotionally abusive mothers grasp is liberating for Reed, but it is not too long before she once again feels like retreating into her usual antisocial loner shell. The only bright spot in her life is the bad boy Thomas Pearsontotally wrong but dangerously attractive and attentive to her.

Then she meets the Billings girls. They are beautiful, brilliant, and the best...and there are only four of them who really matter: Noelle, Ariana, Kiran, and Taylor. Reed thinks that shell be set if she can only become one of them, and so takes every opportunity to suck up to them. Sure, some of the things they make her do, such as stealing a test, make her think twice, but Reed knows that without the Billings girls, shed simply be another sophomore nobody at Easton.

However, the Billings girls and Thomas dont get along. In the meantime, Thomas has secrets of his own, too, and Reed fluctuates from desperately wanting to be part of the Billings girls to hating them for having a sickening power over everyone. Can Reed love Thomas, please the Billings girls, AND stay true to herself all at once? That seems like an impossible mountain to climb.

There is really nothing that has already been written in Private. Thomas is the stereotypical guy we hate to love, and Noelle is your average two-faced perfect villainess. There will certainly be room in this world for Private and its fans, though.