REVIEW: Only the Good Spy Young
May. 14th, 2015 08:36 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
feather_ghyllOnly the Good Spy Young: Ally Carter The Gallagher Girls: Book Four. Orchard Books, 2011
This book starts in London, where heroine Cammie is staying for her holiday with her friend Bex, but as the girls attend a school for spies-in-the-making disguised as a boarding school and Cammie’s life is in danger from a super-secret evil spying organisation with several agents detailed with protecting her, it’s not a relaxing holiday. A reunion with a couple of people leaves Cammie confused – a state she’s in for much of the rest of the term. Who can she trust? Her old Cover Ops teacher or her new one? The mysterious boy in her life?
Fortunately, she can trust her fellow Gallagher Girls, specifically her dorm mates. As formerly cautious Cammie switches traits with Bex, brilliant but clumsy Liz and the understanding and dangerous Macey are by her side too. Cammie is growing up slightly as (some) adults acknowledge that leaving her in ignorance is unfair. We get the pay off of going to the Gallagher Academy’s dark mirror and there’s less humour, perhaps, than in previous books as the stakes are raised.
I did think this could have done with a more careful proofread – “United states” is shoddy – and, unfortunately, the author has a cloth ear when it comes to Briticisms, which is a shame when James Bond is an obvious touchstone. I am, I've got to say, much more excited about reading the next Finishing School story than the next Gallagher Girls story.
This book starts in London, where heroine Cammie is staying for her holiday with her friend Bex, but as the girls attend a school for spies-in-the-making disguised as a boarding school and Cammie’s life is in danger from a super-secret evil spying organisation with several agents detailed with protecting her, it’s not a relaxing holiday. A reunion with a couple of people leaves Cammie confused – a state she’s in for much of the rest of the term. Who can she trust? Her old Cover Ops teacher or her new one? The mysterious boy in her life?
Fortunately, she can trust her fellow Gallagher Girls, specifically her dorm mates. As formerly cautious Cammie switches traits with Bex, brilliant but clumsy Liz and the understanding and dangerous Macey are by her side too. Cammie is growing up slightly as (some) adults acknowledge that leaving her in ignorance is unfair. We get the pay off of going to the Gallagher Academy’s dark mirror and there’s less humour, perhaps, than in previous books as the stakes are raised.
I did think this could have done with a more careful proofread – “United states” is shoddy – and, unfortunately, the author has a cloth ear when it comes to Briticisms, which is a shame when James Bond is an obvious touchstone. I am, I've got to say, much more excited about reading the next Finishing School story than the next Gallagher Girls story.
