Future criminal masterminds...

...take out a pen and get ready to take some notes when you read E. Lockhart's The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks!

Pens out?

Okay, so the basic plot:

Frankie is a sophomore at a boarding school, filled with rich kids from old-money families who are trying to make connections.

Frankie wants to join the school's infamous all-male secret-society, but isn't able to get in.

Frankie decides to take control and work behind the scenes, infiltrating the secret society.

Frankie... is a girl. Full name? Frances Rose Landau-Banks. (Yeah. I totally didn't see that one coming. When I read the title, I just instantly assumed that the protagonist was a guy. Silly me, making assumptions.)

Anyway, more plot. Frankie transformed into a total hottie over the summer before her sophomore year. And now she's getting oodles of attention, most notably from senior boy Matthew Livingston.

It's like... as soon as she got pretty and developed a figure, she was worthy of attention. It's something that kinda sickens me but at the same time it's one of those things that I know happens to girls. It's sad.

Anyway, back to the story.

Despite the fact that she's getting all this attention, and she is BASKING in it all, it's still not the kind of attention she wants. She is being severely underestimated and she's getting sick of all of it. She's a smart, witty, clever girl. But nobody seems to see that.

Her family calls her "bunny rabbit" and Matthew doesn't really consider her capable of much. He kinda treats her like a silly love-sick girl (which she is for a bit).

To prove herself (to her family, to Matthew, to the other boys, to herself) she uses clues to find out as much as she can about the secret society that everybody tries to keep hush-hush.

And other events ensue. But I can't tell you anymore. I don't want to spoil too much for you!

Lemme see... for me, this book was... hmm... okay. It's honestly really hard for me to dislike a book. But I definitely didn't love it. I maybe liked it a little bit. I was a bit disappointed with the end.

Still, though, it has won awards. That's gotta be worth something. (Not one but TWO shiny stickers on the front! Score!) This might have been one of those books that didn't agree with me specifically. I'm not going to say that it was an okay book. Only that it was an okay book FOR ME.

I did enjoy reading it and getting wrapped up in the narrative. As a girl, I did enjoy the whole girl power aspect. And I could totally relate to Frankie's way of thinking. The whole boys vs. girls theme going through, the fact that male-dominated society still affects us... it was interesting.

So yes, there were good parts.

But I dunno... I guess I developed higher expectations while I was reading that the end simply did not satisfy. I wanted more.

But hey, I'm greedy. What can I say?