Books4Tomorrow: REVIEW: GEORGETOWN ACADEMY (Georgetown Academy, #4) by Jessica Koosed Etting & Alyssa Embree Schwartz

Title: Georgetown Academy

Series: Georgetown Academy, #4

Authors: Jessica Koosed Etting & Alyssa Embree Schwartz

Publisher: Coliloquy

Publication Date: June 11, 2013

Genre: YA, Contemporary Fiction

Reviewed by: Books4Tomorrow

Source: Received from publisher

Smiley rating: 5/5

SUMMARY

When the vice president resigns and Ellie and Taryn’s parents emerge as the frontrunners, the girls find themselves back in the spotlight.

Ellie could not care less about becoming the Second Daughter, but she knows how much the opportunity to make history means to her mother – and women everywhere. With her family taking center stage, Ellie must decide whether she can put her feelings for Gabe on hold - again.

Taryn, so used to captivating the hearts and minds of everyone she meets, is unbothered by the increased media scrutiny. But an inopportune screw-up has her beholden to an unlikely – and unfriendly – source for help.

Overnight, Evan has skyrocketed from social pariah to Miss Popular. As she and her reluctant parents adjust to her new lifestyle, the last thing she needs is a front-page scandal.

Brinley can’t stop thinking about her Stowe-bound hook-up…until her father’s intern, Patrick, starts flirting. Is it time to abandon her fling now that she has a more appropriate suitor?

With the second highest office in the land up for grabs, everyone is picking sides. But where does the heart lie when duty, truth, and love collide?

REVIEW

Book four picks up exactly where the third book left off. Scandals abound and tempers flare, leading to friendships under strain and new alliances forming, and is I’ve come to expect from Etting and Schwartz, they keep the rollercoaster ride of emotions going until the very end. The story continues with Ellie’s mom giving her the news about an opportunity she was offered to skyrocket her career in politics, but it’s a move which forces Ellie to put her own life on hold to help advance her mom’s career. Teryn is preparing to make a few adjustments in her life, which might or might not include to-die-for Brooks, Brinley can’t get her mind off Shane and is forced to form a new friendship with someone she despises, while Evan struggles to get accustomed to life in the spotlight.

“That’s what was hard about having friends across political lines. Your personal agendas never lined up and you had to decide how much of a friendship deal-breaker that was.”

Not only is the story incredibly engaging, the authors ingeniously present the reader with the same impossible choices the characters have to make. Who would you root for to become the Second Daughter? Especially if the choice is between two characters you adore equally. I often asked myself what I would’ve done in the same situations these characters had to face where you have to push your needs to the side and make an unselfish choice to benefit the career of one or both your parents. Amidst the glitz and glamour of Ellie, Brinley and Taryn’s lives, the decisions they are obligated to make are oftentimes the price they pay for the perks and prestige that goes along with having a parent with a high-flying political career, and where social status is of utmost importance. The one character to be the exception here is Evan, who is very aware of her “outsider” status, as one of the few scholarship students at Georgetown Academy. As an unpaid intern after school at the nightly news show “Today in Politics”, Evan keeps her head down as much as possible, but trying to navigate the social minefield in her quiet way whilst dating the son of one of the U.S. President’s closest advisors, seems like a near-impossible task.

What I absolutely love about this series is that every book can be read as a stand-alone, but of course I’ll recommend that anyone who is interested in reading this exceptional series start with the first book to get to know the histories of these carefully sculpted characters and to see how their different personalities evolve from the first book to the fourth. Where the previous three books were just cruising along, detailing the dramas of the main characters’ daily ups and downs in the Washington DC political whirlpool, the authors really packed the heat to take it up a notch in the fourth addition to this unparalleled series. Outrageously clever with a phenomenal storyline for each protagonist, Georgetown Academy is chick lit wit pizzazz for YA readers, and a series I highly recommend!