Quick Review: Heist Society by Ally Carter

From the Back Cover:

When Katarina Bishop was three, her parents took her on a trip to the Louvre...to case it. For her seventh birthday, Katarina and her Uncle Eddie traveled to Austria...to steal the crown jewels. When Kat turned fifteen, she planned a con of her own--scamming her way into the best boarding school in the country, determined to leave the family business behind. Unfortunately, leaving "the life" for a normal life proves harder than she'd expected.

Soon, Kat's friend and former co-conspirator, Hale, appears out of nowhere to bring her back into the world she tried so hard to escape. But he has good reason: a powerful mobster has been robbed of his priceless art collection and wants to retrieve it. Only a master thief could have pulled this job, and Kat's father isn't just on the suspect list, he is the list. Caught between Interpol and a far more deadly enemy, Kat's dad needs her help. For Kat there is only one solution: track down the paintings and steal them back. So what if it's a spectacularly impossible job? She's got two weeks, a teenage crew, and hopefully just enough talent to pull off the biggest heist in history--or at least her family's (very crooked) history.

My Thoughts:

A great read from beginning to end! Pure escapist fun with a little bit of poignancy thrown in. Kat and her friends come from a long line of thieving families, and after spending the first fifteen years of her life helping her dad pull one job after another, she just wants to be a normal teenager. But that's not in the cards for Kat, who is quite an exceptional girl. Smart, confident, and ridiculously clever, yet modest, shy, and completely unassuming--wrap that all up together and you get one savvy little thief. And a great character--who's story is told in third-person, yay!

But Kat's got a big problem. A seriously bad man thinks her father stole some of his prized artwork, and he's laying the responsibility of getting it back squarely on Kat's shoulders...or else. With the help of her billionaire best friend (boyfriend??) Hale, and her cousin Gabrielle, Kat crisscrosses Europe to track down the stolen art, and when she finally locates it, she calls in the rest of her crew. They've worked well together in the past, but no one's ever managed to do what they need to do: rob the most exclusive and heavily secured museum in the world. I won't divulge anymore of the plot, but it's smart, exciting, full of twists and surprises, and emotional, too. I couldn't put it down!

I call this an escapist read because it's a quick and fun read, but it's actually pretty heavy on themes of family, friendship, trust, and doing the right thing, and I shed a tear at the end. I can see why this series has so many devoted fans and I am very much looking forward to Kat's next adventure in Uncommon Criminals!

My Rating:  5 Stars out of 5