Standing in front of the full-length mirror, we tried hard not to blink or anything that might confuse the optical scanner that was going to verify that we were, in fact, sophomores and not freshmen trying to sneak down to the Subs on a dare.  I studied our reflections and realized that I, Cameron Morgan, the headmistress's daughter, who knew more about the school than any Gallagher Girl since Gilly herself, was getting ready to go deeper into the vault of Gallagher secrets.  Judging from the goose bumps on Bex's arm, I wasn't the only one who got chills at the thought of it.

A green light flashed in the eyes of the painting behind us.  The mirror slid aside, revealing a small elevator that would take us one floor beneath the basement to the Covert Operations classroom and -- if you want to be dramatic about it -- our destinies.

The Gallagher Academy for Exceptional Young Women, appears -- from the outside -- to be an elite, private, all-girls prep school.  Its reputation as a school for geniuses is partly true.  The secret?  It's a school for spies.  Gallagher Girls are fluent in fourteen languages (and converse in a different one at each meal time), know advanced martial arts and Ph.D. level biochemistry, and get extra credit for breaking codes for the NSA. Cammie, Bex, and Liz are a tight trio their sophomore year, but nothing in their curriculum has prepared them for their toughest mission of all: having a relationship with a normal boy.  Add their first course in Covert Operations, move rebel and tough-girl Macey McHenry into their suite, and these sophomores have no choice but to become a fearsome foursome if they are going to live through the year, not to mention survive falling in love.

Ally Carter's debut novel, the first in a series, is fast-paced, laugh-out-loud funny, and full of all the emotions one would expect in a suspenseful, empathetic novel about talented young women.  Readers will be reminded of threads similar to the Harry Potter series -- friendship, challenging classes, undercurrents of mystery, and the ironic clash of the "normal" and the exceptional, but in this case, in a story fully populated by brilliant ladies who know several ways to kill someone, one of which involves a piece of uncooked spaghetti.  Highly recommended for girls looking for something more in their chick lit, this book is also appropriate for tweens, thanks to its lack of sexual content and profanity so common in young adult literature.  For more on Ally Carter and her novels, click here.