Kate Brian

As Charmed books go, this is a very good one. It begins with some non-magic conflict between the sisters. Phoebe is feeling under-appreciated by her sisters, who don’t realize she also has important things to do. Soon, everyone will see how important she is because during a battle with demons, Phoebe gets separated from her sisters. A knock on the head, and a spell from bad witches later, she’s convinced by the evil witches seeking amulets which will give them ultimate magical power, that she’s their good friend, Ruth, and together they battle evil.

Meanwhile back at Halliwell Manor, Leo can’t locate the missing Phoebe, and scrying doesn’t work either. As of yet, no one realizes what’s going on, or that a spell is preventing them from finding Phoebe, and keeping Phoebe’s memories of Piper and Paige buried. While Ruth/Phoebe helps her “sister” witches retrieve the amulets, despite a feeling of unease, Piper and Paige have to deal with Flector demons, and could really use the power of three. They could also use Phoebe on the home-front. Piper and Paige have a house full of magical creatures demanding the counseling and advice session promised them by Phoebe.

While the magical creature part of the story can get a bit frivolous at times, and the bad witches’ interactions with Ruth a tad tiring, things get much better once Paige encounters Phoebe and her fellow “good” witches in action, and realizes Phoebe has completely forgotten her real sisters. It’s all well written, and for the most part pretty enjoyable. The conclusion helped a great deal, as it was both exciting and fun, and had a couple of wonderful moments between sisters toward the end. It very much retained the feel of the show, so gets high marks on that front.

Probably a 4.2 for me, just because a few frivolous moments bored me, and the series works best when all three sisters have more scenes together. Overall, however, this is a very enjoyable entry which captured nicely the feel of the series. Highly recommended for fans of the show as a light and entertaining read which now has the added bonus of being nostalgic; this show debuted two decades ago! My, how time flies…… (més)

Private by Kate Brian is a dramatic, teenage angst drama perfect for the Young Adult audience.

This novel is a great turn in the Young Adult genre. Why? Because it's not supernatural. I love that this book is not part of the supernatural trend, and it is all about teenagers and their petty drama.

We follow 15 year old Reid Brennan in Easton Academy where she is a scholarship student among many rich kids. It is full of the typical teenage drama - popular cliches, boys, silly drama, high school angst and gossip.

It is entirely what you expect it to be - dramatic and fun! An outside girl is trying to fit in with the popular girls, and of course she will do whatever she wants to be apart of them! And of course you throw a hot, bad boy into the mix and the drama and gossip gets juicier.

I absolutely loved this book. It moves at a fast pace - something is always happening! Sometimes it's romance, sometimes it's drama, sometimes it's both! But it doesn't leave you feeling bored!!

I find it hard to pick up a Young Adult novel that doesn't go on and on about plot lines we don't actually need. Private gets to the point, pulling every piece of drama out of Kate Brian's magical dramatic bag.

It does have it's low points - our main character does not have a back bone like many teens to do today. She is pushed around easily and her emotions get the best of her. School work isn't mentioned that much, but in a soap opera type book who cares about the grades and studying parts of Reid's "real life"?

It's a great read for someone who wants a teenage soap opera. It is for sure, very entertaining!

I would suggest it to anyone who likes novels such as Pretty Little Liars, but with less murder. If you are not interested in petty drama, silly high school drama and soap opera like plot lines, it is not the book for you. It is a book that requires little thought to read, and I find it great only for the amusement - I don't have to follow any crazy plot lines or insane theories. It's just a soap opera! So do not expect Gone Girl with plot twists and awesome endings. It is definitely your cookie cutter drama. Our main character is going to complain about being a teenage girl and she's not going to try to change. Our cast of characters are all very cookie cutter as well, we don't have any awesome background stories - this book isn't going to be made into an Oscar-worthy movie, that's for sure.

This book would sit well with young readers - it's the type of book they need at aged 13ish. It's relatable to that age group, but if you are an older teen or an adult it will seem pretty lame. It's not realistic to the adult mind, but to a pre-teen reader who deals with this type of drama at school, it'll hit a home run right to home base.

It's quick. It's scandalous. And it's mindless for the adult reader.

Four out of five stars! I would love to pick up the next book soon!… (més)

I’m rating this on scale for what it is— a Gossip Girl-esque book that could be pure fun for the right audience (8th graders most likely).

I’m reading this because it is one of the first books I put on my to-read list when I joined Goodreads over a decade ago. So, I can successfully cross that one off, and even though I love Kate Brian/Kieran Scott books, I now realize I wasn’t missing out all these years by not picking this up. She has obviously grown as a writer since this because it was not her best.… (més)