Review: Perfect Scoundrels by Ally Carter

Perfect Scoundrels (Heist Society #3) by Ally Carter
Released: 7th February 2012
Publisher: Orchard Books (UK)
Source: Bought
Reason to read: Erm hello? Hale? Ally Carter? Need I say more
Rating: 5/5 

**This is the third book in the series meaning the synopsis and review will have spoilers for the earlier books**
 
Goodreads description:

Katarina Bishop and W.W. Hale the fifth were born to lead completely different lives: Kat comes from a long, proud line of loveable criminal masterminds, while Hale is the scion of one of the most seemingly perfect dynasties in the world. If their families have one thing in common, it’s that they both know how to stay under the radar while getting—or stealing—whatever they want.

No matter the risk, the Bishops can always be counted on, but in Hale’s family, all bets are off when money is on the line. When Hale unexpectedly inherits his grandmother’s billion dollar corporation, he quickly learns that there’s no place for Kat and their old heists in his new role. But Kat won’t let him go that easily, especially after she gets tipped off that his grandmother’s will might have been altered in an elaborate con to steal the company’s fortune. So instead of being the heir—this time, Hale might be the mark.

Forced to keep a level head as she and her crew fight for one of their own, Kat comes up with an ambitious and far-reaching plan that first, she has to decide if she’s willing to save her boyfriend’s company if it means losing the boy.

My thoughts:

If you're a regular reader of my blog you will (hopefully) be aware of how much I love Ally Carter. I literally only started reading her books last year, but they're so fun and so amazing. The plots are just...well, we'll get onto that.

Perfect Scoundrels had the feel of a Heist Society book; but with much more serious themes running through it. This didn't lessen the impact or enjoyment for me at all, these books usually do feel a bit more serious because so much is riding on the success of their job and so much can go wrong, but this one felt so much more personal. With Hale's grandma and the effect that has not just on Hale but Kat and their friends. 

Hale was so different in this book and in light of what happened you cannot blame him. We got flashes of the old him, sure, but you could see the strain of everything that was happening taking its toll on Hale and it was so tragic. Partly because we lost the laid back, perpetually amused boy that we love, but mostly because Kat lost him. Kat, who was finally starting to recognise and accept her feeling for this boy, and suddenly he's not that boy anymore. He's lost to a world she doesn't fit in with, a place she cannot follow him to. It was good to see, in a way, because you could tell how much she truly does care for Hale that she was so scared of losing him, would do anything to save him. I love how at the end Kat gives him a choice. This wont make too much sense to you till you've read it, but I love that she does it, and the way that she does it. 

The plot met the level of  awesome I have come to expect from Ally Carter. Her plotlines are always so intricate and so well formulated so things are revealed at the right times for maximum impact. Things are kept from the reader, have to be, for the reveals to pack the sort of punch they pack, but you don't tend to care because you are so wrapped up in what's happening. I am always in awe at how Ally Carter manages to pull her plots off, it's almost like her pulling off her own heist, everyone has to be so precise and so delicately planned. I loved how everyone got involved in this, normally Kat and her gang are trying to keep their cons secret from the Bishop family, but this time it was special. We had Uncle Eddie, we had Kat's dad, we had EVERYONE. Even people we hadn't really met before. I loved how the Bishops closed ranks around Hale, that at a time when his own family were being fake and selfish, his adopted family were doing whatever they could to save him.

Kat was so mature in this one, I feel like sometimes she lets her emotions cloud her judgement and she did a little bit still, but it was mostly her fear of what would happen to Hale if he discovered certain things. I felt like she went into this much less stressed, much more balanced because they just had to do this for Hale, there was no time to worry about it.

You could feel the desperation a touch in this book, not just for a con to succeed but for them to have THIS con succeed, beat THIS villain, to save THIS boy and his company. It really added to the atmosphere of the book, to have this tension there. I felt so much more invested in this story because it was so much about Hale. Before, I always wanted them to succeed for them, but now I wanted them to succeed cause it was ABOUT Hale. It was so important to them and to me that everything worked out, and that connection really added to my experience of the book.

Ally Carter has fast become one of my 'must-read' authors and I really cannot express the excitement I felt at the prospect of, and whilst reading, this book. If you haven't picked up an Ally Carter book yet for whatever reason, I urge you to do so!