Academy Girls

Reading Good Girls Lie reminded me of a similar novel, Nora Carroll’s Academy Girls, so I had to reread it. Elements of class and privilege emerge in this story about prep school life.

There are really two narratives unfolding in Academy Girls. In one, Jane Milton is a teenage student, running around with her two best friends, reading poems (with the intensity that poetry can have for teenagers), obsessing about their English teachers’ lives, and investigating a murder that might have happened on campus years ago.  There are layers of secrets, from the students sneaking a beer or a smoke, to a cheating scandal, to a hit-and-run, and more.

In the other storyline, Jane Milton has returned to campus to teach English. Out of work and deeply in debt after her ex-husband’s, uh, financial irregularities landed him in jail, Jane knows this job is her last chance. She’s given all the subtle (and not-so-subtle) suggestions to work the kids hard and give them all As, because that’s how the funnel into the Ivies works. The students, far from caring about poetry and school history, are disaffected and privileged, and without any resources of her own, Jane discovers a new side of the school.

The two stories unfold together, revealing the school’s secrets in both timelines. Such a great read.