Beautiful Americans by Lucy Silag

Publisher: Razorbill
Pub.Date: January 8th 2009
Age Range: young adult
Pages: 304
Format: hardcover
Source Of Copy: from the publisher
Pretty Little Liars meets My So-Called Life in this story of four American teens in Paris and the scandals that haunt each of them.
There's rich New York girl Alex; Cali-born dancer Olivia; closeted Memphis boy Zack; and fi nally PJ, an elusive beauty from Vermont who's hiding a dark past.
Studying abroad for their junior year of high school, they run wild in the Tuileries, hold clandestine parties in their host families' luxe apartments, take over tiny crowded cafes and generally live the glamorous life.
But in the end they all must face the lies they've told and secrets they've kept when the unthinkable happens.

Four stories within a book about 4 exchange students for those who want to read about adventures of finding one's self.

Beautiful Americans starts refreshingly with everything set in Paris, the city of romance. Four different American teenagers with four different backgrounds are thrown together in a web of love, friendship and their own hidden past.

Lucy Silag's writing is fun to read. It changes upon the characters, making a variety of moods for the story. I love how she throws everyone together and naturally build bonds among them, even if some relationships are love-hate type. Four of the main characters are colorful, though some of them make good impressions, some of them fail to make the readers fall in love with them.

PJ's story. It's my favorite, since there's something really dark about her and it suits the atmosphere of Paris - vague, unclear. She seems very lonely and sad and always loses herself into thoughts of the past. I think her story has the most potential to develop to something big and intriguing.

Grace's. Good girl gone bad (or sort of not as good as expected). I like the changes in her after her injury and her encounter with Thomas. However, I'm still not sure if I like her or not. She seems very indecisive.

Alex's and Zack's. I don't enjoy their stories real much since it focuses much just on the love side. I would love to get to know more of their characters, something deeper which I think we can find in the next books of the series.

Overall I like this book and I'm probably going to check out the next two ones. It's one of those books I can imagine being brought to big screens too.

Rating: 3.5/5