Review: Mysterious story that will keep you guessing
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 05 17, 2011
With so many generic mysteries/thrillers on the market, it's very important to stand out in the midst of all the book releases.  You have to be careful, though, not to go completely crazy in your attempt to be original.  "The Mystery of Big Ben" truly found a very happy medium as it managed to be a completely unique story while not being stupid.Story - In London, it's not unusual to have several murders happening daily, but suddenly several people who are murdered are found to look exactly alike with the exception of their different hair and eye color!  And, on top of that, they are murdered with extremely strange medieval weapons.  And the murderers?  Oh, they look pretty much exactly like the victims, too.This novel has such an interestingly unique concept that it truly will keep you on the edge of your seat, waiting for more!  It didn't focus on Big Ben as much as one would think that it would, but that's OK, because what it does focus on makes for a very good story indeed.Writing Style - For the most part, the author did very well writing this book.  It contains everything that a good mystery/thriller needs such as a continuous action-packed story, a few plot twists, and some good old fashioned drama.  Unfortunately, there were a few things that could have been tweaked about the story.First of all, there were so many characters in the story that were so alike that it became a bit difficult to keep everyone differentiated throughout the story, and I consistently found myself going back to see who exactly was the book talking about at that moment.  I wish I would have kept a list of the character's names upon beginning the book, but unfortunately, I didn't.My second complaint was the fact that there were so many typos.  And I'm not talking about the fact that a lot of the words were British spellings/forms of American words such as "tyre" instead of "tire," "lift" for "elevator," and "gaol" for "jail."  I actually loved this aspect of the book; it felt very authentic.  What I didn't like was that there were very often incorrect punctuation or misspelled words that are obvious misspellings and not a different dialect; the list of errors can go on and on.  It really felt quite unedited, which is a little bit unprofessional for an official novel.However, besides these two complaints, I really thought that the book was otherwise amazing in every other aspect especially on keeping the reader's attention throughout the story and never being boring.Warnings - Language, Mild Sexual Scenes, ViolenceOverall - This book was definitely not perfect, but it does stand out among many other books on the market.  It kept my interest from the first sentence on, and I truly enjoyed it immensely.  There were a few kinks to be worked out, but I still highly recommend this novel as a mystery/thriller that is unique and very, very good.