Review: Ups and downs...
Rating: 3 out of 5
Date: 07 16, 2012
I finished SHADOW GAMES and found it to be okay.  Not great, not terrible.There was a really good story in there, I think.  This book contains some neat ideas.  The idea of a "shadow people" is intriguing.  The conflict between the main characters, Paris and Alex Fox, and the powers behind the shadow people made for a good narrative.  I liked the characters more than some of the other reviewers did, I think.  There were some typos, and some phrases that were a bit awkward for me, but not enough to wreck the reading experiences.  And I thought the cover was pretty cool.But the book had its problems, also.  The pacing is not too well done.  Some scenes drag on interminably.  There is a tendency to overwrite, I think, telling every little thing that the characters are doing.  There were inconsistencies in the characters' behavior, also.  They seemed to be overgrown teenagers at times and deadly foes at others, sometimes in the course of a paragraph or two.  The voices used by the characters all seemed to be the same.  I found myself reading a long speech and having to go back to trace the speakers to figure out who said it.  I don't think a reader should have to do that; the characters should have their own voices, or at least it should be clear who is speaking from other clues in the paragraphs.I think it could have used a really good edit to pull out and highlight the decent story that I think this book contains.  I find myself hoping that the author was able to correct some of these issues in the second book, which I may read.  I did like the characters and the plot enough to give it a try.