Review: badly written
Rating: 1 out of 5
Date: 01 9, 2014
I like sentences with a subject and a verb--in fact, those are the two essential ingredients for a string of words to be called a sentence.  I don't mind chopped up bits in dialogue, but this book contains too many narrative passages with phrases passing as sentences.  "White chocolate eyes with dark chocolate irises."  "Set him down and started another."  "Perfect."  These are not sentences, and every time I came across one of these it jerked me out of the story and made me wonder what sort of editing the book had received.I found the book's premise implausible as well.  Mysteries create a puzzle that must be solved with the clues that the author hides in the story.  A magic box and special powers belong in fantasy writing, not in a mystery set in modern America, unless you wish to create a magic world existing alongside or within our normal, non-magical one--like the Harry Potter books.  The author gives no rationale for magic of any kind, and it throws off the whole equation--it's a cheap way to cheat.  I didn't finish the book.