The Land of Stories: The Wishing SpellI'll be honest, I got this audiobook simply out of curiosity. Before I had ever seen Glee, I did see Chris Colfer in an interview. That made me decide I'd give that Glee show a chance. I also liked the Struck by Lightning movie (haven't read that book).
In the end I had to just give it a down the middle kind of score. He wins with the concept (a brother and sister discover they are connected to and have access to a fairytale land). The writing and overall execution though, not so hot.
Perhaps because I was listening to this book as opposed to reading it, I notice little things that bugged me a lot. #1 being that I am sure the word "said" would show up more in a word count that most any other word. No big deal, right? People have to have said things. But without quoting the book let's say the two main characters were alone in a room discussing getting burgers for dinner (didn't happen, just sayin'):
"Burgers?" Asked Alex
"I like burgers" said Connor
"Yes," said Alex "you do."
"You like burgers too." said Connor.
You get the idea. Paragraphs worth of awkwardly written he said, she said, they said...
Even for a childrens or YA book, it just reads too young.
Still, as I said, the story itself isn't bad. It's a really good concept. If he tweaks his writing style some, he could have a future in books. Right now it's just really not refined enough for a higher rating than 3/5.
