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A review by paperprivateer
Keeper Chance and the Conundrum of Chaos by Alex Evanovich
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
2.5
First, I am not the target audience. Although my favorite book genre is middle grade and I read it widely, sometimes a book doesn’t work for me as a reader when I think the target audience wouldn’t have a problem with it. I think this may be one of those books.
I was bored reading a lot of this book. It wasn’t necessary because things weren’t happening. It just seemed like it was trying so hard to be quirky, fun, and adventurous that I was annoyed. Again, there’s a decent amount that I could attribute to not being the target audience. But I love the Percy Jackson books and others that this book has been compared to, and I thought those books did it well without being annoying.
The adult characters all seemed like over-the-top Batman villains. The kid characters don’t make sense to me. They’re just too old to be acting the way they are, and why are high school characters the main characters in an obviously middle grade book? The age mismatch with the story makes it hard to figure out the best audience. Middle school boys? Or high school boys who want easier reads? It doesn’t perfectly fit any group.
I also just didn’t understand a lot of the motivations. Why is Keeper so important? Why is stealing cookies the mission? How, exactly, is this organization supposed to be evil when it just seems like they’re low-effort troublemakers at best? EVIL seemed like the equivalent of Dr Doofenshmirtz trying desperately to be the evilest villain of all but being terrible about it, except it worked for Doofenshmirtz and just annoyed me here. Why is the group against EVIL (so… theoretically good guys?) actually the most villainous people in the book? Maybe the point is that what is good and evil might be complicated sometimes, but if so, why is EVIL so determined to say it’s an evil villain organization while, again, not really doing much worse than stealing cookies and causing light mischief? Maybe some of those questions were even answered and I was just trying so hard to finish the book I accidentally skipped over them.
To summarize, while this book wasn’t for me, I do think there is an audience that will love it. I don’t think it should be compared to Percy Jackson, and I wouldn’t recommend it to the young readers in my life, but I hope it finds the people who will enjoy it most.
Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for the free copy in exchange for my honest review. The opinions are my own and were not influenced by receiving a copy.
I was bored reading a lot of this book. It wasn’t necessary because things weren’t happening. It just seemed like it was trying so hard to be quirky, fun, and adventurous that I was annoyed. Again, there’s a decent amount that I could attribute to not being the target audience. But I love the Percy Jackson books and others that this book has been compared to, and I thought those books did it well without being annoying.
The adult characters all seemed like over-the-top Batman villains. The kid characters don’t make sense to me. They’re just too old to be acting the way they are, and why are high school characters the main characters in an obviously middle grade book? The age mismatch with the story makes it hard to figure out the best audience. Middle school boys? Or high school boys who want easier reads? It doesn’t perfectly fit any group.
I also just didn’t understand a lot of the motivations. Why is Keeper so important? Why is stealing cookies the mission? How, exactly, is this organization supposed to be evil when it just seems like they’re low-effort troublemakers at best? EVIL seemed like the equivalent of Dr Doofenshmirtz trying desperately to be the evilest villain of all but being terrible about it, except it worked for Doofenshmirtz and just annoyed me here. Why is the group against EVIL (so… theoretically good guys?) actually the most villainous people in the book? Maybe the point is that what is good and evil might be complicated sometimes, but if so, why is EVIL so determined to say it’s an evil villain organization while, again, not really doing much worse than stealing cookies and causing light mischief? Maybe some of those questions were even answered and I was just trying so hard to finish the book I accidentally skipped over them.
To summarize, while this book wasn’t for me, I do think there is an audience that will love it. I don’t think it should be compared to Percy Jackson, and I wouldn’t recommend it to the young readers in my life, but I hope it finds the people who will enjoy it most.
Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for the free copy in exchange for my honest review. The opinions are my own and were not influenced by receiving a copy.