The Magic House: The Amazing Adventures of Alexander and Sophia
by Alan Matkovic
Sophia and Alexander are two children looking for adventure. They discover a secret entrance to a magic house with mysterious rooms filled with every imaginable delight. As they explore the rooms, they find all their favorite things. But the mystery behind the last door will surprise them with magic they never imagined to be possible.
This book was just okay. The illustrations are fairly good, but seem unpolished. The writing is fine, but nothing special. The story itself is excellent, but the execution is sort of amateur.
The writing is too verbose for a children’s picture book, wasting time describing the scenery which is already visible in the illustrations. Why bother to say in the text that there are yellow stars on the ceiling, when the reader can already SEE that there are yellow stars on the ceiling? Half the text could be condensed if superfluous descriptions were edited out.
I loved how imaginative each of the magic rooms are! Each time the children entered a different room, I was interested and surprised to see what they would discover next.
But the scenes where the children are traveling to the magic house took too long. The story drags in the beginning. There are also two pages of dedications and acknowledgements at the beginning of the book. It’s a very unusual structure for a picture book.
Overall, a fun little book with a good story, but it needs a good editor to polish it up.
Disclaimer: I received a copy of this book from the publisher in exchange for a free and honest review. All the opinions expressed here are my own true thoughts, and are not influenced by anyone.
The Lonely Cloud: The Amazing Adventures series
by Alan Matkovic
Alexander, Sophia, and Mathias are playing at the playground when they notice a single cloud. They invite the cloud to play with them, and teach him how to make sandcastles with a bucket. However, when they invite the cloud home for dinner, they never expect how he will react!
This book was just okay. The illustrations are fairly good, but seem unpolished. The writing is fine, but nothing special. The story itself is excellent, but the execution is sort of amateur. The writing is too verbose for a children’s picture book, adding in extra details that slow the pace of the story.
I did enjoy the whimsical style of the writing! The cloud plays with the children in imaginative ways, and it was a delight to see how the cloud had to adapt to different playground games. I liked reading about the cloud’s reaction to having dinner with the children. It was a fun ending to the story, and made me chuckle!
Overall, a fun little book with a good story, but it needs a good editor to polish it up.
Disclaimer: I received a copy of this book from the publisher in exchange for a free and honest review. All the opinions expressed here are my own true thoughts, and are not influenced by anyone.
Luminous Libro 