The Revenge of the Shadow King by Derek Benz
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Max Sumner and his three best friends, Harley, Ernie, and Natalia–who form the secret club The Grey Griffins–seem to be the only people in their very normal Minnesota town to notice that strange things have started to happen. When creatures like goblins and fairies and unicorns, all characters from a card game the Grey Griffins play, begin to make appearances in Max’s backyard, Max and his friends know something is terribly wrong. And it’s up to them to stop the wicked creatures of the cards from destroying their town-indeed, their world. – GoodReads

I liked this book pretty well, but it wasn’t amazing or anything. Most of the characters, plot, and writing were very trite and redundant. But there were a few really good scenes that kept me interested enough to finish reading the book.

The writing keeps stating the obvious over and over again, and has a problem with “telling” instead of “showing”. The writing is mostly good and interesting, but I never really got lost in the story. I never forgot that I was reading a book. Continue reading →