Not as great as the James Patterson alone as an author book. I did like the main character and had hoped to see her continued in a series or something to wrap up the story of her "missing years and the vanished boyfriend" I would also like to know the grandmother's inheritance. I feel like it was intending to be picked up in another story somewhere. I do read a lot of James Patterson, including his novels for younger folks. As a teacher I always wanted to find something to grab the attention of the reluctant reader and his books often worked, this could also be one for your reluctant reader to try.
The writing style allows me to just keep going and before I know it the dishes are piled up with the laundry and I have forgotten to go to the post office or anything I had planned. Take this book for what it is, a made-up story about a family tragedy.
The ending surprised me, I can often call it early but not this time!
Okay, I didn't realize this was a YA novel until I started reading it -- it just didn't have the usual Patterson blood and gore... That said, even being a YA novel, I didn't feel this was on par with others I have read for younger readers. The book was narrated by Tandy Angel who wakes up one morning to find that her parents have been murdered in their upscale apartment in the Dakota building in NYC. But how could anyone have made it into the secure building to do the deed unless it was one of Tandy's siblings who lived there with the parents. The family is rich from a pharmaceutical company and apparently the parents had been giving enhancement drugs to their children for years. The oldest is a star football player and then there is Harry, a musical prodigy, and Hugo, a 10-year old strongman. Well Tandy sets out to solve who killed her parents and the end of the story is very anticlimactic with a lot of loose ends. I assume this is because this will be an ongoing YA series from Patterson and his writing team. I think I will steer clear of the subsequent volumes.
