Message from a Star, by Michael J Clark is a DNF for me. I just couldn't get past the characters being annoying.

Any time someone can put together enough words to create a book, I’m impressed. Unfortunately, despite some great reviews, this book is a complete letdown. I don’t often write scathing reviews because I don’t like to hurt peoples’ feelings. However, when something this egregious is released and a review is requested on Netgalley, I feel I have little choice. It is written in a confusing manner with syntax that only serves as obfuscation to whatever thoughts the writer is trying to convey, and seemed to rely on the word “such” a bit too much. Here are some actual sentences, and I use that term loosely:

“Coupled with always gaining straight ‘A’s, in exams, teachers, and even the college Principle (sic) would always look the other way rather than upset their two star pupils.”

The following paragraph was peppered with sentences beginning with “but.” But when I read this, I almost stopped reading altogether: “But life can play strange tricks on you. Call it fate, or coincidence, who can say !” Aside from the exclamation point, that should have been a question mark, there was an actual space after the last word! Then there were these sentences:

“Now as we get older our appearance can change dramatically, but our personality will always stay the same. So Chad’s fun loving and excitable exterior positively exploded with happiness, as he and his beloved family having had at last reached the hotel’s reception desk.”

I couldn’t read any more of this drivel. A skilled editor would have been a great investment. My time is valuable and I don’t have the patience to read such a poorly written amalgamation of words and phrases. I give up. Don’t waste your time.

The first poem is lovely... I hope the book carries on like this!

After a veeeeery slow and boring start, things are starting to improve again now, thankfully.

There are 9 major/main characters introduced in the first chapter though and I'm already confused about who is whose partner and child!

The two friends are in really deep poo now and just keep getting deeper!

Skipped through several chapters because it just was sooo boring and it just seemed a waste of my time to read through so much boredom. I'm at chapter 20 now and the main characters were either caught by the police but talked their way out of it or they are still on the run... I don't care either way any more, I just wanna get to the end of the dratted thing now.

There have been a few good bits in this, but I've skipped another 4 chapters forward now. Its almost like the author had so many good ideas to start off with but quickly ran out of steam and just wrote through boredom very quickly. The book has potential, but there's been very little to keep me interested unfortunately.

The last couple of chapters are as great as the first couple, it's just the main part of the book that is preventing me from giving it a higher rating and more positive review is all.

What a beautiful ending! If it hadn't been for the middle 400-odd pages then it would definitely have got 5 stars from me!