A Week of Werewolves, Faeries and Fancy Dresses by Nicki Chapelway

This short novel is a good debut effort for a teen author. Chapelway has a good sense of creating an ongoing story line. It kept my attention throughout. She has crafted some interesting characters too.

Chelsea, her twin brother and two others find out they have each been traveling to medieval Amar through a portal. They go together and are immediately thrust into a dangerous adventure. It seems their fathers had been there and had left on an important journey, never to return. (The fathers are safe in the contemporary world.) The teens will not be allowed to travel back to their current world until they have followed the path of their fathers and find out what happened to them. It turns out to be a very dangerous journey.

The concept of the travel portal has been somewhat overworked in fantasy novels. A little humor was added this time as the portal sometimes drops the teens in the oddest places, like on top of a table with one foot in a bowl of porridge.

The strength of this novel was character interaction. Chapelway is a teen and has done a great job with the dialog and thoughts teens have. There was lots of humor in Chelsea's thoughts. I really enjoyed that.

There could have been more description as that would have helped readers picture places and people a little better. I read a digital version of the book and several chapters were out of order. The ending of the book is sort of a cliff hanger but I felt it was more just a stopping point in the story line. I would have liked to see some resolution, some completion of some aspect of the story, before the abrupt stop in action.

Chapelway has great potential. The text could use a little correcting of grammar. For example, “Brothers … never appreciate the things us sisters do for them.” (456/3504) Some editing would help the flow of the work as well. Nonetheless, I applaud the author and look forward to watching her grow as a creative writer. This would be a good book for young teens.

I am taking part in a blog tour of this book. You can find links to other reviews and a guest post from the author here.

My rating: 4/5 stars.

Nicki Chapelway is the pseudonym of a teenage girl. She enjoys reading, writing, swimming, and watching TV. She lives in Ohio with her family of eight and two dogs. She is currently working on the next book in the series. You can find out more at http://pausefortales.blogspot.com.

CreateSpace Independent Publishing, 260 pages. You can buy a copy here.

I received a complimentary digital copy of this book through Celebrate Lit. My thoughts are an independent and honest review.