The Mystery Box (The Nightmare Collection)

WARNING: Review contains spoilers!I normally don't read mystery books, but the short description of this one intrigued me. What was in that titular mystery box? The clue to solving a murder case? Something supernatural or fantastic in nature? The possibilities were endless, and I found myself wanting to know more. The fact that the e-book was free at the time didn't hurt anything either, and I figured I would be out pretty much nothing in giving this book a chance.In the end, though, I found the book to be extremely mediocre. Not terrible, but bland and ultimately forgettable.Yvette is a suburban mother in Texas, struggling to juggle a career as an online teacher with three kids, a husband, a dog, and everything else being a stay-at-home mother entails. When a box ends up on her doorstep, bearing her address but her next-door neighbor's name, she delivers the contents of said box (not the box for some strange reason) to Mona, the reclusive and crotchety woman who's long griped at her kids and dog through the back fence. Mona, quite uncharacteristically, invites Yvette into her house and, over the course of several days, tells her the story of her life. At first Yvette simply humors the lonely woman, but soon she finds herself drawn into her tale... and when Mona reveals they have a startling connection, Yvette realizes that she has to act to protect her family. But is the mysterious villain of Mona's tale the greater threat to her family... or Mona herself?"The Mystery Box" is written in a combination of present and past tense, with Yvette's story in present tense and Mona's in past tense. I'm not sure why the author chose to write it this way, as it adds nothing to the story and comes across as the author trying to be "experimental." It wasn't even necessary to use this style to differentiate between Yvette and Mona's stories, as Mona's story is told in first person while Yvette's is in third person. A minor annoyance, but an annoyance nonetheless.The writing in this book is sub-par, in my opinion. The plot has a tendency to meander, with the author pausing in the middle of the story to dump in a flashback or large chunks of exposition. And did we really need her to bring the plot crashing to a halt in order to drop in a Stockholm Syndrome definition that sounds like it came from Wikipedia? Surely this is something the reader is either smart enough to know already or can look up on their own. That and said definition segues into a story about Yvette's grandfather in WWII that has pretty much no impact on the rest of the plot. Also, the author has a tendency to repeat certain phrases over and over and over -- "No backbone" and "liar" and "idiot on morphine" and "hamster in a wheel." Sometimes we get several of these in one chapter, and it gets irritating fast.The characters in this book are rather unlikable as well -- Yvette comes across as weak-willed, resentful, and whiny, while Mona is pushy to the point of creepiness (though I suppose the "creepy" was intentional on the part of the author). Most of the other characters are pretty much cardboard cutouts with no real personality. Even the villain seems to have walked into the book straight from a James Bond film or cheesy cartoon -- he's evil to the point of ridiculousness, and he comes across as cartoony and over-the-top. Having him be connected to the Taliban also adds practically nothing to the plot, and seems to have been thrown in simply to show how EEEE-VUL he is. Authors, please stop using the Taliban as a cheap plot device. There are more (and better) ways to make your characters antagonists than by giving them ties to the Taliban.Yvette and Mona are constantly making stupid decisions as well, which stretched my willing suspension of disbelief to the breaking point. What kind of woman skips out on a family vacation just to listen to a neighbor she doesn't even like tell a story? Who tell someone to not call the police over a life-or-death matter and expects them to obey? Who dumps a loving fiancé just because their professor is hotter? Over and over these two women kept putting themselves in ridiculous situations and acting like airheads, until I finally stopped caring what happened to the. I was quite frankly more worried about Yvette's children than the two lead characters, if only because they didn't deserve to be put in danger because their mother was a bonehead.I give this book two stars instead of one because the last quarter of the book DOES pick up, and it kept me reading and on the edge of my seat. But all in all, this is a series I won't be revisiting, and I can only be glad that I didn't spend actual money on it.

A stream of random thoughts from the author . It starts with gimmicky series of romantic cliffhangers then wanders to terrorism, kidnapping and torture told through a multitude of characters impossible to follow .

The story line is very good. However, I did not like the delivery of the story. Too many times it read like a cheap romance novel, you know the ones that had Fabio on the cover. The story of a woman kidnapped, held hostage, impregnated by a Middle Eastern terrorist, who then gives up her baby, and tracks down the family that adopted the baby is better than it sounds, but the sappy, trite romance novel aspect was a little too cliche for me. I was glad to see the story end in one book. I was afraid I might be forced to read another to see what happens. I do not recommend this book unless you are a fan of cheap romance novels.

Before reading this book, I read the reviews by other readers. There were quite a few negative ones - some for perceived lack of editing and some for the story being "implausible". Some obviously contained spoilers, so I just kind of skimmed over those. There were also a lot of favorable reviews and the premise sounded interesting, so I decided to give it a shot, and I'm glad I did. This is the story of Yvette, a suburban housewife and "soccer mom" type mother of three. The author does a good job of detailing the time and energy needed to maintain a home and try to meet the needs of a husband and three school-age kids with their school projects, sports, extra-curriculars, homework, etc., plus a dog who is a member of the family on equal standing. Yvette also has a small circle of close friends and is basically your normal housewife. She is pretty in tune with herself and is well-aware of what she perceives as her shortcomings - "no backbone", "liar". When she recognizes this behavior in herself, she mentally calls herself out on it. This is not unintentional "repeating", as some readers seem to think - it is a device by the author to show Yvette's awareness of her behavior and I thought it was a good touch. One day, Yvette receives a package from UPS that was meant for a neighbor. Thus begins her involvement with Mona, an involvement that will eventually change her life in almost every way. Up to this point, Mona was merely the annoying and complaining neighbor behind the back fence. When she takes the package to Mona's house, she formally meets the woman for the first time. Mona's house is a mess, Mona is a mess and Mona's life is obviously a mess. Mona insists that she has a story to tell Yvette and Yvette reluctantly agrees to listen. This leads to a series of visits to Mona's house for subsequent installments of the involved story of Mona's life. Each time Yvette leaves, after listening to the story and eating store-bought cakes and cookies that Mona tries to pass off as home-made, Yvette tells herself she will not be returning, yet she is compelled to. (no backbone). She also becomes certain that although Mona claims to live alone except for her cats, there is another person somewhere in the back of the house. Eventually, Yvette becomes so engrossed in Mona's narrative that she starts to feel guilty about neglecting her family's dinner times, kids' homework and even a planned family fishing trip that she makes an excuse to skip so that she can hear the end of Mona;s detailed and complex history. Part of this may be a subconscious desire on Yvette's part to add some excitement to her very hectic, but nevertheless mundane, daily life. The story progresses in an increasingly bizarre and somewhat disturbing way involving a former lover of Mona's who may or may not be insane, and soon Yvette herself and her family are involved in a way Yvette never saw coming. Some reviewers called the plot "implausible" - come on, people - this is fiction, after all! The story hurtles along to a shocking conclusion, and then there is a very satisfying epilogue that ties everything together. I liked Yvette and Mona's narrative was so real that I could actually picture the people involved. The book was exciting, the story was cohesive and I was anxious to see how it would end. Many people and events were not as they seemed, and I liked the way it alternated between speakers. As I said, some readers rated this book down because of "lack of editing", and there were some problems there, but the book was so engrossing that I soon stopped really noticing these things. I am a reader, not an English teacher or editor. I read books for the story and rate them accordingly. This is an exciting book that will definitely take you out of your ordinary, day-to-day routine.

It's a bit far fetched but nevertheless a gripping mystery right to the end. Probably make a good film. However there was one irritant for me in that the author (in common with a lot of self-published authors) has not done her research. She states that Yvette's grandfather was in a concentration camp during WW11 and subsequently says it was a POW camp,then places two characters with Jewish names in the POW camp. The two were quite different sorts of camps and should not be confused. All this information is freely available on the internet and takes only moments to look up, but lack of research on a subject I know something about completely spoils a book for me because if the author is wrong about that, then how many other facts have they got wrong. Authors, please take a moment to check what you are writing about to ensure it is correct.

I downloaded this an age ago and back then it didn't mention the soccer mom part of the title and it shouldn't as I am pretty sure soccer wasn't even mentioned and it bears absolutely NO relation to the story itself, trust me !!I almost gave in with it quite early in as I happened across mistakes and as a rule if they start in early I'm going to need to plough through a heck of a lot more !! There WERE more but they got more evenly spaced out. However, they really ought to have been spotted.The first was "Who you are you"? followed swiftly by "I jealous of them", "...and I will this look good on my application","...and gives out hugs kisses".....easily noticed, in my opinion. As was you're being used and not your, then surly and not surely, scraggily and not straggly and the and not then. All of these should never have got through an editing process and nor should quite a few misplaced apostrophes. Laptop is usually the one word as well. A few phrases that were mildly amusing the first and second times they were mentioned soon got on my nerves....a lot. The constant repetition of liar and no backbone got very tired indeed.I've never heard of the word "suitemates" before which deputised for housemates, really and I wasn't sure what a garden home was. Not something I've heard of. Another phrase I found peculiar was "Her entire body is swollen and numb with dread".....that really means nothing at all. This sentence gave me pause till I realised all it needed was a simple hyphen for it to make immediate sense-"It's time sensitive information" then Yvette ruminates near the ending about her kids perhaps being in a position to witness somebody dying telling us they'd never witnessed a death when not 4 pages back they DID witness quite a horrible one !!I enjoyed the story. It holds your interest with plenty of twist 'n' turns throughout although some of the characters irritated me as they lied quite a lot to nice people and therefore didn't endear themselves. I almost gave up nearing the end as the story seemed to be heading towards the wrong side of believability for me but thankfully it saved itself in time and pulled back !!Sadly all these errors cost it one star for me. I would perhaps try another by the author but I wouldn't rush to add her to my favourites.

Mother of three Yvette is a typical American forty something suburban mom. She feels she is in a rut or as she puts it, on a hamster's wheel of daily routine. Initially, you think you are going to be reading a pretty standard angst "they all take me for granted" whine until everything changes with the delivery of an apparently wrongly addressed box by UPS. The address is correct but the name, Mona Smith, is no-one Yvette knows. After a little research (and opening the box to peek at the contents), she discovers that Mona Smith is her neighbour in the house backing onto hers, a woman who has been sending her messages of complaint about noise from her children and her dog and making her life a misery. She decides to take the box round and her reactions to what and who she finds range from fear, fascination, intrigue, horror, terror and eventually trust. From the first line, the high quality of the writing was very clear and added a depth to the storyline which made it absolutely compelling reading. I completely agree with other reviewers that this would make a gripping film and hope very much that someone in that industry eventually takes it up. Brilliant!

This was a very entertaining book that weaved two stories together. Yvette in present day meets Mona, her neighbour following a mix-up with a package being delivered to the wrong address. Mona decides that she wants to tell Yvette her life story. What appears to be quite random to begin with, eventually reveals a connection between the two women, as we learn about Mona's younger years at college and her involvement with her Philosophy professor.How the two women are linked is eventually revealed, but not until over half way through the book. Although the story is at times ridiculously far fetched, it is extremely compelling and I could not stop reading, this book is pure escapism and would make a brilliant film or mini series. I found it completely different to the usual thrillers that I read, but I really enjoyed it and would not hesitate to recommend it to others.

This book goes a long way to show that a dull imperfect life and marriage is so much better than some of the alternatives. Suspense is well built into the greater part of the book, but somewhat carelessly thrown about in the latter few pages. As I often believe, the author imagines the final scenes as a movie, and it careers a little wildly and disjointedly towards its climax. Not a huge criticism, but there needed to be a little more finesse to the finale. Otherwise, a clever tale, with enough turns to keep you from being certain where the path will lead.