The Hourglass Door

by Lisa Mangum

Deciding that I wanted to continue my latest interest in teen romance I picked up this book. The plot sounded interesting; an Italian exchange student,Dante, comes to town and he’s hiding a secret. What kind of secret I wondered. Obviously something to do with a mysterious door. Abby, enamoured by the Italian, must discover what secrets are hidden before she falls in love with him.

The story was stale and the plot was slow. Dante and Abby have no chemistry. By the end of the story I was perplexed why she loved him and would risk herself to be with him. Abby had a perfectly good boyfriend in Jason albeit a bit boring. Who cares if there were no sparks during the first kiss.   The secondary characters were bland.  The only one I thought was okay was Leo but he talked a LOT about mysteries of yonder.  Kind of boring.

The supernatural aspects of the story were confusing. Time and the absence of time and living outside of time were a bit too complicated for me to understand. And by the time the otherworldly aspects of the plot came into play I didn’t care.

I was ready to stop reading less than halfway through the book. It was slow and uninteresting. Save yourself the time and move on to something other than The Hourglass Door.