Home › Book Reviews › Book Review: Treasures of the Forgotten City / Adventure

Book Review: Treasures of the Forgotten City / Adventure

By M.J. Moores on February 23, 2017 • ( 4 )

Treasures of the Forgotten City – An “Ultimate Ending” Choose Your Own Adventure, Book 1

Authors: David Kristoph &

Danny McAleese

Rating: 4.5 out of 5 Stars.

Recommended Reading.

Genre: Adventure.

“You are Donovan Young, entrepreneur, explorer, and most recently, would-be treasure hunter.” Reading the first line of the book immediately took me back to my middle-school days and the absolute treasure my mother found for my birthday present – a set of 4 Choose Your Own Adventure YA Fantasy books. I devoured those books over and over and over again … which is exactly what’s happening now with Treasures of the Forgotten City.

With 26 possible endings, I’ve stumbled upon 8 so far and I still haven’t made it to the Ultimate Ending! In fact, I’m reading this book whenever I can steal a moment in my hectic day–not only am I committed to the character, Donovan, and his/my quest but now that I’ve started, I have to keep reading until I make it to the Ultimate Ending. I’m addicted and it only took the first line to hook me.

What keeps me reading is not only the hunger to succeed, but the innate desire to learn more about this lost city, Donovan’s strange guide, and about the “book” Donovan’s Grand-Uncle gave him. Each path I take leads me somewhere new as I uncover secrets about these people (both the main characters and those who ruled the lost city all those thousands of years ago).

This is a “guilty pleasures” book for me, in that it’s like cotton candy–oh, so good and yet it disappears oh, so fast. Each time I “die” or leave the city without the treasure, I yell out loud in frustration. ARGH! I love the complex-simplicity of the plot and the devices Kristoph & McAleese build into the book–it’s like a fantasy card game or traditional RPG magically imbued into book form: decisions are based not only on the discovery of items and information, but via the flip of a coin, the role of the dice, and so much more. The interactive nature of it, mixed with motivation and chance, does not guarantee anything for the reader, except that it’ll be different every time.

The story is well written, the plot enticing, the language clean, and the fun/frustration never ending or … at least until I’ve finally discovered the Ultimate Ending! I can’t wait to introduce this series to my son.

Review by M.J. Moores, Author. Editor.