This is why I don't tend to read self-published books. Not because of the really terrible ones, nor the really good ones, but because of the vast quantity of them which I probably would have enjoyed if they had been edited a time or two more, cleaned up and smoothed over and immersive.
This is your typical kids-discover-magic-powers story - really derivative, but with some interesting ideas. However, those ideas just get lost in the flat prose, shallow characters and weirdly paced plot. Throughout the story, I never had a good idea of who the characters were. Their voices were all almost identical - I couldn't tell who was who by the way they talked unless they were specifically referencing something personal.
All of which makes me sad, because I wanted to like this, but it wouldn't let me forget it was a book and that no one was real. Maybe I'm just overly picky. I don't know. But I was deeply disappointed by this book, and I don't think I'll be reading further in the series.