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The Keepers: The Box and the Dragonfly by Ted Sanders
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About the author
Ted Sanders
13 books160 followersTed Sanders is the author of The Box and the Dragonfly, the first book in the new middle grade series The Keepers, coming in 2015 from HarperCollins Children's. His first book, the short story collection No Animals We Could Name (Graywolf 2012), was the winner of the 2011 Bakeless Prize for Fiction. His stories and essays have appeared in publications The Southern Review, Cincinnati Review, Georgia Review, and the O. Henry Prize Stories anthology. A recipient of a 2012 National Endowment for the Arts literature fellowship, he lives with his family in Urbana, Illinois, and teaches at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign.
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
April 21, 2026
(Blurb from Amazon):
From the moment Horace F. Andrews sees the sign from the bus—a sign with his own name on it—everything changes. The sighting leads him underground, to the House of Answers, a hidden warehouse full of mysterious objects. But there, he finds only questions. What is this curious place? Who are the strange, secretive people who entrust him with a rare and immensely powerful gift? And what is he to do with it?
When Horace finds the Box of Promises in the curio shop, he quickly discovers that ordinary-looking objects can hold extraordinary power. From the enormous, sinister man shadowing him to the gradual mastery of his newfound abilities to his encounters with Chloe—a girl who has an astonishing talent of her own—Horace follows a path that puts the pair in the middle of a centuries-old conflict between two warring factions in which every decision they make could have disastrous consequences.
I listened to this book in audio (as I usually do) and this is my candid review.
The book was alright. It started out with what I thought seemed like an interesting premise, but I quickly grew annoyed with both the characters and the plot. The story took a long time to get moving, and by the time it finally did get moving, I wasn’t convinced it was worth it.
I DID finish it. I will not be reading any of the other books though.
Here are my big issues:
I feel like the author was trying to build a big and complicated hidden magical world ala-Harry Potter, but just couldn’t quite pull it off. Most of what we learned about this magical world and how it worked was spoon-fed to us via giant info-dumping dialogue blocks that I had a hard time keeping focus through. We learned that there’s been this giant war between certain magical humans called keepers that can wield magical objects that give them special powers, and the makers of the magical objects who are basically evil now because they are jealous that humans (who are obviously far inferior creatures) can wield these magical objects… ONLY they didn’t always hate humans for this, but they do now (for some reason that we are never given) and it's made them all dark and twisted.
Exactly what?!
The stakes felt contrived and forced… they only seemed to affect the people who are part of this magical society and had basically no effect at all on anything in the real world… unlike how the magical societies in Harry Potter or even Percy Jackson have to actually strive to keep themselves hidden in order to protect the normal world. Normal people in this book would come in contact with magical items or learn about some of the mysteries of the magical society and exactly nothing would happen to them. The only exception to this is when Chloe’s house burns down and her father gets kidnapped… which honestly only came about because Chloe was doing stupid things that even she knew she shouldn’t be doing.
What her actions did do was force the “good guys” to finally decide to confront the “bad guys”... which again, affected nothing in the world at large, and honestly seemed to have no real point… I mean, Chloe’s motivation was to get her father back, but the magical society that backed her seemed to have other motives which, honestly, didn’t make a whole lot of sense or seem terribly important to me. That whole confrontation was supposed to be the big moment of tension and really show the stakes, but personally, while listening to this part of the story I started to wonder exactly why I should care.
The characters also felt flat and lack-luster, and I found myself frustrated with both their personalities and how they interacted with their magical items. Horace was supposed to be very logical and meticulous, but he kept missing things and misinterpreting signs that I felt should have been fairly obvious. Chloe was supposed to come across as a bit aloof and almost overly independent (I suppose with the idea that her character would evolve over the course of the story) but I found her snappy and annoying. There were a few moments where I also found her brave, but they weren’t enough to redeem her character in my eyes. Neither of them seemed to have much of a redeeming arch, although I think they were supposed to… I had a hard time connecting to them and struggled to understand why I should care.
Also, the way the magical items worked really didn’t make sense, and it felt like the author was relying on the “it's fantasy so everything’s made up and it doesn’t have to all make sense!” aspect of fantasy writing. I will say that I think the idea of the magical items and the powers they granted showed some potential… but I don’t think they were thought through enough for them to be as central to the plot as they became. For example… Horace’s magic box can show him the future 24 hours from now if he looks through its glass bottom, and can send objects (and apparently living creatures) 24 hours into the future if he puts anything in it and closes the lid… HOWEVER, the BBG of the story can also sense the box’s presence 24 hours in the past… but the box can’t show the past… and the future that Horace sees with the box can still be changed, but once he’s seen it, he’s not supposed to change it. And Chloe’s dragonfly can let her basically become ghost-like and pass through anything she wants to… but there is literally no explanation for how or why and it ended up feeling a bit like a deus-ex-machina at times. Also, people are perfectly fine and normal before they come in contact with these magical objects, but once they have a magical object and become a keeper, they can’t be separated from it without going catatonic and losing their souls? But ALSO we are never given a reason as to WHY this is… are the objects sentient somehow? Do they connect to the soul of the person? Do they become part of the soul of the person? Are they powered by the person’s life force? We are given exactly no answers on this matter… it. just. happens.
I think that’s my biggest issue here… There were plenty of info-dumping conversations where the secret society and all were supposed to have been explained to the reader, including cringy ancient magical names that were 100% unnecessary and mean basically nothing, but when it came to how things actually worked, or the whys and hows of the story itself, no one had any good answers to offer. And there was also the fact that the people in the magical society liked to speak in this stilted speech pattern that would have fit better in a more medieval fantasy setting, and felt out of place in a setting that was supposed to be part of the modern world. Y’all still live and try to blend into the real world, right? You know how to talk like a normal person in the modern day… why are you talking like that?
I don’t know… I’ve seen mixed reviews for this series on goodreads, but I struggled with it and didn’t think it was really worth the credit on hoopla. I also kept finding my thoughts wandering off during particularly long info-dumping conversations, and even started dozing off a few times.
I give this series 2 stars… it might be worth it for some people, but for me it just didn’t hit the mark. I feel like the author has a decent understanding of writing techniques, though… but needs to work on fleshing out the story more. And really, all of the info-dumping is hard to get past… it makes it feel like the world is far shallower than it COULD have felt with a little more thought put into how it was presented.
From the moment Horace F. Andrews sees the sign from the bus—a sign with his own name on it—everything changes. The sighting leads him underground, to the House of Answers, a hidden warehouse full of mysterious objects. But there, he finds only questions. What is this curious place? Who are the strange, secretive people who entrust him with a rare and immensely powerful gift? And what is he to do with it?
When Horace finds the Box of Promises in the curio shop, he quickly discovers that ordinary-looking objects can hold extraordinary power. From the enormous, sinister man shadowing him to the gradual mastery of his newfound abilities to his encounters with Chloe—a girl who has an astonishing talent of her own—Horace follows a path that puts the pair in the middle of a centuries-old conflict between two warring factions in which every decision they make could have disastrous consequences.
I listened to this book in audio (as I usually do) and this is my candid review.
The book was alright. It started out with what I thought seemed like an interesting premise, but I quickly grew annoyed with both the characters and the plot. The story took a long time to get moving, and by the time it finally did get moving, I wasn’t convinced it was worth it.
I DID finish it. I will not be reading any of the other books though.
Here are my big issues:
I feel like the author was trying to build a big and complicated hidden magical world ala-Harry Potter, but just couldn’t quite pull it off. Most of what we learned about this magical world and how it worked was spoon-fed to us via giant info-dumping dialogue blocks that I had a hard time keeping focus through. We learned that there’s been this giant war between certain magical humans called keepers that can wield magical objects that give them special powers, and the makers of the magical objects who are basically evil now because they are jealous that humans (who are obviously far inferior creatures) can wield these magical objects… ONLY they didn’t always hate humans for this, but they do now (for some reason that we are never given) and it's made them all dark and twisted.
Exactly what?!
The stakes felt contrived and forced… they only seemed to affect the people who are part of this magical society and had basically no effect at all on anything in the real world… unlike how the magical societies in Harry Potter or even Percy Jackson have to actually strive to keep themselves hidden in order to protect the normal world. Normal people in this book would come in contact with magical items or learn about some of the mysteries of the magical society and exactly nothing would happen to them. The only exception to this is when Chloe’s house burns down and her father gets kidnapped… which honestly only came about because Chloe was doing stupid things that even she knew she shouldn’t be doing.
What her actions did do was force the “good guys” to finally decide to confront the “bad guys”... which again, affected nothing in the world at large, and honestly seemed to have no real point… I mean, Chloe’s motivation was to get her father back, but the magical society that backed her seemed to have other motives which, honestly, didn’t make a whole lot of sense or seem terribly important to me. That whole confrontation was supposed to be the big moment of tension and really show the stakes, but personally, while listening to this part of the story I started to wonder exactly why I should care.
The characters also felt flat and lack-luster, and I found myself frustrated with both their personalities and how they interacted with their magical items. Horace was supposed to be very logical and meticulous, but he kept missing things and misinterpreting signs that I felt should have been fairly obvious. Chloe was supposed to come across as a bit aloof and almost overly independent (I suppose with the idea that her character would evolve over the course of the story) but I found her snappy and annoying. There were a few moments where I also found her brave, but they weren’t enough to redeem her character in my eyes. Neither of them seemed to have much of a redeeming arch, although I think they were supposed to… I had a hard time connecting to them and struggled to understand why I should care.
Also, the way the magical items worked really didn’t make sense, and it felt like the author was relying on the “it's fantasy so everything’s made up and it doesn’t have to all make sense!” aspect of fantasy writing. I will say that I think the idea of the magical items and the powers they granted showed some potential… but I don’t think they were thought through enough for them to be as central to the plot as they became. For example… Horace’s magic box can show him the future 24 hours from now if he looks through its glass bottom, and can send objects (and apparently living creatures) 24 hours into the future if he puts anything in it and closes the lid… HOWEVER, the BBG of the story can also sense the box’s presence 24 hours in the past… but the box can’t show the past… and the future that Horace sees with the box can still be changed, but once he’s seen it, he’s not supposed to change it. And Chloe’s dragonfly can let her basically become ghost-like and pass through anything she wants to… but there is literally no explanation for how or why and it ended up feeling a bit like a deus-ex-machina at times. Also, people are perfectly fine and normal before they come in contact with these magical objects, but once they have a magical object and become a keeper, they can’t be separated from it without going catatonic and losing their souls? But ALSO we are never given a reason as to WHY this is… are the objects sentient somehow? Do they connect to the soul of the person? Do they become part of the soul of the person? Are they powered by the person’s life force? We are given exactly no answers on this matter… it. just. happens.
I think that’s my biggest issue here… There were plenty of info-dumping conversations where the secret society and all were supposed to have been explained to the reader, including cringy ancient magical names that were 100% unnecessary and mean basically nothing, but when it came to how things actually worked, or the whys and hows of the story itself, no one had any good answers to offer. And there was also the fact that the people in the magical society liked to speak in this stilted speech pattern that would have fit better in a more medieval fantasy setting, and felt out of place in a setting that was supposed to be part of the modern world. Y’all still live and try to blend into the real world, right? You know how to talk like a normal person in the modern day… why are you talking like that?
I don’t know… I’ve seen mixed reviews for this series on goodreads, but I struggled with it and didn’t think it was really worth the credit on hoopla. I also kept finding my thoughts wandering off during particularly long info-dumping conversations, and even started dozing off a few times.
I give this series 2 stars… it might be worth it for some people, but for me it just didn’t hit the mark. I feel like the author has a decent understanding of writing techniques, though… but needs to work on fleshing out the story more. And really, all of the info-dumping is hard to get past… it makes it feel like the world is far shallower than it COULD have felt with a little more thought put into how it was presented.
June 17, 2025
Excellent book if you like fantasy. Only giving it three stars though because the language was so bad.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews