Child's Play    by Carmen Posadas Order:  USA  Can Harper, 2009 (2009) Hardcover, e-Book Read an Excerpt    Reviewed by Kelly Thunstrom As an avid reader of psychological mysteries, I was very excited to read this book. The description on the book jacket and the dark cover with the child in school uniform made it seem like this novel would be a modern day version of The Bad Seed. Luisa, our narrator and bestselling author of mysteries, enrolls her preteen daughter Elba in the private school she once attended. On the first day of school, Luisa discovers that her old friend Sofia is Elba's teacher. Another friend from long ago, Miguel, is the father of one of Elba's classmates. These three were somehow involved in the death of Miguel's twin, Antonio, many years before. Elba is a strange character indeed, and the reader never knows quite how to take her. She is entranced with things that a preteen girl has no business being entranced with. Unbelievably, another death occurs in Elba's school, one that that mimics Antonio's. Between understanding the details of these two deaths and keeping track of the advent of Luisa's new novel, the reader can get terribly confused. I found myself only able to read a few pages at a time without having to put Child's Play down. The paragraphs were long and riddled with bad metaphors. Comparing a man's pink socks to two cones of raspberry ice cream was too much for me. Posadas is trying to be too literary here and, in my opinion, lost what could have been a humdinger of a whodunit. Note: Opinions expressed in reviews and articles on this site are those of the author(s) and not necessarily those of BookLoons. Find more Mystery books on our Shelves or in our book Reviews