Oksa Pollock - The Last Hope

So far I've only reviewed books that I've really enjoyed. Oddly, I find it harder to review books I've liked as I find it difficult to explain quite why I've enjoyed something. For me it's very much a case of the overall experience of a book which makes it good and enjoyable.
In Oksa Pollock The Last Hope it's far easier for me to say why I didn't enjoy it.
In case you don't know Oksa Pollock is a huge bestselling series across Europe, The authors, Anne Plichota and Cendrine Wolf, are French and the book has been translated into English by Sue Rose. It's very much your typical 9-12/teen standard fantasy book. A young girl discovers she has powers and she is vital to reclaiming her own land. It's set in the modern day and the book was set in London, as the authors thought this was a far more interesting city to set the book in. It's been called the French Harry Potter, which is high praise indeed.
Oksa is the last in line of the Graciouses, the female rulers of Edefia, a hidden magical realm. Her family were forced to flee when her Great Grandmother, Malorane was overthrown and her Grandmother, the current gracious and her followers have been hiding out in Russia and then in France for the past 50 years or so. They've now moved again to London in order to keep Oksa safe. Discovering her powers, which include firing fire balls from her hands and the ability to fly, Oska then has to deal with her new powers and a teacher, who isn't all he seems, in many escapades.
This book isn't really that bad, (it's by no means brilliant) but for me it just doesn't live up to the hype, partly because I think it has been let down by very ordinary translation. It's almost as if the book has been translated word for word, where what it needed was to be translated and then reworked by a children's author. Some of the phrases and terminology just sounds wrong in English; the power of Cameraeye, where the Gracious looks at a wall and projects her memory from her eyes for example, just sounds a little too literal. In J.K. Rowling's magical world this ability would have been latinised just to make it sound a little more magical. I also can't remember the last time i read the word "chums" in a book for this age group; it just doesn't sit with the rest of the story. And there's a whole section on objects called granok shooters, which I'm afraid I failed to fully comprehend, I believe them to be a little like a pea shooter, but they propel magical effects. The "science" or reasoning behind these is explained at very great length, which really just upsets the flow of the book and bored me somewhat. And the whole evil teacher malarkey has rather been done to death now.
There are lovely moments and characters though. My favourites are the goranovs, hypochondriac plants, which are rather funny and the back stories of the characters are interesting in places. Just a couple of notes in case you decide to give this to a child, there is one case of bad language and one example of casual racism, where a boy with Chinese ancestry is called a rude name by another child. It did stand out when I read it, as it seemed to be at odds with the rest of the book.
On the whole it's worth a read, but I'm not sure I'd be interested in reading the whole series, which I fear is rather damning in itself.