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Cute story, narration though...

Revisado: 04-21-25

I like the overall cuteness of the story. The MC asks to be sent somewhere 'nice,' instead of seeking adventure, and he got it. Cozy's the descriptor. I was reading this on kindle then bought the narration to go with it. Sadly, the narration sounds to me like an infomercial. I could barely make it through ten minutes of it before returning to the kindle version.

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Really recommend, if you can ignore faults

Revisado: 02-27-25

TLDR; Great characters, good world building, fun and interesting story, serial plot, sloppy word usage, negative editing, 6 star narrator, totally recommend for those who won't be kept up at night because of imperfection.

Where to start? I'm not a litRPG reader usually. The one or two other books I've picked up in the genre would, in my opinion, have been much better without the RPG mechanism. This series, however, the game mechanisms add a ton to the story.
Pros:
Alexa Thyme is one of the most interesting and enjoyable characters I've ever read. Yes, she's over powered, but the reasons behind that power are very engaging and make perfect sense to me. (Plus, I rather enjoy an OP protagonist in certain situations.) I find myself looking forward to finding out what she's going to do next at every stage of the story.

The world building in this is outstanding and interacts with the story line in a meaningful way.

The author has a great sense for story and entertainment.

Kinda pro/kinda con:
This was written as a serial, in installments by what I believe to be a hobbyist writer, outside of professional editorial support. Resulting in the expected rambling all over the place plot that isn't appealing to everyone. It also has a few retcons in it as the series progresses. Some minor plot points get dropped or forgotten along the way. I personally find this kind of thing a nice change of pace. The story keeps going, outside the limitations of a typical three or four act plot that can encapsulate what we get. You, however, may not agree.

Cons:
The biggest con for me is also a HUGE WIN for the narrator. The author is rather sloppy with language. They'll repeat a phrase several times close together, mix their metaphors, set up a run on sentence that kind of loses itself along the way. All the sort of thing that a prolific writer does when focused more on describing what's in their head than their grammar. Which is perfectly ok, that's what editors are for. It's harder to find a good storyteller than an efficient editor. However, the publishing house apparently didn't employ an editor, so we're left with the need to be very tolerant if we want the story. I didn't realize how bad this was until I read the third book on kindle, as the audiobook was not yet released. (I went to royal road for the fourth book, I was having so much fun). Here's where Mare Trevathan kicks in. She somehow manages to make it so you don't notice how bad it is, she keeps the tone, intent and interest in the language alive in some pretty challenging circumstances. This really is a scenario where I wish I could give the narrator 6 stars.

As stated above, bits and pieces of plot get lost or retconned. If that's the sort of thing that keeps you up at night, you might want to give this one a pass.

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esto le resultó útil a 2 personas

Kind of soulless, though sometimes funny

Revisado: 01-02-25

Ok, look. I don't expect a fauxmance romcom to have believeable situations. But I DO expect it to have believable emotional context. And this doesn't. The characters had very little emotional life or connection for the first six chapters or so, and then it was all over the map. None of their behaviors made sense to me in context of what came before. At least once I had the actual thought "This plot just jumped the shark." At the end of the book the characters were just as much strangers to me as they had been at the beginning. Perhaps more so.

On the flip side, every other chapter or so some twist of language or one of the character's thoughts would make me outright laugh. One of these authors has a great sense of humor. I can forgive a lot just for that.

So the upshot for me is that while I definitely will not recommend this book to others, I'm not going to say it's not worth your time. I will say it's definitely not worth five stars.

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Fun, uplifting, perfect bit of holiday

Revisado: 01-02-25

Well written, enjoyable, easy to connect to, checks all the boxes for a holiday romcom.

I saw some discussion of the German accent in the comments before I bought. I wouldn't worry about it. I can't measure if it's a 'good' example of German accented English, but I think the problem is that you don't often have a POV character speaking (and thus narrating) in accented English and it was a bit weird to listen to at first. I quickly adapted and it became enjoyable. Don't let the discussion on that topic keep you from the book.

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esto le resultó útil a 1 persona

Could not finish

Revisado: 12-12-24

The writing is just poor. Characters behaving dramatically for very little reason. A romance unsupported by interaction. I held on, because sometimes authors learn as they go and improve but halfway through it just became laughable

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Very cute

Revisado: 12-12-24

Very cute little novella. I'd have wanted a few more scenes in the second year before the third act blow out. It wasn't quite convincing with what we were given. Overall though, a winner.

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Good but.....dry

Revisado: 11-21-24

This book has great plotting, characters, interesting context and yet.....dry. I can't quite tell if it's because of the reader or the prose, but it's just not written in an engaging way. Everything comes off colorless.

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Eh

Revisado: 11-19-24

Weird combination here. The plotting and character design were excellent. All the framework, the stuff you do before sitting down to actually write, was better than most books of this sort. But the execution was poor. Characters suddenly being angry, though the reason isn't really clear. Or suddenly saying something that makes no sense. Writing that forgets what had been said previously as part of the characters thoughts or feelings, making it seem like they were being yanked around like poorly managed puppets. At one point I wondered if there were actually two authors who weren't communicating well with each other. Or if the book had been written in spurts that were far enough apart that the author forgot what had been written before. Usually I'd just walk away, but the set up was good enough that I stuck with it, wanting it to improve, or show more of the tenor that peeked out here and there, where there was a well written scene. Now and again you run across an author who you think would do excellently as part of a co authoring team, and this book causes me to believe Ms. Richardson is one of those.

I thought Lori Prince did well with what she was given.

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Eh, meh and yeh.

Revisado: 10-22-24

I love the Donsaii stories, so thought I'd give this a shot. It's far less appealing, but I expected that. The biggest drawback is that he invests a ton of time in explaining all the speculative science. I know some folks love that, and sometimes it can be very interesting when it adds a lot to the plot (Weber's Harrington series, for example) but here I just found it a good time to do the dishes while waiting for the story to move forward. For some, it will add to their enjoyment though so no harm, no foul.

The main character is a bit inconsistent, but he's also a teenage boy so the inconsistency feels not unbelievable. The story line had a lot of threads to it, and they don't feel like they're finished. A peek ahead to future books make me think that they'll come around later on. I hope so. I picked it up because a sample indicated we'll get to see some of Dahner's 'And this could fix the world' kind of stuff that I very much enjoy in these times when we could all use a little soothing.

The narrator is....ok. Not awful. His voice reminds me a little bit of that Ned Ryerson character from Groundhog day. Which was occasionally an asset, he was able to express some of the teenage characters quite well. But for the narrative and some of the other characters, it didn't work out that well.

So, look. It's a lukewarm review and that's merited. But I'm pretty quick to just not finish a book when it grates on me and I finished this one. I'm planning on grabbing the next one on the basis of what I've seen about where the plot is going. It's not bad, it just feels like a warmup for something else.

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Felt a bit short, not a fan of the narrator

Revisado: 10-21-24

The book's a bit shorter and less momentous than most, but in a series that runs this long, it feels like a necessary beat in the story arcs. Need some sort of lull to get us centered with the new family organization, keeping up with all these prodigies, and the world changing rapidly. It's still fun and creative and enjoyable so....I'm not gonna complain!

Except about the narration. I was cautious about "I don't like it" in reviewing the last book because I know how much I dislike change, so I didn't want to be overly harsh in her first book in the series. This book, however, made it clear to me that I'm really not a fan. She doesn't have enough range, her basic narrative voice is a bit...immature? Whiny? Disaffected? They're all too strong but go in the right direction of the problem. She definitely does not stand up to Bannister. That said, I've heard far worse narrators out there. I wouldn't not get the book because she narrated it, but I'm enjoying them far far less, and being pulled out of the story by narrative issues far more often.

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