OMG Leatherworks

Realize what you're getting in to before you start

Revisado: 08-01-21

To help you know what you're getting in to before buying the first book in this series, I'm going to point out a few things.
This was one of those stories I found myself thinking about how I'd review it as I listened to it.

First the positives:
What a great story. The title had me a bit cautious but the description got me. I didn't listen to the sample first but I wanted a new story for my daily 1.5 hour each way commute.
If you like the stories about gaming from the users perspective, immersive thought provoking worlds, a bit futuristic utopian, and 'some' character depth (more on that later), and some familiarity with online MMORPG gaming terminology - then you should like this.

The voice actor Eric Summerer - His character voices are distinct and consistent. When a character is given a voice that allows me to picture the being not just through description but vocal characteristics, I really enjoy the depth of the story much more. Eric Summerer pulls this off well with the material he's given in the story.

So, I also have some negatives but for me it hasn't been enough of a deal killer for me not to purchase successive books and continue the story.
First is I think the translation. This was originally written in Russian? and translated to English. I don't think everything translates perfectly and some words sound out of place - like, is that really what they meant to say or would it work better if that was slightly rephrased for the translated version? Some of it may also be cultural slang and it may be a bit awkward.
Speaking of cultural and awkward. - Many if not almost all of the female characters in the series come across as very shallow, catty, manipulative, and materialistic - whether it's a 'real' person or a game NPC It keeps you guessing about how the characters will react to such attitudes, but again this might be due to translation and cultural differences that I don't understand.

In all, the story is really good. I am in process of listening to the 4th book and don't know if the story will wrap up or if there's going to be a 5th. If so, I will most likely be purchasing it when it arrives.

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More confusing than this ride through chaos should

Revisado: 04-08-19

Eventually the story started to come together but it took pretty long.

The narrator doesn't make the character's voices separate. It makes following the dialogue very difficult.

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great story and superior narration

Revisado: 01-08-19

Always great, we're still collecting the Harry Potter series in audio when long car rides come up. The Order of the Phoenix is my least favourite of the movies but the audio book is just wonderful. Jim Dale's vocalization of Professor Umbridge is magic.

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Slow start but pretty good overall.

Revisado: 03-01-18

I liked the narrator in the Dragon series so this was recommended to me. Overall not bad. Up to chapter 5 its just two characters and some fairly annoying dialogue as the new dungeon heart grows and learns. Once other characters come in to the story it develops nicely.

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Sweet!!! Great story and even better series

Revisado: 06-24-16

This is the first book in the series. This is a great introduction to the characters but keep an open mind. It takes me sleep about half way through the book to get the voices down that you'll hear throughout the rest of the series. It's totally worth it.

You can enjoy this story even if you aren't part off the role playing game world but knowing the basics of gaming will make it more enjoyable.

There is a significant amount of blue humor and foul language.

This author and narrator do a very good job of painting images as the story goes on. I especially like the monotone of the narrative between the great dialogue that lends such a matter-of-fact non-urgency to the story that is in total contrast to what is actually being said.

Again, this is a great book on its own but its main function is to get you to the third book which is a screaming hilarious mess.

Don't miss all the short stories along the way about the individual adventures in Cardinia.

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Oh what a beating...

Revisado: 05-04-16

Would you say that listening to this book was time well-spent? Why or why not?

It was mostly a time killer - it's the 3rd book in a series that has been OK but going downhill.

What did you like best about this story?

When the storyline focused on the gameplay and character relations - that I could see.

What didn’t you like about Michael Goldstrom’s performance?

It was bland. The voices were too similar between characters. The cadence was quite quirky and inflections on the wrong words would make the story stutter rather than flow or create an emotion.

Do you think The Duty needs a follow-up book? Why or why not?

It has one - The Inferno, which I haven't decided if I'm going to purchase yet. The three so far have gone downhill and the last book could be, well, less.

There was a decent cliff-hanger however, so that's the only thing that still has me on the hook.

Any additional comments?

This is a wonderful story concept - I'm a huge fan of gaming storylines. This is the first series I've experienced about mmorpg gaming. It's a fairly new and modern book and set in the future and translated from Russian. I think my issues with this book lie there.

I noticed that the first story had a few odd things in the cadence and vocabulary at times. The Clan continued the strangeness and leveled it up a bit. However, The Duty reached a new level of weird- there is a lot of jumping around and disjointed topics. There is also a large amount of Nationalism and saber-rattling about historic conflicts that distracted from this being a story about gaming. Yes, a bit of it is necessary to set up how various governments are going to handle the laws and crime and punishment of the virtual world, but I didn't handle it well, with an eye-roll occasionally when he started on a new tangent about the Chinese or Germans in an old Russian conflict.

The other part of the translation is that the vocal cadence didn't seem smooth or continuous. A sentence would end as a question and there would be a pause like a written paragraph break and then another sentence that should be part of the same conversation would seem totally unrelated.

The vocalizations for the most part were quite similar and I would loose track of who was speaking at times.

There were some fun and 'visually stimulating ' pieces to the story. However there were just to many disjointed parts that were simply narration that didn't stimulate the imagination enough to keep me very interested.

I'm invested in the series- three books now but this may have put me off finishing up by buying the next installment.

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More of the same, but a little less...

Revisado: 06-15-15

I've really enjoyed the Bill the Vampire series so far but this book seemed to be just filler - it followed mostly the same formula but fell a bit flat.
Yes there were some new and fun moments but like some other reviews mentioned, this book was more transitional. I'm expecting something big in the next book - which I'll be starting this afternoon on the drive home.

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Eat Suck - Suckface! Hank rules!

Revisado: 05-14-15

Yes Hank has hard luck but he always takes it in stride. I think book 1 had the best storyline and the narration was the best in book 2 but all three of the novels rate 5 stars in all categories.

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