Alex Gesing

Story Doesn't Really End, it Just Stops

Revisado: 05-31-24

I realize that this is just book 1 of a series, but this book really just spent a lot of time with characters getting from A to B, and just as things started to really heat up, it ends.

The ending of the book also has a problem with teleporting characters. One of the characters we follow, a human hunter, has been tracking two of the other main characters. While he's doing this, he comes across vital tracking information (on multiple occasions!) that he does NOT share with his fellow hunters. Yet, at the end of the book, apparently just to spice things up, another hunter manages to intercept the hunted characters; with absolutely no explanation on how they could have possibly gotten there first.

However, my biggest beef is right near the start of the book: One of our main characters is met by resistance fighters at the factory where he works. They give him a thumb drive, and to do so 'secretly', one of their members starts a fight with a guard; which ends up getting both him and one of our main character's friends killed. Our character then escapes the factory and meets up with those same resistance fighters again... AND HANDS BACK THE THUMB DRIVE. We're never given any explanation why our main character needed to hold on to the thumb drive for, like, a couple hours. We ARE given some "this is what it means to fight for the resistance - we put our lives on the line" BS. Honestly, I think the resistance just really hated the guy they told to get himself (and bystanders!) killed for no good reason.

Anyway, I will not be continuing to book 2.

Has calificado esta reseña.

Reportaste esta reseña

Beware Marty Stu, Mage Healer to the King

Revisado: 10-30-23

Everything's just a little too easy for our main character - sure, he starts in a low place: a twelve year old orphan of four years, born to a camp follower; his only claim to any significance is his mother's tales of an unknown mage father. However, from the very start our little orphan is showing off his legendary sling skills, dispatching pursuing soldiers with almost casual ease.

He finds and loots the corpse of a dead battle mage, and from there, things start getting really out of hand. It turns out that, even without training, our hero is a mage healer - and not just any mage healer, but apparently the strongest in the the entire realm; if not the world. Wounds of all types - from battle damage so fresh that the spear is still stuck in it, to ancient wounds and even physical decay caused by aging. He also branches out into dragon magic, earth magic, and wood magic, which he is also superbly talented at.

Our ragamuffin of a main character, even at twelve, also has no problems interacting with royalty - up to and including the king of the realm. Never once awed or tongue-tied by the lofty company he suddenly finds himself among.

I think this book's greatest flaw, however, is the magic system - or lack thereof. As I already mentioned, even from the very start, our hero can cause miraculous healing. But he can also make glowing orbs as needed. And create fires that can burn without fuel. And kill off insects in his bedding. And lock doors so that only he can open them. And make illusions. And sense when people come onto his property. Where does he learn how to do all this? No idea. We're told that he studies/is taught some specific dragon-related, earth-related, and wood-related spells, but everything else is apparently just baked into our main character from the moment he puts on the magical gloves he looted. There also seems to be no rhyme or reason to what magic can do - we're told several times that a spell can be locked in place, apparently without any ongoing cost - even things like a permanent mage fire spell to give himself hot water on demand, or a permanent illusion disguising some structural changes he magics into existence.

By all accounts, the people of this world should be living a life of luxury and plenty, as mages, although not common, also don't seem to be terribly rare, either. If any of them can cast permanent spells, the world should be awash in all kinds of helpful magic trinkets and magically strengthened and repaired buildings - but it's not; apparently because no one (before our hero, of course) ever thought to use their magic to, for instance, take worthless sailing ships on the verge of sinking and repair them in a single night using wood magic to strengthen and reseal the hull.

Has calificado esta reseña.

Reportaste esta reseña

Never Really Coalesced Into Something Great

Revisado: 08-07-23

We’re given the bones of a great setting - a world of dangerous creatures and mysterious magics, built upon the ancient bones of high technology.

However, the world just isn’t fleshed out enough. We’re constantly told that the natives are using weapons made with hafts of bone and blades of giant crystals or stone - but not why (or how, for that matter). There seems to be plenty of high tech metals available - apparently (unbelievably) just sitting around, unscavenged for centuries.

Heck, our hero even comes across a shipping container - apparently no worse for wear, electronic locks still charged and ready to open up its undisturbed contents with the press of a button.

We’re introduced to too many characters with too little background, and the dialogue between them is rather stilted.

I’m still not sure how the three types of magic (the Many/crystals/liquid metal) work, as their powers and requirements seem to change to whatever the story needs in the moment.

Has calificado esta reseña.

Reportaste esta reseña

esto le resultó útil a 1 persona

Starts Strong, Loses Its Way

Revisado: 07-12-23

The story starts with a terrifying virus outbreak in a movie theater that ends in a bloodbath; caused by the mysterious Red Queen Inc. Why? Excellent question, and the book’s not going to tell you. As far as I can tell, Red Queen Inc is run for the evulz, rather than profit or any sane reason. Their business model appears to be 1) Create corpses 2)??? 3) Profit!

There’s an entire section near the end of the story where multiple characters infiltrate and exfiltrate from a “locked down” location multiple times (I put locked down in quotes, because it’s apparently trivial to get into and out of the place.)

Finally, I can only agree with the other reviewers - the reader is very grating - anything with a double ‘t’ gets mangled. Written becomes Wri’ten.

Has calificado esta reseña.

Reportaste esta reseña

A Timewarped Journey

Revisado: 02-22-23 El oyente recibió este título gratis

This is a tale of four strangers, brought together by circumstance and plot, who get to know each other, overcome obstacles and their own personal flaws… really, really quickly.

Note: spoilers from the first couple chapters.

“Hey, Boy! Your name is bad, you should change it to the name of my dead son.” “Okay, guy-I-literally-met-a-day-and-a-half-ago, you’ve convinced me!”

“How dare you not address me as royalty, peasant?” “Princess, you need to overcome your years of being a noble and realize we’re all in this together!” “Okay, you’re right, I’m sorry.”

“You know that magic sword that has passed into myth and legend? Have you tried… just wishing for it really hard?” “Oh, wow, that worked, that’s handy.”

“My father was turned into a horrible dread beast that tried to kill me, so we had to kill him… oh well; I’m vaguely saddened by this event.”

“Arg! I’ve lost a hand!” Little fireside cauterization and I’m up and running around in a day or so.

The evil advisors are also ridiculously over-the-top evil. Like mustache-twirling, cowl-wearing, cackling evil. How they even got into the front gates, let alone onto the palace staff, is a bit unclear. I assume magic.

Narrator does a decent job. Her voice is nice and clear; but her range, especially for male characters (which is most of the cast), is a bit limited.

Has calificado esta reseña.

Reportaste esta reseña

Kept up the Pressure

Revisado: 03-31-22

I would rate this as one of the top-tier LitRPG books I've listened to. The protagonist starts as just one man in an 'outpost' (his camping trailer) in the middle of a demon-infested wood. His character is strong, but he earns his titles and powers (even if many of those are due to a lucky early start), and overall he doesn't make repeated boneheaded decisions. He uses his powers and equipment in a logical way to maximize results; and he's often forced to improvise and occasionally retreat and regroup to overcome his foes.

Minor spoilers: One bit that I found fun was a quick teleport to the mainland our hero makes (most of the book is focused on the smallish island our hero starts off on). Throughout the entire book, we'd seen our hero just barely fighting his way out of ever more dire situations against escalating enemies; so when we hear about the major beast that's been terrorizing several villages, it sounds like yet another major threat... except it turns out it's just the protagonist's island that's turned up to 11.

It was a fun ride, and I plan to continue to the next book to see how everything unfolds.

Has calificado esta reseña.

Reportaste esta reseña

Needed Another Round of Editing

Revisado: 03-29-22

Book two of the series continues to follow our two main characters, Eric and Rugrat, as well as expanding the cast with a number of chapters that follow the lives of the inhabitants of their dungeon-town.

Pros:
The author, unlike many LitRPGs, doesn't spam us with unnecessary stat page readouts. Usually we're just told what's changing, and descriptions of loot are mercifully short and far-between.
It's still entertaining to follow our main protagonists on their journey to ever-greater power, utilizing a mix of the gamified world they find themselves in with their knowledge of Earth to punch well above their weight.

Cons:
This book really could have used another editing round. The author's greatest sin is unneeded repetition of a word, up to three or four times in as many sentences. Made up, but not exaggerated example: "Eric walked to the formation. The formation pulsed with power. Eric stepped onto the formation, and the formation teleported him away in a flash of light." It happened often enough to distract from the story.
Related to the above, combat, which should be getting progressively more epic, instead gets bogged down due to focusing on the trees rather than the forest. Especially notable when our main duo teams up with a platoon to go exploring, combat devolved into a list of names and actions: "A made a dodge, but B was hit in the side; C fired a crossbow at the enemy, and... (repeat for D-Z)."
The author desperately needs a new plot hook - "Eric and Rugrat unintentionally anger someone important upon first entering a new place" started to get old in book one; they do it two or three more times in this book!

I personally found the chapters that focused on the side characters to be mostly cringeworthy. I think maybe the author tried to force personality into too many side characters all at once by making them all 'quirky'.

The reader did a decent job with what he was given, although bit characters (people overheard speaking in a crowd, for instance) tended to get odd accents and ways of speaking.

Overall, I listened through the entire thing, and I don't regret the time spent; but I don't think I'll be continuing to the next book.

Has calificado esta reseña.

Reportaste esta reseña

esto le resultó útil a 1 persona

A Former Assassin Would Say...

Revisado: 07-11-21

Plodding is the best way that I can describe this novel. I made it half way though the book, but when things just didn't appear to be getting any better, I decided it was time to call it off.

Stilted language plagues this book. Conversations are more like monologues that are far too often maddeningly prosaic. Even the action scenes are cursed with language that manages to make the fights tedious to listen to. Basic information that we learned just a chapter ago is dutifully brought back up terribly often; just in case we'd forgotten, I suppose.

One of the major contributors to the book's problems is that the author apparently decided that it just wouldn't do to keep referring to the main character the same way for more than a single sentence in a row. Therefore, you end up with sentences like (paraphrasing) "He took out his sword, Danzen moving to encircle the evil beast. The former assassin threw his magic sword with a satisfying 'thunk!' 'It was a good fight,' thought Danzen Ravja to himself."

Of those, "The Former Assassin" is the most grating, and one that you'll be hearing dozens and dozens of times.

The narrator does his best with what he's given.

Has calificado esta reseña.

Reportaste esta reseña

Interesting Premise Hindered By Poor Storytelling

Revisado: 06-11-21

The book started off decently strong, but fell apart once they reached the new planet. The level of detail is all over the place - I'm given an exhaustive briefing on how the ship's capacitors work, and all the parts of a field rifle, but the first sighting of another intelligent race? They're blue with black braided hair. The humans manage to get some optics close enough to get more detail on one of the aliens' faces, and I also learn that they're "ugly". Great. In an almost throwaway line once our heroes start talking to the aliens, I also found out that they've got four arms. Dude! You think that maybe you should have mentioned that earlier?

Once our first contact negotiators (who, thanks to the wonders of AI, are able to perfectly translate the alien's language by just observing them from a distance for a single day) somehow picked up that the alien was speaking "with an angry tone" - again, this is literally the first time these two races have ever met in the flesh - I decided this novel wasn't for me.

Reader wasn't bad - good voices, although he had an odd habit of pausing in the middle of sentences occasionally which I found distracting.

Has calificado esta reseña.

Reportaste esta reseña

I Thought They Were Overreacting, He Said

Revisado: 03-13-20

I saw a number of reviews warning about the dialogue in this book, but thought that it couldn’t possibly be as bad as it was made out to be. Got through the (action-heavy) introduction with good feelings... but then hit the introduction of the first couple characters... and as soon as they opened their mouths, it’s nothing but “he said”, “she said” ad nauseam. Couldn’t stand it, and this’ll be my first refund.

Has calificado esta reseña.

Reportaste esta reseña