JakeTheSnake

And this is the point where Scott was running out of ideas

Revisado: 01-31-25

This book makes it painfully clear that Scott Meyer only had a clear plan for the first 3 books and their 3-book deal with the publisher. The whole thing just felt very forced and contrived, a plot trying trying desperately to justify the existence of another book. Between this and the unsatisfying mess that the books after this have turned into, I intend to spend the rest of my life pretending that this book series ended after book 3, and I encourage other readers to do the same. Believe me, you will be happier that way.

To top it off, the narration sounded unenthusiastic and phoned in on this one, especially compared to the palpable enthusiasm in his narration of the first 3. I don't think Luke Daniels even liked this story with how the narration sounded.

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Good Story, New Narrator did his best.

Revisado: 10-14-23

Loved the end to the story. The new narrator wasn't perfect, but did an admirable job all things considered. If he had been the narrator for the whole series, I would have still enjoyed it.

And for those complaining about the narrator switch, it wasn't something they chose, Christian Rodska (the previous narrator) died of cancer in between the release of book 5 and 6, so the switch wasn't something anyone wanted to do.

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Epic History Meets Contemporary Fantasy

Revisado: 10-23-21

I think some of the reason that people don't like this book as much is that they don't seem to know what the author was going for. This book reads something like a mix between a ancient historical epic with elements of modern fantasy storytelling mixed in. As someone who loves each of those things on its own, I was fascinated and enthralled by Liu's mix of the two kinds of stories. It is different than most fantasy books these days, but I loved it. maybe it is because I am also a history nut and love reading the old epics too, but this was one of my favorite books I've read in a long time.

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Wow, wow, wow!

Revisado: 09-27-21

My mind was blown by this book. I never got into a lot of hard sci-fi, but this book manages to be fascinating, scientific, and heartwarming all at the same time. Perhaps it just hit my exact group of preferences, but this one is going down as an all-time favorite for me. Excellent audio as well!

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Lifechangeing

Revisado: 12-13-18

absolutely amazing. mindset over motivation. even though I thought he was a little nuts for a while, I realized just how right he was by the end.

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Just amazing, surprise for modern readers

Revisado: 07-25-18

before I read this, I thought for sure then all the hype about it was just a bunch of snobby old professors obsessed with old books. I didn't think that some 400 year old book would hold any appeal for me.

I have never been happier to be wrong, this book is Simply Amazing. it has aged well, snd in what surprised me the most about a 400 year old book is that it is still funny even to a modern reader.

it is rounded out here by an impeccable cast performance. highly recommend.

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A bit biased in favor of catholicism, But Good

Revisado: 07-18-18

I am neither protestant nor catholic, so I dont have as much of a dog in the fight as they might. But I was interested in learning more about the Reformation in general.

I appreciated that Gregory here tries to correct the impulse to mythologize all of the reformers as Heroes standing up against the tyranny of medieval Catholicism. much of that history has been mythologized well beyind the actual corruption that did happen. While Gregory admirably does try to portray the different Protestants in their own words, I felt like his objectivity didn't go much beyond that. Overall I felt like a lot of these lectures focused on showing how Catholics have been misportrayed during the Reformation, and I agree that they have to a point, but I feel like here he sugarcoats and downplays the both the corruption and the atrocities committed by the medieval Catholic Church. for example, when he speaks about the Saint Bartholomew's Massacre, he mentioned how it was an action by the king against a few that was later blown out of proportion by the mob. In this and many other cases of execution of heretics, he seems to be following the current catholic trend to try to shift the blame for religious violence off of Catholic Church and its leadership to the secular authorities of the time.

It may have been true that many of the atrocities were committed by a secular leaders, but they were in many cases openly sanctioned by popes. the king of France was given a golden Rose by the pump for perpetuating the Saint Bartholomew's Massacre. Other Popes openly sanctions the actions of secular governments in their burning of Heretics. I understand we can't completely condemn these based on our modern moral views, as they took place in the time when views were very different on moral issues. Notwithstanding, neither the Protestants nor the Catholics can be fully exculpated in the atrocities committed on both sides in this time. The best course of action in my opinion would be for both sides to simply admit that they both did a lot of terrible things, not attempt to make flawed defenses of them, and move on from them.

On top of that, he seems to spend a disproportionate number of the lectures focusing on the Catholic views and responses, and doesn't seem to devote the time that is deserved to the various Protestant movement. Most of the bias that I saw in these lectures takes that form: not explicit criticism, simply a lot of focus on the good Catholics, with a lot of focus on the bad Protestants and explaining the facts about what each of them did. What he says isn't wrong, it's just not the complete picture.

I do appreciate how he really does into the different motivations behind government acceptance and rejections of these and how they played into the evolution of these different religious beliefs. I would still recommend this lecture series for one who wants to learn about the reformation. but I would recommend that along with it you study other resources that give more information from various perspectives the balance out what I saw as a clear Catholic bias in this one. I suppose it is only to be expected, Gregory is Catholic himself.

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Will change the way you view western civilization

Revisado: 02-16-18

completely changed the way I see the western enlightenment, as well as my perspective on our "civilized, christian western culture." Ghengis Khan may not have been good by many of our modern standards of ethics, but he truly stood head and ahoulders above most of his contemporaries in the "civilized" west, most of whome became better by his influence.

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good

Revisado: 10-03-17

i thoroughly enjoyed it, though I would say it isn't quite as good as the first.

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awesome

Revisado: 09-14-17

this was just awesome. all I can say is was it, you will not regret it.

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