This is fourth in a Space Opera-ish series. You'll want to read in order.
I have friends who really like this series. I hope they'll forgive me becauseThis is fourth in a Space Opera-ish series. You'll want to read in order.
I have friends who really like this series. I hope they'll forgive me because this one just killed my interest. I have four problems with this but the last one was the true killer (I'll do a bold header before that if you want to skip all the nit-picking). I'm not spoiler tagging any of this because I dropped out at the 25% mark. If you're super spoiler sensitive, you might want to stop here.
My first problem is that the author has turned everyone in the galaxy against Bob. Bear in mind that every single one of them would be extinct without his benevolent and kind actions. Also that he gave them tech and resources for free. But he's "other" and gratitude has an expiration date even if the Bob doesn't ask for a thing in return. This is so monotoned that it feels like author say-so. It's both narratively uninteresting and restricts potential plots. Maybe that was the point? The author didn't want to deal with plots in the space colonies? Because he couldn't just stick with PoVs that he found interesting, I guess? I dunno. But it felt manufactured and made me kind of hate the galaxy and want them all to die.
Second, everyone who disagrees with Bob is an idiot. Yeah, that's a little bit of the above point, too, but it goes further than that. Replication drift has now progressed to the point that the Bobs are fracturing. And the biggest fracture is a unit fanatically devoted to Star Trek's "Prime Directive". One of the head Bobs points out that the Prime Directive was a plot device that nobody actually took seriously. Like anywhere, ever. And for good reason. Namely that it's a compassionless idiocy that would leave vulnerable species to suffer and even die with the only payoff the almost guaranteed loss of conscious sapience in the universe. Elevating the prime directive to an absolute makes you a moral midget or simply evil. In either case, someone I have no patience taking seriously. It's no surprise that the trekkies have no counterarguments. Because there literally are none. They just huff off with threats that we all know the Bobs are going to ignore until they come back later to break stuff and cause trouble.
Sadly, it isn't just the antagonists who are being stupid in this story. Bob finds a system with a megastructure that occupies an entire planetary orbit. There are automated systems of some capability guarding this structure, but the Bobs can work around that once they figure out the limits of those systems. One of their number (named Bender, humorously enough) has crashed and been captured in the system, though, and they want to know where he is. They find that the superstructure is inhabited by essentially a zoo of the system's sapient species. The zoo is low-tech and maintained by the automated systems that are defending everything. Their home planet shows signs of advanced nuclear and biological war that scoured the planet, making it uninhabitable and shows that the ones in the zoo were the ones who built it all (and destroyed it all). That planet has buildings and whole cities intact in isolated places. So where do the Bobs go to find info that might lead to their friend? We spend maybe 80% of the first quarter of the book preparing to infiltrate the zoo with android bodies. Lessee if I follow that logic. You have buildings with paper and electronics semi-intact that might illuminate the automated systems and probably contain an interesting history of the system. Or maybe you can track the automated caretakers and learn their headquarters or operations, even if you can't track their info packets (why can't you crack this traffic? This seems like author fiat, too). And you have a zoo with managed inhabitants who don't have any tech, can't do anything, and don't even know their own history. Yeah, it's time to infiltrate the zoo. What? Really? What can you possibly learn from inside the zoo that you can't find better poking around literally anywhere else?!?
But what really broke me
Is learning that the zoo is called Heaven's River by the inhabitants. Which made me realize that the plot that was boring me to tears is going to be the entire book. It would have been one thing if I could count on it being a diversion that they'd soon learn is a dead end and get on with finding the actual thing(s) in charge to find Bender. But no. This little jaunt was going to be the whole book.
I'll admit that at that point I dug into reviews and synopsis to see if this was actually true. It appears to be. Some reviews even pointed out that it has a lame ending, though I didn't dig to know what that is. I expect it's where they find out that Bender is in system AI headquarters either helping to run things (maybe 35% chance), enslaved by alien AI to produce tech (maybe 15% chance if only because the enslave thing has happened in a different plot and the aliens aren't using tech that Bender would have had), or simply hanging out somewhere awaiting rescue or opportunity to escape (how much percent is left? 50%. Sounds good). That's if I'm right. I dunno. Taylor is good en0ugh with plot that he may have something else at the end. I hope so because I'd actually hate being right in this case.
At any rate, I can't stand the thought of spending a whole book surfing a contained river in a glorified zoo. I was already bored with the sapient otters, frankly, and the other PoVs weren't getting much play to help me along. I hate to end the series here, but this is a one-star dnf. My interest has been taking a dive the whole way along but I'm honestly surprised to drop so far so early into this book....more
This is third in a Space Opera-ish series. There's enough remembery stuff if you've read the other books, but not if you want to skip. So don't skip.
IThis is third in a Space Opera-ish series. There's enough remembery stuff if you've read the other books, but not if you want to skip. So don't skip.
I got very impatient with this one. Bob (and maybe the author?) has a serious problem with unearned guilt. Fail to stop a species from being wiped out? His fault. Doesn't matter that there is literally nothing that he could have done or that he actually did waste a bunch of precious resources trying. And he pulls this lazy "people die so don't attach to ephemerals" thing. Look, his perfect memory means that yeah, you remember the loss, but you should also remember all the good times, too. Right? Those should vastly out-number the bad or you're doing it wrong.
And don't get me started on the whole "don't kill people" thing. If he really wanted a mature guilt complex, maybe he could accept guilt for the hundreds who died because he wasn't willing to take out the fascist who wanted to take over a colony? This is "evil people exist" 101. I mean, kudos to the author for having people doing bad things on a reasonable spectrum. But do we really have to be so indecisive in the face of known evil scheming?
Bob has been described as a "humanist" all this time and I'm honestly wondering what kind of weak moral framework this is if it can't handle the basic question of stopping known killers intent on killing. I mean, they're even a little reluctant to take on the Others full-out. Oh no, I have sads because we have to kill these completely self-serving aliens who have told me they consider me nothing but food. Ugh.
There's enough action and interesting developments to keep me engaged. So I'm only dropping this to three stars and am still a little interested in the next book. But I really hope the Bobiverse doesn't degenerate into more of this sloppy nonsense.
A note about Chaste: Howard (all the Bobs have their own names) gets a girlfriend. There are romantic-adjacent things happening. No sex, though. I mean, the Bobs develop realistic-seeming androids by this time and explicitly could do the, er, attachment thing. But they don't. For no reason that's ever articulated. So this is still very chaste....more
This is second in a Space Opera-ish series. The author has included enough reminder bits if you've put down book one a bit ago, but you definitely neeThis is second in a Space Opera-ish series. The author has included enough reminder bits if you've put down book one a bit ago, but you definitely need to read that book first.
This continues the voyage of the Bobs. At this point, I have my favorites, but they're all at least interesting enough to go on with. It does give it the weakness of any PoV hopper that you're naturally more engaged with some storylines than others. The author handles it well, but it remains a pace killer.
And the pressure is ramping up. In addition to the Earth-origin antagonists, we meet what we're calling the Others (quite original, but they lampshade that because Bob). We see enough to put them past any reasonable expectation of peace so the Bobs have to move onto a war footing as they search out and try to bracket what they are facing. Or will face since we're still constrained by the speed of light. I'm not really happy with the whole "Others" as they're designed to be implacable so there's no room for creativity beyond technological and tactical innovation.
Anyway, I'm still happy with the series, but the PoV hopping and the new foe drop this down to four stars. I'm still happy with it and looking forward to the next book.
A note about Chaste: All PoVs so far are Bobs. Who is still just a memory matrix replicant in a computer. We do get a weird romance like thing with A Bob who falls for a women and that's a little painful. I wish I meant that in an emotional sense, but I actually mean that in a romance sense. Oh no! Star-crossed lovers! Emotional angst! I found those PoV moments my least favorite. Still very chaste. Because still essentially a computer....more
This was a recommendation that turned out to be on my want to read shelf already. I'm glad I picked it up because it was a really fun ride.
But I almosThis was a recommendation that turned out to be on my want to read shelf already. I'm glad I picked it up because it was a really fun ride.
But I almost put it down in disgust. The early worldbuilding is an anti-Christian monstrosity that posits a world where domestic Christians managed to take over the US and make it a flat-out oppressive theocracy. And has done so successfully for nearly a hundred years when Bob is decanted from his freeze. It's just too ridiculous. I mean, you can't get half of Christians to go to their own church every week, let alone agree on which church to go to.
But Bob is interesting and his willingness to make the best of hard situations was engaging. And I loved how willing he was to innovate his way out of problems and tackle the hard things one step at a time. And once Bob gets himself into space the story takes off and only gets better as he starts cloning himself as designed.
And it doesn't hurt that each clone somehow has its own personality and quirks without sacrificing the core ability to work together and make the best of the things they have to do. No Bob ever decides to just skive off and live in a comfortable VR forever and just give humanity the finger.
Anyway, this was a lot of fun, very engaging, and I attached to all the Bobs. It's an easy five stars, though I admit that I'm tempted to drop a star on the stupid worldbuilding to start.
A note about Chaste: Bob is a computer. Yeah, he has his VR world to hang out in, but there's no sex drive and nothing sexual going on. So this is very chaste....more
Too much nerd. Too little cultivation. Okay, I just wanted to say that. It isn't actually even a nerd story. And it didn't help that the protagonist tToo much nerd. Too little cultivation. Okay, I just wanted to say that. It isn't actually even a nerd story. And it didn't help that the protagonist tried wielding trope powers for progress. And succeeding in the lamest possible way. By the third time some wild, untested power turned out exactly how he expected I decided we weren't so much in nerdtown as we were in author's special pet territory and gave up....more
I wanted to like this. Thrown into a killer jungle to see if you could chemistry your way out seemed like it might have interesting action. UnfortunatI wanted to like this. Thrown into a killer jungle to see if you could chemistry your way out seemed like it might have interesting action. Unfortunately, nearly every scene/conflict utilized the same mechanic—being blindsided by some previously unknown thing that shows up to nearly kill the protagonist and push her further away from any of her goals. I kept waiting for any progress on her intentions but can only take so many diversions and nearly dying before giving up. I need to see at least some indication that the main character can start exercising actual agency or I just get frustrated....more
This has an interesting premise. But there's no real continuity and the motivation and focus shift around kind of randomly. And don't get me started oThis has an interesting premise. But there's no real continuity and the motivation and focus shift around kind of randomly. And don't get me started on the annoying little helper rat. Way too many of the main character's actions seemed like someone rolling dice and then consequences seemed to be based on someone rolling dice more often than not as well. If I wanted a random story, with random events and random payoff I'd find a five year-old to entertain me......more
If you like a protagonist who is an amoral psychopath manipulating family and tribe for his gain you may enjoy this one. The author does take some paiIf you like a protagonist who is an amoral psychopath manipulating family and tribe for his gain you may enjoy this one. The author does take some pains to give him a motive to help some people (because they'll be resources for him later on) so the potential atrocities are kept down at least somewhat. But he's still a psychopath with cheat powers due to being a deity with a hobby of starting lowly and seeing how fast he can regain his godly status.
Yeah, one star. Interesting world building and decent action couldn't save the moral vacuity....more
This is fourth in a LitRPG story that you really want to read in order.
This was a little flat. I mean, there's a bunch of action and developments andThis is fourth in a LitRPG story that you really want to read in order.
This was a little flat. I mean, there's a bunch of action and developments and Emie finding her way out of some real sticky situations. But what there isn't is any sense of her connecting to other people. And that kind of wore on me.
The plot itself is a bit bead-on-a-string, probably because Emie doesn't have any goal beyond "take a vacation, maybe catch up with the family". She has been absent for a decade as far as outsiders experience (time dilation made it much longer for her) so frankly, her family relationships are a little strained. Which made it a bit annoying that she keeps treating them like her most important motivation. Because it is obviously not her most important motivation by this time (her most important motivation is fulfilling her promise to advance to the top really fast).
And I'll be honest, the relationship I was most looking forward to is with Master Kairos. We have been teased for the entire series with him wanting a companion for ascension with the connotations of that a bit open. Like does he want a boon companion? Or a spouse? Or something else? I wanted some progress on that front and got none.
I'm going to give this three stars for the scattered plot and relationship stasis. There are some interesting developments, sure, but nothing I really cared about.
A note about Chaste: Emie is still all "I have to leave in ten years so I can't really develop intimate relationships." She isn't wrong in terms of creating a family. But establishing a loving, possibly intimate relationship? The lie of her stance is highlighted by her close friend Zavira. They are trusted friends with close, intimate (non-sexual) ties with an obvious foundation of love. Every objection to a romantic relationship applies to this friendship and yet Emie has no intention of limiting or hedging against emotional pain. All this to say there's no hint of physical intimacy and it is very chaste....more
This is tenth in a series you should read in order.
Well, you know what you are getting and this is very much a continuation of the previous. Tala is RThis is tenth in a series you should read in order.
Well, you know what you are getting and this is very much a continuation of the previous. Tala is Refined and working in Alefast as a Protector. She's figuring out what to do with the community building up in her dimensional storage with Kit (and preparing to soulbond with her). And Tala is finding a whole new path of magic for humanity made possible by her control over magical ambiance within her dimensional space—specifically, giving those born without humanity's curse of a magical gate (i.e. the gateless) a path to magic similar to the Arcane's magical gifts.
So there's lots of magic wankery. In a good way. And providing a home for those considered "broken" is something I'm always going to be interested in.
A good piece of this story is Rane trying to catch up with Tala and become Refined on his own. There's more than a thread through the story that his biggest roadblock is his motivation and that culminates in this story and he finally becomes fully his own person capable to stand with Tala as an equal in all ways.
One of the humans that Tala gifts with magic gets married in this book and I'm pretty sure this is the first time we see humanity's marriage tradition and ceremonies. I mean, I might have missed it but I'm pretty sure I'd have remembered loincloths and body paint and the consummation hut that gives the couple a literal glow after doing the deed. And I know I'd have noticed that sex literally produces a soulbond that is visible even non-magically for days after its creation. No wonder there's no casual sex in a society that treasures family, fidelity, and has a built-in siren that paints violators in bright light. And to be clear, this is apparently not even a human exclusive thing as they were talking about the souldbond of marriage in Arcane lands, too. And there's no casual sex there, either. Hmmmm.
Anyway, I loved the story. I was fully engaged. It was an easy five stars, though again, not a lot of conflict outside of Protector and cell inspection duties Tala fulfills.
A note about timeframes: The story is starting to compress time a bit here. The first seven or eight books were a year or so. The next two have been another year or so. I sense that the scale of Tala's objectives is becoming a bit much to keep on such a tight timeline and it wouldn't surprise me if we start seeing years elided in the next book.
A note about Missing Faith: I don't know if this is deliberate, but the magic and culture in this story seems built around creating a heavy personal incentive for marriage and fidelity. The human society is already geared towards reinforcing social norms that would be very conservatively religious in our society. If so, it's very cleverly done and the author doesn't shy away from discussions of social engineering, community compacts, and the duties and rights of individuals. As such, I don't consider this an absence of faith that would leave unexplained holes left because the author just didn't want to deal with messy sex stuff. It's all very strongly supported, though not so overt that I don't wonder if the author ended up creating those explicit illustrative circumstances later and didn't have that strong of support in the beginning. Tala had her own reasons for being celibate and those were enough in the beginning. Maybe it's only as her relationship with Rane became close enough that modern audiences (like me) were wondering what the hold up is that the author gave it enough weight to bear up on its own. At any rate, this doesn't merit my missing faith tag, but it's close enough I thought I'd explain why. I do want to reread the first book or two to see if this cultural underpinning is there at all and I just missed it.
A note about Chaste: Tala and Rane are definitely in each other's intimate zone. Even a little bit physically. But not in a sexual or inappropriate way for even the highest sticklers of propriety. The book does end with (view spoiler)[them deciding that they are officially courting! Woohoo! (hide spoiler)]. So this is very chaste and we'll see if we get to see Tala and Rane in loincloths, mussing each others body paint in the consummation hut......more
This is ninth in a series you should read in order.
Now that Tala has taken the next step on the Mage path, the one that makes her functionally immortaThis is ninth in a series you should read in order.
Now that Tala has taken the next step on the Mage path, the one that makes her functionally immortal, she needs something to do. She decides to head to the currently waning city (that would need so much backstory exposition I'm not g0ing to bother, roll with it if you can) to become a Defender. She is tasked with fighting off the hordes of magical creatures targeting the city as well as investigating pocket dimensions that are weakening (as they do in a waning). These pocket dimensions represent humanity's solution to problems they cannot kill—kick it down the road for future generations to deal with.
As you can expect by this point in the series, there isn't a cohesive plot really. Lots of stuff happens. The pace is good, the action fun, and some real creativity in those pocket dimensions. Better yet, this is Rane's hometown so she gets to see his dysfunctional family and come to understand him better at the same time.
Tala spends a lot time navel gazing between action scenes because the next Mage step, Paragon, is only possible through understanding yourself and your connection to humanity. And frankly, Mullins is uncommonly good with matters of connection, shared humanity, community, and individual responsibility. So I enjoyed these sections way more than I normally do for this type of thing.
Much of the material magic wankery in this one centers on Kit with Tala's goal to soulbond with the devourling. There are lots of details to handle with regards to the growing community within her dimensional storage and how to let those supporting her within to safety should the worst occur and she die out in the magical wastelands. I love the idea of her traveling around with a village essentially doing their thing while she takes on the world's nightmares.
If you're engaged with the series (and you should be at this point), this very much delivers on expectation. At least for me. So this is a weak 4½ stars that I'm rounding up for the soulbond scene with Kit in the penultimate chapter.
A note about Chaste: Rane and Tala are definitely committed, at least internally. There's affection and support. But no shenanigans. This is very chaste....more
This is book 8 of a series that you should read in order.
So Tala makes it back to human lands with an iron-eating parasite staved off from killing herThis is book 8 of a series that you should read in order.
So Tala makes it back to human lands with an iron-eating parasite staved off from killing her by a neat trick with her Archon Star. I'm glad this didn't spin out too long and soon we find Tala actually soulbound to the magic-inert iron. She has always had a better relationship with iron than other Mages and now she doesn't have to rely on iron-based paint to do it. I liked this solution and enjoyed how this works out.
Tala has also arrived with her magically enhanced memory and the ability to upload her memories of her time in Arcane lands to the Archive that will give access to them for others. This is a literal (i.e. figurative) goldmine as human Mages haven't had any reliable information on their hostile neighbors in millennia. This means that Tala's biggest drive for action of getting out of her debt is now gone (with a lovely scene of her relief when she pays it all off—can relate!).
So we get a book that has a lot of wankery over magical stuff along with reconnecting with friends and family. And I was completely down with that. Add further developments with her dimensional storage item, Kit becoming a sanctuary for others and Tala working out how she could reasonably go into danger carrying a community in her pouch and I was all-in from start to finish.
This is a giant pull-back from the action of the previous book. I'm sure readers who engaged with that action as a sign of how the series would progress from then on are probably needing treatment for whiplash. Personally, I'm giving it five stars because I like the wankery and Tala's banter with Alat (i.e. herself) is just flat-out fun.
A note about Chaste: Rane knows better than to press his interest on someone dealing with the trauma of being free after slavery. He's so awesome, though, and I just want to give him a hug. This is very chaste, but also includes some minor developments as Tala drops some of her hesitancy in leaning on him at need....more
This is seventh in a series that you'll want to read in order.
This picks up from the cliffhanger of the previous and represents a hard-shift in tone. This is seventh in a series that you'll want to read in order.
This picks up from the cliffhanger of the previous and represents a hard-shift in tone. Tala has been wandering around building her magical career as a protector and dimensional specialist. She has made friends, reconnected with her family, and has some stability and a chance for real growth. That all stops here. Spoilers for the cliffhanger.
Having been kidnapped by an "Arcane" (non-human sapients who view humans as broken and good only as menial slaves for their broken magic) and her memory has been wiped. Her personality has been replaced with one deeply devoted to her kidnapper. She is a slave fanatically committed to her slavery and that first chapter or two is deeply disturbing, frankly.
Fortunately, we pick up right about the time Tala gets hit in the head and the overwatch personality she had installed last book kicks in with a reboot. So now Tala has three people in her head. Tala, obviously, but also Tali the slave and Alat her overwatch mind/personality. Tali doesn't get to drive and is totally dormant and selectively aware except when Tala pulls her foreward to do something the last months have been training for under her new master.
This entire book is Tala in the land of the Arcanes, being used to bolster the House of Blood as one of their super-deadly tools they call Eskau (the title, yes). Tala is her master's Eskau and earns her keep by killing things he wants killed. There's lots of action and Tala meets people she can never trust even though they aren't completely evil as we eventually learn. She even makes at least one friend. Well, probably friend. The thing is, the House of Blood isn't a completely corrupt house and has some interesting ideals that Tala isn't really against supporting. If only she weren't their slave.
So there are interesting conflicts both internal and external. The whole book is Tala looking for a way back to human lands and figuring out how to do so without a pyrrhic waste in her backtrail. Not that she wouldn't burn the place down, but getting caught in the blast herself isn't useful.
And developments with Kit in this book are frankly fantastic. Turning her (I don't know why Kit is a her as it's a devourling being used as a dimensional storage) into an Arcane-style sanctum. So the Arcanes give Kit an entirely self-sustaining environment, including false sun and a farm to produce food uniquely nutritious for Tala's magical makeup. And they let Kit eat a couple rival house "Holds" to expand Kit's space enormously. So Tala now carries a home that is designed to turn into a self-sustaining homestead for her support. I love this so much.
H0nestly, I planned to dock this a star for the tone shift. The series bills itself as slice of life in some of its marketing and for the most part that has held true. Humanity is under tremendous pressure and cooperation and trust is a cornerstone of Mage society. Being in Arcane lands where cooperation and trust are commodities to be traded and discarded when convenient is a huge shift. But frankly, I enjoyed this story and was engaged throughout. Tala has a lot of latitude for a slave because she is frankly an enormously valuable asset. So it isn't all grim abuse and thrash.
So I'll go with four stars with only mild discontent with the disconnect between this book and, frankly, the entire rest of the series that is set in human lands and where Tala is surrounded by her friends and companions.
A note about Chaste: Sex with humans isn't a thing Arcanes are interested in. So this is very chaste....more
This is sixth in a series you should read in order.
This one starts off beads-on-a-string as a pattern. But then Tala decides to confront the ghosts ofThis is sixth in a series you should read in order.
This one starts off beads-on-a-string as a pattern. But then Tala decides to confront the ghosts of her past and head back to the city she comes from. There she meets her family and tries to work out the trauma that has been core to her since the series started.
I really liked that the author didn't try to make everything okay or pull some kind of happy families nonsense out of thin air. And I like even more that Tala's siblings took her to task for shutting all of them out. Tala has some honest blame for her actions and accepts that and tries to make it better. And I liked her siblings and their various personalities and concerns and developments—particularly that a couple of them are getting ready to follow in her footsteps of entering the magic academy as she did.
I was heading for the standard four stars I've given most of this series, but the author pulls a staggeringly ginormous cliffhanger in the second epilogue (yeah, add epilogue abuse to the piling sins). And that's an automatic loss of a star. So three stars and I'm not sure I want to move on to the next, but probably will at least sample it.
* Cliffhangers and why they are evil: Cliffhangers are the ultimate disrespect to readers. They're an overt emotional manipulation to invest you in the next story by holding a metaphorical pistol to your head saying "you don't get a satisfying conclusion unless you read the next book, sucka!". Or, less hyperbolically, "I don't trust you to be interested in the next story unless I employ this emotional manipulation to ensure that you are." If you don't believe me that they are an active offense to readers, try this mental exercise: imagine for a moment that an author put a big star on the front of their story proclaiming "Contains Cliffhanger!" Would that make readers more or less likely to want to pick up that story? Right. That's all you really need to know about cliffhangers. Which is why cliffhangers are an automatic loss of at least one star.
A note about Chaste: Still very intimacy averse. Frankly, I'm starting to feel sorry for Rane. Maybe he needs to move on?...more
This is fifth in a series you'll want to read in order.
I read this two years ago, but reread it so I can continue the series. It took a while to rememThis is fifth in a series you'll want to read in order.
I read this two years ago, but reread it so I can continue the series. It took a while to remember all the details of who is what so having phantom memories as well was an interesting effect.
The story is good. A little beads-on-a-string, but the events are interesting and I was never disengaged or felt like stopping. I like Tala and her inquisitive exploration and her urge to do and be better. I like Rane, too, and the other surrounding characters are engaging as well.
A good pace and fun action make this an easy four stars (the sense of a plot or throughline is what's keeping this from being better). I'll definitely be picking up the next.
A note about Chaste: This is still chaste. Tala does have a talk with Rane about not wanting a relationship (he clearly wants one). Her reasons are a little lame, but not so bad that I'm willing to dock stars to even grouse too much. If I were expecting romance at all, I'd probably be angry but I'm not so we're good....more
This is part of a series you'll want to read in order.
Tala gets a bit of a talking to for being so careless as a dimensional mage for caravans (if sheThis is part of a series you'll want to read in order.
Tala gets a bit of a talking to for being so careless as a dimensional mage for caravans (if she dies, the entire caravan is a dead loss as that means the dimensional wagon will simply disgorge everything and everyone will be stranded). She does manage to get permission to be both the dimensional mage and an official protector with higher wages as a result. But she also gets a babysitter in the form of Mistress Odera. I kind of love Mistress Odera and the calming influence she is without being preachy or a spoilsport.
I have a bit of an issue with the forest scenes on the way to the giant tree city of Makinaven. The Leshkin are kind of boring antagonists and having them soak up chapter after chapter in opposition to the caravan had me skipping chapters—particularly on this reread where I already know what's happening and why. I don't know why the author seems so enamored with the Leshkin. To me, they're just zombies made of plants and without the ability to infect others.
Anyway, the rest of the story is Tala in Makinaven where we get lots of sparring, conversations with various factions, and more power fantasy goodness as Tala improves her abilities and pals around with Rane.
Speaking of, there's some good development with Rane in this. Tala is completely clueless on the relationship front and he is clearly smitten. But he's not an idiot, either, so I like how they become trusted friends in this book. This builds a foundation that goes into the rest of the series and those first steps matter here. It's well done in a slow-burn kind of way even if I get impatient for Tala not to be so very clueless in this way.
Anyway, this is 4½ stars, but without enough weight to round up. Seriously, the Leshkin are blah.
A note about Chaste: Tala is still unwilling to forge intimate relationships. Which is too bad because Rane is awesome. Anyway, it's very chaste.
A note about reread: Yeah, there's still no hint of the mechanisms behind the societal bounds around marriage and sex. For how well they work eventually, it's clear the author didn't really have them in mind at least to this point of the story....more
This is fourth in an isekai LitRPG series that you should read in order. It has a lovely "Story So Far" section but it's only for book 3 and seems geaThis is fourth in an isekai LitRPG series that you should read in order. It has a lovely "Story So Far" section but it's only for book 3 and seems geared to catching up someone who had to wait between books.
So Nate is finally going to take on Giantsrest, the capitol of the slave state that brought him to Davrar in the first place (to exploit and enslave him back in book one). He knows that Questor Badud is there and plotting to subjugate and enslave his adoptive home and the people he cares about. Starting with him as Badud has explicitly threatened Nate and is likely to come after him in the future.
Nate enters the city with Faline who is still directing him in matters of murder and political disruption. Around a quarter through, though, she manipulates Nate into a situation where he refuses to commit an atrocity and Faline delivers an ultimatum to get to killing or she's out of here. He tells her to take a hike. I kind of liked this result, though I still find Nate's ethical reasoning shallow. I mean, we found the line he wouldn't cross, but is that only because Faline chose to go for the gold standard, Anakin level of evil and skipped a bunch of steps along the way? What I mean is that we don't know his actual line, only that he has one that prevents him from being a cartoon villain.
Anyway, Nate on his own in enemy territory was fun. He starts getting creative and that means finding a way to take on the Ascendant Academy at the heart of Giantsrest's power. Faline has never managed to crack the fortress at the center of the city and has had to pattycake around its edges. Nate decides to take it on with his own unique brand of daring brazenness and experimentation. Infiltrating the school was interesting and gave Nate a bit of time to reflect on just how far he is willing to go in wiping out this enemy society. I mean, students being indoctrinated in the foundation of the evil empire are on the road to evil. But are they there yet? Can he spare these students without giving away his schemes or ruining his chances? I liked seeing him struggle with that and found this way more engaging than the Faline as vile temptress episodes.
So I liked this story and I think it's the first unqualified five stars I'm giving in this series. Is that because Nate is on his own for most of this? His buddies, the Heirs, can't join him in the clandestine plot here, so they are on their own doing adventury things. I dunno. I missed them a bit, but not so much that I wanted the story to be something different.
A note about Chaste: Faline is definitely too crazy to do anything intimate with. There's a seduction scene that might have been steamy if Nate had been tempted at all. Or ogled, even. But he resisted and we don't get enough that I'd tag it as steam. It's borderline for the chaste tag, but I'm still going to call it that but if you care maybe skip that scene. It's not long or important and should be easy to see coming....more
This is third in an isekai LitRPG series that you should read in order. There is a very nice "Story So Far" section, but that's going to function mostThis is third in an isekai LitRPG series that you should read in order. There is a very nice "Story So Far" section, but that's going to function mostly as a reminder for those that have had a gap.
This book is about growing while establishing ethical boundaries. Nathan has two strong influences in this book, each with their own agenda and way they want to solve problems. I'll get to thoughts on those in a second.
First, I want to acknowledge that the pace is high and the action is good and I love seeing Nate grow together with his friends while doing work they find meaningful and important (freeing slaves and overthrowing a government based on mind-control and exploitation). I was fully engaged the entire story and that's a good thing.
And I'm not that dismissive of the ethical reasoning here. But I am somewhat. Nate finally has to kill a guy (at the end of the last book, but he's dealing with it internally in this one) and I can't say I'm impressed. Look, Teol was an unmitigated waste of skin. He was a slaver who explicitly sees people as things. In particular, as things that he owns and deserves to control. There is no cure for that psychosis, at least within reach of Nate and his friends. Killing Teol is a service to mankind (personkind? given multiple races on Davrar) and an unmitigated good. I do not subscribe to the whole "killing evil people is still a blight on your soul" nonsense. I find it lazy moral reasoning. Not that I can say I have tested that by actually killing evil people myself. I just know that presented the scenario in this story I wouldn't have hesitated even a little bit. And I wouldn't feel bad about it afterwards. I don't think. It's hard to predict emotions, so maybe I should say that I'd be rationally and explicitly clear about having done a good thing by stopping an evil person from continuing their evil in a permanent fashion. Slavery is bad and needs to be stopped and force is absolutely justified in making that happen.
Anyway, Nate spends time under the tutelage of Faline who is an assassin for the good guys. She's kind of evil herself so Nate having to question her teaching is appropriate. I just wish he had a bit better sense of ethics while doing so. Faline teaches him how to gain a second class so he gains skills as an assassin and starts leveling up with murder. She has him conduct a bit of a terror campaign in Halsmet by targeting the powerful mages in charge of all the slavery.
So Nate murders a bunch of people in charge. Since these slavers' explicit goal is to subjugate Nate's home and consign his people to slavery, I'm good with that plan. Nate struggled. Which is fine. Good even. What frustrated me is that the one thing he never does is consider or weigh the alternatives. Nate has a chance to free a bunch of slaves and overthrow a slave state. If he is going to object to the means laid out for him, then what is it he should do instead? Why does he never consider what the alternatives would be? I mean, maybe he'd find a better way. Or maybe he'd decide it wasn't worth it to him personally. I'd be fine if he had made those choices even if I disagree with their basis. But it never enters his reasoning. And I find that weird. If you are trying to map a moral quandary, considering the alternatives is an important step. If you fail that basic piece of reason, then you are left with false dichotomies or worse, an unstated hypothetical that "there must be some better way". Well is there? If you can't think of a better way then for all practical purposes one doesn't exist.
Anyway, Nate also bounces off of a new figure in the story, the Questor Brox. Questors are beings of incredible power who show up throughout history to champion various causes. Nate has run into Questor Badud who champions the slavers. Brox is apparently Badud's foe and he shows up to "help" Nate and his friends fight off the bad guys. Only Brox is a giant jerk who only cares about his own aggrandizement and has social skills that manipulate people around him to agree with and venerate him. This is dubious help and Nate spends as much effort fighting off his mental influence and trying to manage the big hyperactive baby as on his actual goal of fighting slavers. Frankly, Brox is nearly as bad as the slavers because he treats people like things that there only for his own amusement and gratification. He's just dumber about how he goes about it. Fortunately, Nate is fairly clear-eyed about Brox and refuses to do the stupid things he suggests, even when the consequence puts Nate's plans in jeopardy. I wish Nate had worked around the moral reasoning better in this case, too, but at least he stuck to his own path and didn't let Brox warp him into stupid things he would regret later.
Anyway, all of that griping is just me venting about a very small part of the story. So take it with a grain of salt. I liked the book and I'm still very engaged with Nate. This is 4½ stars that I'll round up to five because it's still the power fantasy with good action and characters I care about.
A note about Chaste: Faline is a bit of a wannabe temptress. So I'm glad Nate is being all stoic and is smart enough not to bait the crazy. This is still pretty chaste without any intimacy or shenanigans....more
This is second in an isekai LitRPG series so you'll want to read in order.
This book is a bit episodic and mostly centers on Nate and the "Heirs" (the This is second in an isekai LitRPG series so you'll want to read in order.
This book is a bit episodic and mostly centers on Nate and the "Heirs" (the adventurers he fell in with in the first book) growing together. They take on hard challenges and figure out how to compliment each other (in terms of team function and power working toward shared goals).
I realized shortly after picking this up that I've already read this one, though I apparently never reviewed it. Fortunately, I was just fine tagging along for a refresher with the promise of catching myself up at some point. It doesn't hurt that I like both Nate and his team and seeing them grow together is a lot of fun.
The pace is good with lots of action, though little in the way of throughline. Their escapades don't really form a plot so much as an impetus for them to gain skills and levels and talk about what they want to accomplish. There's a lot of talk of "path" and "build" in true LitRPG nerd style, but that's at least part of what I was looking for so that's all good.
There's a bit of tension over Nate's plan to take on the Giantsrest nation/state/snakepit because that's a fight the Heirs didn't sign up for. And since Giantsrest is the bigbad of all bigbads in their neck of the woods, with lots of archmages and slavery, that's a pretty reasonable stance to take. Nate's hate for those guys is personal and related to the backstain who isekai'd him to Davrar (well, and also his perfectly reasonable hatred for slavery). And that's more risk than even the greatest adventurers in their home of Gemore can withstand. Still. They become solid friends and I liked seeing them become closer.
There are developments at the end that had me tense, but it resolves enough before the end to avoid becoming a huge nail-biting cliffhanger. The bad guys in this story are simplistic fools gifted power by the author for plot reasons and every time they show up to chew the scenery makes me tense. Frankly, they're a bunch of whinerbaby egotists and seeing them gifted victories grates, particularly when everything is so hard for everyone else.
Anyway, like the first book, this is a round-up to five stars and I'm still all-in on the story. I'm pretty sure I've read the next book (at least in part) in the past as I haven't caught up to some of the events I vaguely recall. But I'm happy to continue and I'm glad for that.
A note about Chaste: Nate's antimagic doesn't protect his clothes. So he's something of a serial nudist. There's nothing prurient about it, though, and there's no intimacy in this story. So it's pretty chaste, though Nate also is pretty free in appreciating some of those around him. He's an unabashed bisexual and there's lots to appreciate in a world where improving stats and levels makes people healthier, stronger, and more graceful. He never acts on it, though, so it's pretty tame all-told....more
This is the wrap up for the series. You'll definitely want to read in order.
This starts pretty slow. And stupid. If you get to some planet at the end This is the wrap up for the series. You'll definitely want to read in order.
This starts pretty slow. And stupid. If you get to some planet at the end (beginning, whatever) of the universe after four weeks of unending escort where your current food supply is a few crackers and a past-ripe apple and the guy in charge of the planet you arrive at invites you to lunch at his place, what the crap is there to discuss about this invitation?!?. We get pages, maybe a whole chapter of the motley crew discussing this with Jake being super-conscientious to solicit everybody's opinion. And I'm all, "um. Can nobody see the alternative is literal starvation?" This isn't a hard calculation to make.
And don't get me started on how frustrating Carl is in this book. Sure, he's a bit traumatized. Kidnapping and torture will do that to a guy. And he's not even twenty at this point. But his emotional outbursts are so extreme I lost pretty much all respect for him as a person by the end of the story. The only thing Jake can count on from him is to do the exact wrong thing in any given circumstance.
Anyway, you get a bunch of chapters of blather discussion and mysterious goings on for the first maybe 80 pages. And then Jake kicks off some contrarian hijinks and we're off to the races. The action is fast. The noodle-wank (sorry, philosophy) is interesting enough not to drive me out of the story even a little bit (this is quite an accomplishment, actually). And the author manages to wrap all the mysteries up while showing us some great, flavorful set pieces, and throws in a sympathetic stint in 1960s California without making it silly or glossing over the grit (um, beach sand in this case. Heh).
Something harder to do than DeChancie makes it appear is the last chapters consist of making Jake the motive force for resolving all the paradoxes that they've accumulated to this point. He has some tough choices to make and some trauma to deliver to the innocent (and retribution to withhold from the deserving) all so that things can happen the way he experienced. He's invested in the outcome, as hard as things are, so having him essentially pull the trigger on everything he has to go through is just as weighty as it should be.
And I cried at the end. Yeah, that's not a great accomplishment. I am, as Jude Law put it so succinctly in the Holiday, a weeper. Still, it's a great catharsis and every bit as fun as I remember from all those times I've read this in the past. The central romance even comes together satisfactorily, though not with the finesse a true romance writer would have managed.
So yeah, this is an enthusiastic five stars and makes that middle book slog totally worth it (slow start, and Carl, notwithstanding).
A note about publication: This is the worst of the new covers. And the Kindle edition isn't quite as good at the OCR as the second book was. In fact, there are a lot of single-line dialogue pieces that should have been their own paragraphs that end up tacked onto the prior paragraph. This makes some of the back and forth dialogue unnecessarily confusing at times as a speaker shift happens without tagging it (as you can do as a convention if you have single-quote dialogue paragraphs). It's not the complete embarrassment of the first book, but it's not great.
A note about Steamy: There are a few intimate windows in this, but it's not terribly steamy. Again, enough for the tag, but extremely lightly....more
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