Frustrating narrator

I so wanted to enjoy this story but why does the narrator read the sentences as though they are questions? It is really distracting with many non question sentences ending with a raised inflection!

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2 people found this helpful

Well written and enjoyable but …

The story was very similar to several others I have read lately: growing up in a school system but not quite accepted, the object of hate that becomes the object of love and turning out to be the very thing that was perceived to be the enemy.

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Superb

Having listened to all the other books by Mitchell Hogan available on audiobook, I was so looking forward to this new series. I was not disappointed! The story, narration, characters were brilliant, I highly recommended this book.
Can’t wait for the next instalment now.

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4 people found this helpful

Great read

The main character is on every page, so nice not having a million b-listers to remember. It’s not endless battles there’s an actual story. The characters aren’t constantly fleeing from certain death only to be repeated ten pages later. It has a diverse and logical magic system with many spell ideas, not just napalm death again and again. The characters aren’t paranoid superhero's or endlessly changing sides, and Micheal Kramer is as always superb.

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6 people found this helpful

Great story

The oblygt downside is that the book is somewhat slow from time to time.
I recomend it.

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Excellent, classic fantasy story

First of all the book doesn't really do anything new, but then again there are no new ideas left in storytelling, literally everything you can think of has already been done before so there's nothing wrong with that.

The story and characters are well written, protagonist is someone who really wants to be a perfect Galahad style perfect Knight but is simply far too flawed to be that way.

The most interesting part of the whole thing is the magic system so might as well talk about it.

The magic system is interesting, basically there are Tides of magic, which have some overlap even though they are wildly different in nature.

Namely the ones we know of right now are the Dawn Tide, the Dusk Tide and the Dark Tide. Dawn tide is focused on stuff like healing but also has offensive capabilities like the other two, Dusk Tide is considered sorcery and focuses on offensive spells and Dark Tide is more mysterious than that.

However interestingly enough all 3 of them can produce Wards, which are basically magical shields that seem identical in form and function but are simply different colours, at least that's how it appears, which makes it seem like maybe the difference between these 3 isn't as vast as it might seem.

I think that's enough to make you curious about how it all works without spoilers so I'll leave it at that.

Overall this is a good book, considerably better than average so the story earns 3 stars there. Nothing groundbreaking but well written, well narrated because yeah no shit it's Michael Kramer and the story is interesting enough for me to have already purchased the second book in the series.

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3 people found this helpful

Disappointing

I chose this because I had just listened to the Sorcery Ascendant trilogy which I enjoyed very much. This is just like a very watered down version of the same thing - all the same ideas just called slightly different things.

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3 people found this helpful

Ticks all the boxes

Easy listening, engrossing, good action.. Does everything you're looking for in a swords and sorcery book.

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SPOILER ALERT

I listened to all five books... disappointing is a suitable word. The book started promisingly, but by the end of the second book it turned into a disappointment. I haven't met many main characters that I find so dislikable. Dumb, immature, spineless. At the end of the story, he is as stupid and confused as he was at the beginning. And the hero of the story is also the "damsel in distress", every time, Anskar, instead of saving himself thanks to his own powers or cunning, is always saved by others, circumstances and even one or two magical McGuffins. The fact that I know more about the drinking and sexual habits of the natives than I do about the history, geography and culture of the world they inhabit is an additional source of irritation.
If the author was really inspired by The Lord of the Rings for his love of "fantasy", I suggest he read it again, maybe next time it will inspire a love of "literature" as well.

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