Comments: This is a new series from the author of Battlemage Farmer (which has reached Plaid Power level).
Pretty good series, but there are certain parts which evoked an extremely negative response. They are perpetrated by the bad guys which is why it wasn't an instant DNF. I'll see how I feel after book 2, but I will read it.
Bedroom Activities: None
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Comments: This is one of the books that I read in an effort to branch out from my usual fare. It's not LitRPG, GameLit, or Isekai.
All in all, very good. It's got some skipping around, and the pace could be faster, but the world is interesting and the characters are good. If I had to describe it, it's kind of an alternate history with magic. There are many elements that are clearly inspired by the real world, but it's neither annoyingly plaigiaristic nor incongruous, so it meshes together seamlessly.
Book 2 is out next month and I will most likely pick it up
Bedroom Activities: None
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Comments: This might have been my most anticipated book of 2024. I was thrilled that it did not disappoint. After the last book's explosive ending, this book inevitably had to be a slower pace, and that's managed in a very good way. It's a "back to the farm" and "kick back" kind of book. A lot of the mysteries we've been reading about for 3 books are fully fleshed out and revealed, which is pretty fascinating.
Looking forward to book 5!
Bedroom Activities: FTB
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Comments: This is my first review after the Great Hiatus of 2024.
Full disclosure, M. Tress is someone I've conversed with more than once on Discord, and it goes back long before he started publishing books.
This book was one of the more innovative stories that I have read in the last few years. It has good characters and a really interesting storyline. His best book so far.
Bedroom Activities: None
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Well here we are, 2024 is over, and it's a whole new year.
I don't know if this picture is a sunrise or a sunset, and that's oddly appropriate because it could be the end of 2024 or the beginning of 2025.
2024 was a pretty crap year for me, mostly because of the loss of my brother by another mother. In July I was struggling with coping with the grief, so I took the step to see a grief counselor, and she was very helpful. I feel like I have gotten past the primary danger there. I have struggled with having any creative energy and while I have kept up my reading, I have not felt like doing reviews.
I'm going to try reviving CBR, and we'll see if I can find the motivation to keep up with it. Lord knows I have a large backlog.
So last Saturday I went to a gaming event with my best friend. I've known this man for 34 years. He was the best man at my wedding, and I was a groomsman at his. Our sons were born 2 months apart. I have had to talk him down a few times when things were going sideways for him. I'm not exaggerating when I say he saved my life when my life went sideways.
He dropped me off at my house on his way home. He lives 3 blocks from me. Thirty minutes later my wife hears sirens. Pulse Point says it's at his house. Their neighbor texts my wife that one of his sons (5 kids) is in the front yard hugging the neighbor. That was enough to send me down there.
He had called 911 before handing off the phone to his 15 year old daughter, then collapsed. She started CPR on him, and switched off with his 20 year old son.
The EMT's worked on him for an hour before taking him to the ambulance. His wife was out of town at a work conference, and she asked me to go to the hospital with him. I took his 20 year old son with me and he was pronounced dead almost as soon as we got there. I will never forget the anguish in his son's voice when he screamed "You mean he's fucking dead?!!! Why!? I'm only 20, what the fuck am I going to do now?!"
My wife said I may have gotten 5 more kids, and honestly I'm ok with that. We mutually pledged to take care of each other's families if anything happened, and I guess it happened.
I'm not sure when CBR will pick back up, but now you know why it just stopped.
Fair winds and following seas my friend. I will see you on the other side. You will be missed.
Eighty years ago today, the Allies breached the wall of Fortress Europe and began the liberation of France and the final defeat of Nazi Germany.
My ability to sit here, read dozens of books, and gripe about their quality, or extoll their quality is directly related to the sacrifices made on a beach in France in 1944.
Comments: I should start a tag for "Time travel isekai" but I don't think I will be able to convince myself to try another one.
This is not a great story. It is so full of plot holes that I used the phrase "plot colander" when discussing it. I am amazed I made it half-way through it. I can't even describe all the issues with the story.
Disappointing, hopefully Mr. Tanner cleans up the story in future books.
Bedroom Activities: None
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Comments: As a stunning contrast to yesterday's review, this one is awesome.
Mark of the Fool has always been good, some books are better than others, but no real stinkers, with consistent improvement in the story from book to book. For that to be true over 6 (now 7) books is really remarkable.
The side character development is something where this series really shines. Almost all of the recurring side characters have been developed to the point where you really have an emotional reaction when something significant happens to them.
Honestly the end of this book was some of the most stunning twists and turns I've found in a book in recent memory.
Highly highly recommended.
Bedroom Activities: FTB
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Comments: I'll be honest, I didn't have a lot of expectations of this title when I picked it up. It failed to live up to them. This has to be his first book. I can't believe this had any editor revisions.
The narration is moderately coherent, but only moderately. Things jump around with little indication of what happened. The protagonist is a clinical sociopath (confirmed by someone who has read more of it, which utterly horrified me.)
There seems to be a complete lack of effective rapport building between the reader and the characters.
It was honestly one of the worst things I've picked up this year. The only positive I can take away is there is a corgi in the group of survivors.
Bedroom Activities: Unknown
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Comments: I picked this series up because I was sick and needed something that required very little brain power to read. Imagine my surprise when it was actually really good?! There are a lot of really funny characters in the books, and there is a sub-plot with his family that really hooked me hard.
All in all, very good, and I'll be reading the next one, assuming there is a next one.
Bedroom Activities: Some Explicit
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Comments: I picked this up because it looked interesting and I love the performances Daniel and Rebecca do.
The performance is absolutely top notch. So many distinct voices and speech patterns it's amazing.
The story is pretty good, but it really suffers a bit from the protagonist being too good at everything. It's not quite to the level of Mary Sue, but it's VERY close. I will probably pick up the second book just to listen to Dan and Rebecca more.
Bedroom Activities: FTB
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Comments: The premise of this book is fairly common, ship is separated from the rest of civilization, and has to improvise, adapt, and overcome. I mean Star Trek: Voyager anyone?
So not particularly innovative a premise, that's not that big of a deal, some of the greatest literature in the world have similar premises.
The characters are pretty decent, and the action is too. If there's a problem I have with it, it's that the action is too BIG, and the stakes are too high. I mean after achieving victory in this story, where do you go in the future? It's kind of like in Star Wars, Luke blows up the Death Star. How do you top it? Blow up ANOTHER EVEN BIGGER Death Star.
Anyway good, but I'm not sure where things are going to go from here, so book 2 is waiting.
Bedroom Activities: FTB
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Comments: I have been having issues with this series since book 4, when the family aspect began to dwindle away, and at this point the family gets mentioned maybe a double handful of times per book. Characters that we expected to have a significant role in the overall story in early books don't even get mentioned. Meanwhile Sam is routinely punching above his weight class, despite there being an extremely limited number of beings that are actually higher tier than him.
And then we have the navel gazing. It's gotten worse. I was regularly skipping paragraphs, and significant chunks of pages.
At this point I'm invested in this story and I will probably finish the story, but I don't find it nearly as satisfying as the early books.
Bedroom Activities: None
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For the few people wondering, I didn't have a post yesterday because I have been sick, and just haven't been up for doing a post. I have some books queued up, but translating that into posts takes brain power, and that's been in short supply
Comments: I picked this up because Seth writes Battlemage Farmer, and that's great. Objectively the writing in this book is just as good as Battlemage Farmer but the protagonist's actions in this story seriously bothered me. Morally and ethically, I find what he does to be wrong on so many levels. Sorry, hard pass on this series.
Bedroom Activities: None
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Comments: This one has been floating in front of me for a while, but I just put off picking it up for a lot of reasons. I grabbed the audiobook because I needed a commute listen and then when I was done with that I picked up book 2 because I didn't want to wait for the audiobook. It's a really good cultivation story, focused on a street kid who was bullied by the noble brats and then they get a cultivation mentor of phenomenal power. Hilarity ensues.
Definitely going to be reading book 3.
Bedroom Activities: FTB
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Comments: Path of Ascension as a series is starting to deal with the issue of dragging its tail along with the story. All the stuff that has happened before is there weighing things down. I mean the characters are still good, and the setting is decent but as readers we still want a new story with our familiar tropes. For myself, in order for the story to be good, there has to be something new. This one took a while, but it gave us some of what we want. This book covers the first half of Minkalla. It's an odd setting honestly, but the author puts some really interesting scenes in it. I'll still be reading the next one, but I hope he picks up the pace.
Bedroom Activities: FTB
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