Charming, clever, and bawdy. Until it isn't.

This book will mention spoilers, but I will try to keep it to a relative minimum and be somewhat non-specific as I think this review contains an important warning that the book itself does not. At least, not as it is presented on Audible. That warning is that this book contains, and does not satisfyingly deal with, rape. I will elaborate in the review below.

I will start with the easiest positive. The narration. It is excellent -- full of personality, with distinct character voices and well expressed emotions and accents. Jeff Hays is immensely talented and worth every cent invested in his hiring.

As for the book: This entire series thus far has been a charming and satirical take on fantasy as a genre. References abound from dungeons and dragons, to mmorpg's and other media. Some tropes are leaned into, some are subverted. There's a lot to like about the characters and the character development is both rewarding and interesting to read.

The book is full of sex and sexual references that up until now felt self-aware and satirical in nature. I started to get a little concerned when one of the demon characters casually referenced their love of 'rape', though it was implicit and off-screen and thus didn't quite cross any lines. Unfortunately, that did not remain so. This particular book contains a rape scene that is not dealt with in an elegant or appropriate way.

The central character of the story performs it, and the consequences for them approximates offering an apology then getting rewarded for it in every way possible. The fact that the victim of the act has multiple chapters dedicated to expressing their trauma and pain in the fallout from the act demonstrates that the author is not unaware of what they have described or written about. Yet the way it is just cleared up in the narrative then subsequently brsuhed over shows a wilful disregard to engage such a serious thing. I think the story would have been much better if the author had got to the point in the scene where it happened, then had the main character change their mind at the last moment. There would be other means to get the victim to the point of character development they wanted.

For me it became a significant blotch on the series and I've been left questioning whether to continue reading or not. I am not sure I trust the author to circle back to this moment and give it a more mature and appropriate treatment and if they did try, I am not sure how they would manage it in a satisfying way.

This incident in the narrative of the book certainly significantly impacted my subsequent enjoyment of the book. I think if an insouciant attitude to sexual assault bothers you it is likely to impact yours as well. I feel leaving a review here is the fairest warning I can give.

If this is not an issue for you for whatever reason, I would not hesitate to recommend this series to you. I enjoyed it a lot and I only give the two star story score because of how much the scene itself threw me for a loop, otherwise it would likely have been a five or a minimum of a four.

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1 person found this helpful

A great sequel

Those last few chapters are exceptional. Well done to voice actors and SBT. On to Part 4!

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enjoyed the chestie book

great voice acting and a good story. I will get the next book in the series.

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Awesome

As good as the second book, and Jeff Hays makes it one of my favorite audio books to date. Love it when the performance and writing is good enough to make me laugh out loud multiple times during the book.

Thanks Neven and Jeff, can't wait for the next one.

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2 people found this helpful

Levels are tasty

How did this moronic box end up some powerful? Easy, levels are tasty. Killing things are tasty. Snack is tasty.

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I love this series and the narrator

the narrator does a great job of bringing the world to life with all the different voice's and expressions

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An absolute cracker again

Just how exactly does an auto turn off, integrating a Swedish song into their story? Listen and find out

Caramell Dansen lol

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The first third is very very dark

I read a lot of reviews before buying this audio book and was quite nervous about it. The first part is very dark, and quite disturbing. But I thought it quite good towards the end end, and quite enjoyed the conclusion.

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Loving every minute of this series!

Seriously good. can't get enough of this amazing series 😄
Top notch in every possible way.

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Great.

Jeff Hays + good writing makes for another awesome book and hours of fun. Highly recommended.

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