This is my 200th audiobook which has pushed my listening time into “weeks” instead of “hours”. That said, I’ve had the honor of listening to Nick do “The Land” and Aleron’s latest God series (WIP). I’ve discovered TJ KLune’s gay-character-based fantasy and her excellent writing. I’ve discovered world-class authors like Dan Simmons and his most amazing novel to date, “Carrion Comfort”. Recently, just before Mr. Travis Bagwell, I discovered L.M. Kerr and felt the disappointment the reading world feels over his lapsed date to complete the Reborn series. All 5-star writers, all 5-star narrators and now, onto Mr. Bagwell’s work review.

That critical first 20 minutes, when you’re listening to a book, sensing the storyline, deciding whether to keep a commitment of tens of hours or return it angrily, I was on the fence. It would be poor prose to state, “I’m creating a childlike reading background so I can shock the shite out of you with my adult themes” but, this is what he does. He took the risk, and for me? It paid off. I’m in deep. 5 books later!

I have a stronger appreciation for books which are more than 20 hours long than shorter books. However, if someone is going to completely waste my time, like Dan Simmons did in Ilium, or “Just kill me” or whatever it was called, don’t hope I’ll trust the author again! Travis made the introduction of the first chapter or so seem VERY much like a high school reader but, there was a great reason. The series gets dark, and real, and in-depth with bad schools, bad teachers, pay-to-play reality and all the icky aspects in the worst of humanity. During all this mega-human condition drama, a VR game breaks out! Fun, fun! Critters, creatures, avatars, VR, very cool stuff. There are three major themes interplaying within each other.

I love width as much as length. Oh, stop it! You know how your mind works, and so does Alfred. Question is, do you truly have what it takes to learn how Alfred’s mind works? Crawl into bed and put your VR headset on. Hit “play” and immerse yourself into AWAKEN ONLINE. If you have private issues of abuse, be forewarned, this work is heavy into human familial relationships, moreso about failure than success. I can see a University doing a study on this work and lecture on AI and its development as an alternative social-scape for humanity.

Everyone either loves or hates narrators. Usually, it’s a few catch words which set people off, like if he or she says “warsh” instead of “wash”, or “PROgress” instead of “prah-gress”. David Stifel has fewer than most. “Eggs” said like “AYE-ggs”, which drives me a little nuts but, I can cope. I mean, WhoTF says “AYE-ggs” for “eggs”. It’s ONE ‘e’ for gods sake! Say it, just don’t marry it! “eggs”. My one criticism about this writing is the canned repetitive phrasing, such as “her smile didn’t quite meet her eyes”. A handy phrase alternative notebook would stop this minor but consistent irritant. Mr. Bagwell uses the same phrase too much, and it does distract from the genius of his work. I hope he stops making this error.