Story:
If I had to sum this book in two words, it would be “beautifully original.”
Arand does an amazing job at character developing. Each character were given their own unique personality and grew as the story progress. By the end of the book, I felt like I knew all of these character. All the their pain and suffering, all their goals and desire, and all their joy and accomplishment felt as I had live in the same world with them.
And yes, the story does contain a sort of harem, but Arand done it beautifully. It felt like a loving relationship between all the character rather than a horny pervert rapping women. Arand did an amazing job to ensure each relationship felt real and natural for the audience to experience. Overall, I end up cheering for him rather than finding him a creepy pervert, unlike in most other books.
Performance:
If you never heard an audiobook presented by Jeff Hays before, like myself, prepare to be mind blowed! He is amazing voice actor who does amazing impersonation of each character. He gave each and every character their owe unique tone of voice and really brought the book to life. I can not express how amazing he is. Hays even put in the effect to alter the voice to match the character location in story. Voices echoes when characters speak in hallways, corridor, or certain rooms. Voices are alter to sound as though they are spoken over radios, or speakers as the story describe. It’s simply amazing. The little details is what really separate Hays acting from every other fiction story I’ve heard so far. The performance very much made it felt like a once in a life time experience.
Overall:
I’ve read and heard a look of stories in my life. I find may stories to be wonderful and breathe taking by how much details an author used to develop their characters.
But, it’s not every day I hear a story that envelope me in its world and makes me never want to leave. My warning to any listener out there would be;
“Prepare to feel sad and empty when it end. It’s like truly falling in love. The ending isn’t sad because of some tragedy. The ending is sad because you know something beautiful ended. And I fell in love with this book.”