This is a somewhat unique and interesting story… so I’ll start by saying that I generally recommend it before I go into the inevitable rant that is coming… Shades First Rule has a solid plot, good world building, and solid character development.
Unfortunately, this author clearly suffers from an illness which is sadly very common to authors in the gamelit genre. It’s a mysterious disease known as:
IMMCS or Inexplicably Moronic Main Character Syndrome.
This disease is diagnosable when a gamelit author insists on allowing the reader to know as much information as the MC and then proceeds to have that main character be totally incapable of drawing basic logical conclusions based on the information they have. This creates tension as the reader is sitting there waiting for the MC to figure out something extremely obvious, but instead the MC just does stupid things and fails completely at making appropriate choices or the most mundane of conclusions in spite of having every bit of necessary information.
There is really no logical explanation for why an author would think any person of average intelligence would want to listen to a story about someone who is too stupid to live, hence it must be some kind of impairment the author is suffering from.
Even more dismaying, A. F. Kay clearly has a the more invasive and serious strain of IMMCS. This is where the reader is repeatedly told how intelligent, experienced, or clever the MC is, and in the same paragraph the MC’s statements and actions indicate that they must surely starve to death because anyone this idiotic would be unable to figure out how to use a spoon, let alone be capable of both procuring sustenance while also having the wherewithal to consume it when they feel hungry.
So you ask, if this is the case, why am I still giving this audiobook a (qualified) buy-it recommendation? Well fortunately, though the MC is a total and complete nitwit 2/3s of the time, (and at points I was sorely tempted to return this book), there is just enough promise that the MC might gain some wisdom as the story progresses that the many good aspects of the story were able to strike a precarious balance… Which is saying something as normally I don’t hesitate to immediately return books by authors suffering from IMMCS.
I do feel sorry for their plight, but I also have no intention of enabling their disease.