That was my thought when I passed this series up for several weeks, what with an unknown author and fugly MC and tribe, even knowing it was performed by the renowned Jeff Hays. However, due to a lull in other interesting title offerings, I decided to give this series a try.
Seriously, if you’re like me, I’m here to admit that I was wrong. Shemer Kuznits crafted a well-designed story, giving ample backstories to the MC along with many secondary characters. Honestly, Jeff Hays’ performance of the sarcastic pet construct was flawless There is lots to like and little to dislike about this novel. As already mentioned, the backstory outlining was well-done but the author also included a number of story elements such as poignant moments, relationship hurdles to overcome, hilarious interludes to temper the slower parts of the environment building, &c.
There were also sections that considerably slowed the forward movement such as tedious resource gatherings for the lair construction and a too-often tendency to go into litRPG stat-bane mode which, for audio listeners such as myself, just moves me to the fast-forward button on my mp3 player.
Even with those drawbacks, I’ll not wait to continue with the next book in the series and others most likely not either.