Dhane kicked the bucket in spectacular fashion, every bone crushed, every organ popped against the full force of a 40-ton garbage truck speeding through a red light.
The only part of him intact—whole—entirely unaffected by the grisly affair, was his soul. Souls are durable things, you see, like kids: they bounce.
And bounce he did, into the abyss between worlds, drifting until one excited soul watcher fished him out and found him a new home, a heaven for gamers and nerds and everything in between.
It was all he could have ever wanted in the afterlife, down to choosing his class, killing mobs, and exploring a beautiful, fantasy world chock full of mysteries yet to be discovered.
At least . . . it would have been those things if that first day had gone a little, tiny bit differently.
Instead, he now finds himself locked in the middle of an eternal conflict between Light and Shadow—humans and monsters—potentially being the enemy to all.
My Opinion: 347 pages, $4.99, Available On Kindle Unlimited
*Some humor, but misses for me because of inconsistencies*
You can tell there’s a lot of heart put into the story and there’s a certain charm if the jokes and sense of humor land with you. But there are also issues. Consistency with the world building, subtly unrealistic dialogue or interactions written for a joke.
Good things: There is a consistent sense of humor and good gamer jokes. When you see details about game mechanics, they are thorough. There's semi-regular action and some interesting class features.
Issues: The main character just magically knows a bunch of stuff about the world and even the game mechanics of the world without ever having had to work for the information. It ruins the opportunities for exploration, learning, and world building.
The dialogue, especially from monsters, felt too modern. There were lots of modern American slang and colloquialisms that didn’t feel like they fit. For those humans that were sent to the light side, it would make sense, but it’s a part of the lore that the dark side doesn’t have that or at least they hadn’t for a long time.
The story starts out with the main character (MC) as being part of the dark side, with the monsters. Which is a neat premise. But then he spends the next section of the story pretending to be with the light side, training with the humans, and even getting a light side affiliation, which is supposed to be impossible. Instead of working within the limitations of being dark side associated, the MC has no real penalty or challenge and does what everyone else does.
At one point the Mc is arrested by some light side priestess, which isn't setup well. But worse, he magically knows her secret true name which gives him some vaguely defined power over her. Both, true names & how he knows it, which felt completely made up on the spot without any setup within the game mechanics.
There's also no gradual character progression. One chapter the MC is a low level noob, the next he's a high level badass able to bluff others into believing he's a king, demand his own release, and win a fight with conveniently undisclosed leveled opponents.
Also, there’s a fundamental flaw in the world building that doesn’t setup the concept that people from a modern earth suddenly randomly believe another speaking, thinking person or being was made to be evil and there to be killed just because that's what they'd been told.
Overall, the story misses for me because of inconsistent and seemingly made up in the moment game mechanics. On the story side, there are some good points but book 1 in the series seems to exist mostly to introduce the bad guys and explain why the MC has to defend the shadow faction from them while teasing town building for book 2. If forced story moments and inconsistent game mechanics don't bother you, you may enjoy the story more than me.
Score: 6 out of 10
Wrong Divinity: Oh Sh*t! I F*cking Hate Spiders! (Arachnomancer Book 1)