The Problem with Artorian Stories

This set gives you an excellent value with more than 36 hours of reading for one credit. Bravo. Also, the writing is intelligent and while sappy at times, a credit to both authors. Unfortunately, the authors seem to believe that their magic system is in fact real. They go into painstaking detail on every facet of cultivation, cores, etc. For hours on end, it reads more like a text book than it does a story. Both Books 1 and 2 start very slowly. I almost quit each of them, but kept telling myself to just plod along. Speeding up the reading to 1.4 helped, but even then my mind wandered for minutes at a time because there was just nothing interesting happening. I am not going to become a cultivator (safe to say none of us are), so I found very little enjoyment in hearing every arduous detail of this magic system. The actual adventuring aspect of the books are quite brief. In summary, well written but boring. I can only hope Book 3 is more interesting. As for the narrator, Baldree is excellent.

15 people found this helpful

Way Overrated.

This book is boring.
This book is a painfully deep dive into the magic system and Horribly placed history tangents during boss fights.
There are huge plot holes and the MC makes massive leaps in reasoning that come from nowhere.
It utterly unbelievable and I only got through book 2. I own the file with all three and I am putting this one down.

9 people found this helpful

very very disappointing

one book one weakling bad guy die, three books three weakling bad guy die. the MC seems very smart but has no fighting abilities, very disappointing.extremely overwhelming rated. i bet all of these testimonials are fake. this book deserves one star. so much talk but no fighting and no ploting and bad story lines.

6 people found this helpful

Talk about Cultivation Nerdville!

If your not into a thorough dive from beginning to end in cultivation, this is not for you. Two days ago, no one would be able to tell me, I'd have listened to 3 books about Cultivation. And beleieve me, the first 6-7 chapters is about the MC being his academic brain to the test, while testing on his body to get strong as old in body man.

There is no dugeon diving. There is no crunchy stat sheets. This is straight up about an old in body man whom decides he'll learn how to use the one thing that will help him save his family, while dishing out some justice and helping other people along the way.

The beginning of the book sets up things so sweet and nice and family/village oriented, that you wonder when and where, will the cultivation begin. But mannnnn.... the author hits us with a whopper. And the really journey begins.

This book has life lessons, value of oneself And family talk, terrible enemies, bad memories, lots pf laughs and you just cheer the old bugger on. He has so many set backs. And so many times you just want him to keep going and handle business, but later on you see, that not only dis he do the right thing, had he not done certain things, other life changing things may have never happened.

This is a set of long winded beautiful books. Its literally the only book(s), Iv ever ready that stayed on topic, and wanted you to undertsand this topic to thoroughly, that you had no choice but to learn it, grasp it and connect some dots later.

Its totally worth it.

3 people found this helpful

Mediocre

I've made it to the end of the 2nd book, and I think I'm tapping out there. The story has some interesting ideas and good moments, but everything surrounding them only barely makes it worth it.

For the good parts: the magic system is very detailed, some of the solutions to problems are clever, and it uses some archetypes not typical to the genre. The magic system was the biggest highlight for me, as you can tell the author spent a lot of time thinking about it. characters discuss it in specific detail, and there are even references to in-universe methods and theories. If a detailed magic system is very important to you over other details, you may enjoy this series more than I.

Unfortunately the narrative framework around these stories is not very compelling. Great lengths of time are spent on small details that hardly come up later, and exciting moments tend to almost be skirted over. The author will occasionally go long stretches writing in a traditional fantasy style only to suddenly bring in anachronistic terms (at one point during a fight scene a "Falcon Kick" is used) and/or random bouts of onomatopoeia This can be very jarring, especially as these fluffier writing elements tend to crop up during serious fight scenes.

My biggest issue is what could have been the story's greatest strength: the protagonist. He is an old man, and we are frequently told he is a grandfatherly, kind, loving philospher. Some of this is true sometimes, but the philosopher bit is greatly overplayed. This is mainly because his chief philosophy is "good people should live and bad people should die, I personally am the only one capable of making the distinction." This isn't an abnormal personal morality for MCs in progression fantasies, but it makes more sense in a generic isekai story and a lot less sense when you're told this person has spent decades researching at an academy. In this story philosophy mostly translates to talking a lot about how you're right because you're right. I'm certain that's a branch of philosophy, but it's not one that's particularly compelling to read in this instance.

I love the idea of an elderly person progressing and the lessons everyone could take from that, but while the author does a good job touching these elements occasionally they're not what they could be.

1 person found this helpful

Three in one

If you love the Divine Dungeon series this is a must have. three books all in one. It also goes into more depth about the details of cultivation which is excellent.

1 person found this helpful

Grandfather eternal Art

Cultivation growth explanations, variables articulated thoroughly.
a grandfather hugs his grandchildren grown up and powerful in their our right! With tears and a smile this man brought several great beings to tears helpless in deep heartfelt hope. Not fear!! will re-read/listen again after finishing the series!

1 person found this helpful

what happened to the story?

the story line disappeared into philosophical/drug dreams and I could not finish it. lost the plot in strange incomprehensible happenings.

Oy

I finished it, but hated the writing. Great ideas and excellent narration, but I felt like the constant lengthy focus on explaining the magic system was so unnecessary. But what was the book without that? Not much.

A new coming of age story

Excellent narration carries some of the slower parts. I love that it parallels one of my favorite series Dungeon born. this is set in the same universe and helps draw you in with the little nods to the original here and there.