Excellent

I've read this book a few times, but I found this narrator to have an excellent command of the different characters involved in the story. I live Pet, Jin-Yeong, Zero and Athelas with their various personalities and foibles, and Detective Tuatu is fun. Love this series.

2 people found this helpful

One of my favorite series of all times.

I am generally a Mystery rather than a Fantasy buff, but I don’t mind a bit of woo-woo in my world. This series is just amazing and wonderful and I totally love it. A bit dark now and then without being unrelentlessly dark, a bit gruesome now and then without being over the top, with plenty of mysterious threads dangling and taunting and making it impossible not to keep listening. Each character is beautifully formed and fleshed out, and the protagonist - Pet - is just one of my favorite characters of all time.

Zehra Jane Navqi is amazing and brilliant, bringing each character their own distinct voice and personality - truly a terrific match of author and narrator. Not ashamed to say that in the month since I bought the current 4 books on offer in the series I have listened to them 3 times. Can’t say that I’ve ever done that with a series before.

2 people found this helpful

Why that voice

I loved reading this book, but listening to it is a whole other matter. Jinyeong is korean yes, but here he sounds like he's been inhaling helium for the last decade. The romanization of korean words was already annoying when I was reading it but I could still tolerate it because it was easy to skim his parts when his sentences were being translated but in audio? Not only do you have to sit through mispronunciation after mispronunciation, you gotta sit through a WHINY interpretation of his voice. It's absolutely horrendous, especially because **SPOILER*** I have many theories as to how this series is going to end and I'm like 90% sure jinyeong ends up with pet. So you know, having the main love interest have such an annoying af voice isn't going to endear anyone to him. He's already annoying in the books, but still he's endearing. In the audiobook format, I want to punch him in the face for existing and having his voice. Stick to the book version folks unless you're desperate.

1 person found this helpful

So worth a listen!

I love love love this series! It’s not a predictable series at all! W.R. Gingell is my new favorite author and Zehra Naqvi did this so well I felt like I was right there with Pet the entire time!

This is for anyone who loves a good fantasy, murder mystery, story. It’s for anyone who doesn’t want the same ole plot line and doesn’t want some bodice ripper to listen to. It’s good quality make you say hhhmmmm reading/listening.

1 person found this helpful

Both book and audiobook are surprising delights!

I stumbled across this series in Kindle form, and was happily surprised at how original and GOOD it is. Let's face it, there's a lot of mediocre to crappy urban fantasy fiction out there. This isn't crappy, it's great!

I have three ratings categories for titles that I read and like.

1. Like them enough to buy them.
2. Like them enough to reread them soon after finishing the last one.
3. Like them enough to buy the audiobooks to be able to listen to them because I want to reread again, but can't spend all my time reading and I need to actually get things done. Yay, audiobooks!

This series has ticked all the boxes, and has reached Category 3. The characters are well-crafted and interesting, the world building is original and excellent, and the writing is excellent overall. A good book doesn't make a good audiobook, as we all know. Thankfully, the narrator for this series is PHENOMENAL. Much of the action in this book could be confusing (shifting realities, characters finding themselves oozing from one dimension to another to another, creatures in disguise), but the narrator brings everything into focus in the best possible way, making the story even better. Narration is clear, characters come alive, and the action and environment are both fascinating and understandable. I'm American, and have no problem parsing the narrator's (very appropriate) Australian accent. Hooray for good diction!

Five stars, and this series is now an automatic buy in both ebook and audio format for me.

1 person found this helpful

You Won't Regret Listening to it!

Oh. My. Vampires. What in Tasmania did I just read?????

I've been hearing about W.R. Gingell's books for a while now and finally picked this one up since it is in Kindle Unlimited. Wow. Just. Wow. I was so blown away.

This book is one of the craziest things I have ever read. The author just has such a zany imagination. I'm in awe.

In some ways, this book shouldn't work. The main character is barely described. We don't even know her name. So much of the backstory and current story and stuff that is happening is never fully explained since Pet doesn't want to think about how her parents died and her fae and vampire owners aren't going to explain things in too much depth to their pet.

Oh, yeah. Did I mention the main character kind of ends up a human pet for two fae and a moody vampire? Honestly, that should be creepy. Or weird. Well, it is weird. But it somehow works in this book. I'm not even sure how it works. Maybe because the main character is just so sarcastic and fully embraces her role as a pet...down to being mischievous and sometimes disobeying just because she thinks she can get away with it.

And the world building in this book. All the layers and craziness. I can't even begin to explain it. Probably because the book doesn't fully explain it, and it somehow makes it all the cooler because it isn't fully explained.

What I also really loved was that this urban fantasy is set in Hobart, Tasmania. Sometimes even international authors set their urban fantasy books in England or the United States, but this Aussie author fully embraces her locale and all the dialect and slang that goes with it. All the slang really added to the book, and I just LOVED it.

There is some blood and violence. Some mild descriptions of a vampire ripping people's throats out, that sort of thing. Mostly blood and sound is described while anything more gory is skimmed over.

The audiobook narrator does a great job with this crazy book. I loved the trace of Australian accent that reminded me of the setting but wasn't so overwhelming that it made the book hard to understand. Well done. Well worth a listen.

2 people found this helpful

A confusing story

I was confused by this audiobook and struggled to finish it. In this book, a young, orphaned female is forced into menial labor to survive. She initially works for very low wages in a restaurant with an obnoxious male boss that throws food, yells and garnishes her meager wages for minor errors. Then she ends up acting as a servant for a group of three paranormal men. By the end of the book they appear to have adopted her in some manner, but she still appears to the cook and bottle washer for these three guys. I was not sure if Pet was human and/or female for a while. We never hear her real name which further dehumanizes (and this isn’t Rebecca by Daphne Du Maurier).
There is very little character development and world building. I assume the author is setting the stage for the future books, but it felt like too much was missing. In contrast, it felt like an excessive amount of time was spent on Pet’s job and her obnoxious boss, which didn’t feel particularly relevant.
There is what I assume to be Australian slang that I found a little confusing. The narrators performance for Jin Yeong, the Korean vampire was frankly painful to listen to.
I read in a few reviews that the later books flesh out the characters and provide some world building, but not sure I will be willing to spend time on another book in this series to get to find out.

A must read to set the stage!

This is the first book in a great series! This series was recommended to me with the comment that the first book is a little hard to understand, but that each book seems to get better and better. That was a very accurate assessment! Once I got the magic and characters down, I could hardly wait to read the next book in the series. Really well developed characters, fun magic, laugh out loud spots as well as surprising and serious outcomes.

I hate writing reviews but I just love this story

This book series is NOT a typical blank-page heroine surrounded love-sick "amazing" hot guys. It's Not a bloodless tale. It's Not devoid of consequences. It is devoid of lude scenes and foul language but it's not for kids either. All of the main characters have growth. And it's Not boring.

The story is compelling, a bit gruesome at times but often offset with humor. And it either breaks the tropes that these types of stories fall into or uses them in a constructive way.

The characters have depth (even the side characters) that runs deep in the story, but this is my best spoiler free version of the top four:

Our heroine "Pet" is delightfully funny, kind but not a push over, and has good (human) commen sense. She still has room to grow, and if you stick with these books, she does! (can't tell you how proud I am of this girl)

Zero is the strong sight type, and not very good at being honest with himself. His often most funny when he doesn't mean to be.

JingWang is affectionately full of himself and is a bit OCD. It's the BEST when Pet mess with him! And personally I grew to like him in latter books.

And my favorite Atholis! He's like if Lucius Malfoy were actually cunning and didn't feel the need to prove his superiority through acts of violence. He most certainly has a superiority complex, and he commits acts of violence, the two are just not connected. He is the perfect, original concept of the fae. From his double meaning comments to the way he sips his tea, Everything he does is weighed and measured 5x in the blink of an eye.

I love your work Gingell! And plan to get more of your stories soon!

Good Story - just needs some tweaks

I finished the book two days after someone gave me it as a present. I couldn't put it down because of how exciting and fun it was. The Korean pronunciation needs work, but if you don't know the language it isn't a big deal. If the narrator learns Korean later, it would be nice; Otherwise, I loved the book a lot.