Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

EDITED to add: the second edition version of this book fixes every negative point in the review below and has gained my full, enthusiastic endorsement and admiration for the dedication and effort that was put into the revisions. But mostly it reads like fanfic. The cons: There are entire swaths of narrative early in the book that are italicized. Sure, he wants you to know that the character is not on earth, dreaming something, but that can be accomplished in a better way. Like using a sentence of two to convey it. Page after page of italics is _hard_ to read. I almost gave up on it. The POV character is generally relatable, has a solid foundation for development, but every few pages the author breaks the character's POV and inserts his own. Often with internal dialogue that starts in character and ends with the author as POV in the same sentence with tidbits like "I love this system!" or "I friggin love magic!" It's jarring and breaks the reader out of paying attention to the story. Several elements in some scenes are overly contrived. I've teleported to a fantasy world, I need to climb down the outside of a miles high tower (for a few levels), so I pop in some airpods and play music... a minute later as I'm learning stealth I find out I forgot to turn off my phone and some alarm I set a month ago goes off alerting the thing I'm trying to sneak up on. The incredible number of exclamation points. I'm not kidding! There are several places where multiple sentences in a row end with an exclamation point! It's ridiculous! It breaks the reader out of the story! It's damned exhausting to read so many exclamation points! The number of exclamation points needs to be reduced by 99.9%. Some of the descriptive writing is bad. A character is creeping up on an enemy, but pauses and waits "cautiously". A lot like that. Some number of book said-isms, I lost count and just started mentally editing them. These are always wrong unless you are being intentionally facetious. Some of the characterizations are cartoonish. Absurdly so. The pros: This guy just needs a good editor. A person with real knowledge of the written word to help him sort some things out. Maybe a writers group to give him feedback. The imagination behind the story is genuine. Conclusion: It's not really worth money in it's current form. If you buy it, be warned.