Fallen Reach is in danger, and only Hiral and his surviving teammates can save it.
Gathering their strength after the loss of their friends, the Builder and Growers race across a hostile landscape to save their homes and obtain the power they need to battle their nigh-unstoppable enemies.
The companions must survive dungeons gone wild, the hunger of the dead, and the wrath of an ancient power that was once the hope of an entire people.
Still, Hiral will not be deterred, and is ready to cut a path of destruction through his enemies and achieve the loftiest goal of all…
I've been struggling with this book for far too long. It has lost its driving force.
The team seems to be going from one meaningless fight to another. Level up, fight a challenge, level up, fight in the real world. Since we don't get an enemy POV, the plot seems claustrophobic. I'm done forcing myself to read each night.
This book is about the group doing a dungeon crawl. There are long and I mean long fighting sequences that cover about 20 to 40 minutes of time, but they take up several chapters in the book. The fighting sequences are very detailed, and if you like that sort of reading, then this book is for you. All likable characters, and the story sort of moves along. I had a really hard time finishing this book, I kept reading because I was interested in the characters. The first book was good, and I was hoping this book would eventually turn into something more than a dungeon crawl, but I was disappointed.
I feel like there is a great story hiding in here somewhere, unfortunately it is drown out in endless and overly descriptive fight sequences. Some people might enjoy hearing how he did a back flip double wammy, two all beef patties special sauce punch on but for me it gets a bit old and I find myself skimming the whole fight hoping I don't miss something important.
All in all I love the world the authors have created here but I wish there was a little more story happening here.
I read the first book and had some substantial issues with it but decided to continue as I’m a big fan of one of these authors other series (mark of the fool). I wish I hadn’t though.
I didn’t finish but I got 77% of the way through and that took me awhile (when I normally devour books). It’s just so boring. Long, tedious dungeon runs with no real development just the maintainance of the dull as dishwater status quo. One note lifeless characters. Dialog that tries to be witty spewed by characters with no development saying the same one liners over and over.
It’s just tedious. It’s also generic. This has none of the spark of creativity of mark of the fool, it feels like if you put all the tropes of the genre into an AI generator and asked it to write an x page book this is what you’d get.
Maybe I’m being harsh but this book bored me so goddamn much I’ve come to resent it.
I don’t really feel anything for the characters anymore and the plot is not really moving or very interesting . The main point of the story just seem very repetitive and there’s a lot of combat that doesn’t seem to have any real point. The character in the first book was so intriguing and now it is just dreadfully boring.
I like how the author makes all of *our* words for things *fit* into their world. Without any obvious connection. It’s clever without being too clever.
No rating since I realized that it isn't my cup of tea. I wanted story progression but what I got was dungeon crawl. If you like dungeon crawling you'll love this.
This book has roped me in after the set up of the previous book. This had me in the perfect spot where I know just enough to be excited, but not enough to have all the fun mysteries solved. It still has the problem of combat being way too long or descriptive, or just overall too much combat. This book would be great if it had different things going on. Combat is meh because there's so much of it, but if it was more rare, it would be excellent. The story has been carrying me through this book, every battle sequence is the tough pill to swallow before a big reveal, lore drop, or dialogue.
I'm hoping that it gets better, this is borderline 3 because of the quantity of combat. It was nice that it varied more from the last book because the characters got new abilities, but regardless I could really use more plot over combat.
Really liked this book, a great continuation of an interesting series. I really liked the magic system in this book. It is super interesting, and everything is tied up in a way that is satisfying and super cool. I loved the characters in this book; honestly, the best part. Each character is well-defined and very interesting. The coolest thing to me is using the dungeons to expand on the world lore in such cool way. I really liked the world-building in this book as well. I highly recommend this book and can't wait for book 3. Well done.
I love when we can't tell how the magic affects everything, even from the in world explanations. The growth, the risk, the training all being tied into the world's magic is awesomely done.
An extended dungeon run while pruning characters and no story advancement. This seems like set up and filler and nothing more. I was hoping for more background. Book three had better get back on course or I am done with this series.
I am at 47% right now and I just have to write a review because im kinda pissed.
This book has a really cool background story. Falling from a flying island is just insane. Sadly as many others wrote here, the book lost its drive. It is just fight after fight after fight. Always the same moves, always the same. The whole story behind it all falls short so far imo. They just got 200 hours to get the dungeons clear and they seem to chilling quite a bit and all are really chill and relaxed. Its just kinda weird. ALSO Yanily is prolly the worst character I have read this year. I dont wanna be a dick but it is so bad. Every single sentence from him is dumb and needs to be a joke. You can make characters dumb without them trying to be weirdly funny or annoying. Also why is commenting literally everything. I understand its the freedom of the author I just wanna say it is making it really hard to get rhough this book. Every single sentence makes me wanna quit this book.
Another point are the backstories. The only thing we got sofar is that the parents of Seena went with their daughters to the surface. That is it. We get no clue about any other person. We dont even know the husbands name of Seeyela. What prolly would help are different POV's or cutting out a few of the fight scenes and focus more on the real story and characters. ALSO PLS just make a joke like every three chapters or sth. I haven't laughed one single time during the first half of this book.
I assume the author has read all the other reviews and changed something up for the next book. I will try to get through number two and write another review for book three if I feel the need.
have a good new year folks
Also there is no backstory for the characters so far. The only thing we got is
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
The book continues to feel heavily inspired by contemporary MMORPGs, like World of Warcraft, even including a recurring NPC driving the Dungeon narrative forward. This is all great, and Li'l Ur, in particular, is fantastic. The Dungeon's themes are varied, with interesting boss mechanics, and a lot of care has gone into making them not feel repetitive and seem sensible inside a broader narrative. The characters are all interesting and feel independently realized, and their banter is top-notch. The MC is powerful but doesn't feel completely overpowered with respect to the rest of the party. The setting continues to be fun, and I enjoy learning more lore about the Fallen and the Enemy.
The problem is that the story starts to feel a little one-note. It doesn't matter how exciting and innovative the car chases in your movie are when all you are doing is showing me one after another; by the time I get to the fifth or sixth in a row, I start to get a little bored with car chases. This is where this book let me down; we spend too much time running Dungeon after Dungeon when I wish to instead see the characters return home and see that inevitable disaster start to unfold.
I can see how the author needs the Dungeons to justify the characters' growth and to make their power feel earned. It just needs some bigger breaks to give us a palate cleanser between all the Dungeons runs.
Rune Seeker 2 being the second book in the series, pretty much picks up where the first book left off. It follows them through the three dungeons they need to be able to reach the sanctuary, (though they don't call it that). The trials are many, and since they're all fighting ones (with the exception of perhaps one of them), it makes for a lot of action, but to be perfectly honest, not a whole lot of character progression. Sure, they level up, and they get more skills, as you would expect, but considering they're practically dying every single fight, that isn't really proper compensation, even though at least one of them is broken, which is rather amusing. The end of the story leaves them down 2 members of the team, since they're working on other things now, but they do actually transport themselves to the sanctuary at the end of the book, so the third one should give us some seriously needed answers as to what's actually going on here, it will be sorely needed information, since there's been constant hings, but nothing solid just yet in the first books. Should wrap up the trilogy nicely.
A science fiction dystopian litrpg with stats, skills and levels and a unique solar powered magic system.
Hiral and his party have survived the first tier of dungeons but if they want to be strong enough to challenge the Enemy - they have a long way to go. And their trials get harder when they find the next tier of dungeons have been corrupted. With only one way through they have no choice but to go on.
In some ways this was much better than the first book. In other ways not so much. So the good; the party really settled into their stride as a team. There was lots of camaraderie and plenty of inside jokes. I loved the redefining of NPC - There were a few others - some of those new definitions were really clever.
The bad; it was repetitive. I like the magic system and the enchantments and the world history - I don't like reading the same battle over and over and I don't enjoy a drawn out and overhyped enemy. The emphasis on the Enemy got tiring. I just didn't care. I also wasn't fond of the implications of whether the party caused everything to happen by running the dungeons. Too existential for me. And I absolutely hated But I also kept reading and was curious enough to read the next one so take it as you will.
This series is non-stop dungeon crawling. While there was some good character development and interaction, that was almost all in the first 1/4 of book 1. Here we have flat characters used almost entirely for their game skills.
The game is interesting enough, with a non-standard set of classes. There is a reasonable amount of recitation of character sheet elements, but the number of special abilities gained quickly becomes unmanageable. After every major fight, every character gets somewhere between two and seven new abilities or major changes to abilities. With a six-person party, that devolves to noise.
The biggest problem here is the lack of a real story. ("Bad things will happen unless you, the overpowered adventurers who have arisen at the last moment stop them", isn't much of a story.) This series seems to be an exercise in going from one fight to the next, entirely in service of grinding for levels and advantages. And that isn't really enough to sustain a series.
I might continue this series if I can find book 3 cheap enough. and I can't really recommend it to anyone else.
Freaking brutal ending. I feel like I was lured into a false sense of security only to be ripped apart in a “psyche!” moment and I’m not happy about it.
However, the rest of the book was actually really good. I want to say the author really leaned into the references, but can’t really say he wasn’t leaning into it book one after the whole p.i.m.p. It just took me a while to realize oh, he’s doing this on purpose. And now that I know that, I was much more aware of them in this book.
I actually like all of the references and they add a bit of levity to the seriousness of their situation. I had actually planned to leave a review of exactly two words long: WITNESS MEEE! Because that’s possibly my favorite reference besides “the trouble with troblins” but then the ending just kind of ruined all those happy feelings and now I am sad so there’s that.
Will probably get around to book 3 eventually cause I don’t hate (loathe/reject with my enter being) what happened, I just am really annoyed at the bait and switch feeling and have no desire to be in this world for a while.
Clarke is very creative in his destruction. This genre is fairly constraining, and with so many entrants it is sometimes difficult to remain fresh, but Clarke pulls it off. There were a couple of fights where I wanted to speed-read through the zombie encounters (not my favorite), but for the most part I enjoyed the creative encounters and I could hardly wait to get through the dungeon to find out how Hiral's skills, abilities, and attributes evolved. In fact, as a special treat, one dungeon was full of puzzles, not fighting. Refreshing.
I loved the second book as much if not more than the first one. The second book held a lot more weight to the humor that the story and the characters themselves carry. You can feel and understand why the humor is necessary for them and even us, the weight to their situation only lightened cause of it. The weight that is only increasing more and more. I love the way the story holds depth and manages to ease the pressure on the reader so the read itself is enjoyable and filled with plenty of adventure and action. The lore is deepening with every chapter and more is uncovered with every dungeon. Action was peak as always. Looking forward to read book 3, once I am ready to handle whats next. 10/10 would recommend.
Having read this on Royal Road, I can say with confidence that this arc is some very good story and power progression from book 1. Hiral and Co. get some cool new powerups, including a frikken death laser! And the struggle to get through the dungeons, past the Enemy, and back to Fallen Reach is reaching new heights with a heck of a gut wrenching ending! Book 3 promises to really be a ride as well! So buckle up folks and get ready for both butt kicking and emotions!
The history of this world is both frightening and so very sad. It is also remarkable how much that history is reflected in the party’s interactions. So many have died, or been lost, to the Enemy. And now we are beginning to understand what happened to the other races too.
I am excited to see how Hiral will develop as he grows in rank. Will they be able to save their families? Will they find a solution to succeed where everyone else before them has fallen short?
This series keeps ramping up. I almost wish the cooldown periods were longer. Please note that I've been listening to the audiobooks, which I find much harder to pace myself with. Litrpg's are hard to read sometimes, with main characters getting overpowered too quickly too often. This happens a little bit here, too, and Clarke even has the characters call attention to it. However, I've been pleasantly surprised at how well the balance has been kept in big fights. I'm a game designer and game design teacher, and I appreciate the cooldowns in this book!
I really loved reading/listening to this book. If you want to read a book that’s just about progression or Lit RPG then this is the book for you. The background story is really secondary to the fight scenes, the party interaction, the party progression, and the powers that are gained by the characters in this party.
It’s an easy-going book that any fans of this genre will enjoy without having to think too deeply. Don’t go into this book expecting some profound concept, but rather go into expecting to enjoy it and for fun.
Haral an his friends must defeat dungeons race against the clock to make it back home .
Haral an his traveling companions are still trying to reach home the islands an pick up one of their friends along the way going home . And defeat dungeons grow stronger in order to find the path leading home as quickly as possible for time is running short as the cycle is about to come back around in order for them to get home . recommend reading excellent series .
Another great book in this series. I'm totally enjoying the series And all the characters in it Are extremely well rounded. I am however sensing a theme at the end of each book. LOL. The way the story unfolds And everybody learns the history of the race at the same time. Can't wait to see what the next Installment will be like. More power more loot and more answers. Bring it.
Lot of good ideas in this one, the reoccurring odi was quite good and that arc's conclusion. I will say that pacing could be an issue, since it seemed like even when they weren't in a dungeon it felt like they were in a dungeon. I know this volume was designed to have a certain level of overlap, but the result was that it felt smaller and limited. Still over all a good book and i'm looking forward to seeing the story develop.
I feel a little bit bad about rating this 2 stars because I can't identify why I didn't enjoy this book, but the fact remains that I didn't (I usually enjoy similar books), and I'm unlikely to continue the series. By all accounts, the book seemed to be well-written; it just wasn't enjoyable to me.
Note: - 1 star = I disliked it - 2 star = It was okay - 3 star = I liked it - 4 star = I really liked it - 5 star = It was a favorite
Another well written entry in the series. It’s basically fighting start to end, yet still feels like there is solid character building and story development. Stats are there enough to satisfy those who are all about that, but not so much as to be annoying. Looking forward to the next book.