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Zectas #1
Enigmatic Village of Nanahuatl
At eighteen years old, Nash Smoak maintained three jobs. He worked as an assistant to the cook in a small diner, he was shadily hired as a construction worker, and worked as an attendant at a game arcade. Nash needed to take on these jobs in order to support his two brothers and sickly Grandma. Ever since the tragic accident of his parents’ death, he took it upon himself to support his family. After being worked to the bone, Nash found a sacred place, his paradise of relief - the virtual reality world of Zectas. However, his only sanctuary was destroyed when a group of high-level players used him as bait in one of their quests. Nash was captured and tortured by a sadistic Boss monster! Little did they know that this incident would cause the birth of the Legendary User Smoke!
406 pages, Kindle Edition
First published November 29, 2014
65 people are currently reading
216 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews
June 21, 2015
Oh... my... God. This is the new champion in the on-going contest for the most poorly put together indie book.
The story itself is OK, though it sort of plods predictably forward, with the main character creatively thinking of one way after another of developing himself and completing quests that somehow the thousands of other users in the game have never figured out. The characters are mildly interesting, though not deep at all. Still, I would have read it and enjoyed at least parts of it.
The book aspires to be a pretty average entry into the MMORPG genre. Unfortunately, the marginal English skills of the author make it impossible to immerse oneself in the story. The author is either in fourth grade, left school after the fourth grade, or wrote a book in another language and then used Google Translate on it. (Dear author: If you are in fourth grade, you should be congratulated for completing a novel and you should keep writing... and have an editor look at your book before publishing.)
The book is packed with little gems like "As the everyone in the clan new of their story, they understand the heroic deed that you have accomplished," or "Seeing the griffons fly off. The Condortlians felt relieved most likely they will try to look for another food source since the lizard people has been wiped out."
I can only assume there were no editors, proof readers, family members or friends involved in the production of this book. The author wrote a first draft, ran spell-checker, hit the "fix all" button, and uploaded it. In every single paragraph there are the most basic mistakes. And I'm being literal: every single paragraph.
I pay attention to the mistakes I find in other books, but I'm not obsessive about it. This book, however, makes it unavoidable. And the mistakes make it just too painful to plow through the story. My message to the author: Please, please, the next time you write a book at least have a friend read it through.
The story itself is OK, though it sort of plods predictably forward, with the main character creatively thinking of one way after another of developing himself and completing quests that somehow the thousands of other users in the game have never figured out. The characters are mildly interesting, though not deep at all. Still, I would have read it and enjoyed at least parts of it.
The book aspires to be a pretty average entry into the MMORPG genre. Unfortunately, the marginal English skills of the author make it impossible to immerse oneself in the story. The author is either in fourth grade, left school after the fourth grade, or wrote a book in another language and then used Google Translate on it. (Dear author: If you are in fourth grade, you should be congratulated for completing a novel and you should keep writing... and have an editor look at your book before publishing.)
The book is packed with little gems like "As the everyone in the clan new of their story, they understand the heroic deed that you have accomplished," or "Seeing the griffons fly off. The Condortlians felt relieved most likely they will try to look for another food source since the lizard people has been wiped out."
I can only assume there were no editors, proof readers, family members or friends involved in the production of this book. The author wrote a first draft, ran spell-checker, hit the "fix all" button, and uploaded it. In every single paragraph there are the most basic mistakes. And I'm being literal: every single paragraph.
I pay attention to the mistakes I find in other books, but I'm not obsessive about it. This book, however, makes it unavoidable. And the mistakes make it just too painful to plow through the story. My message to the author: Please, please, the next time you write a book at least have a friend read it through.
June 30, 2016
Pretty sweet. Overpowered righteous hero who is financially broke cliche is getting old. Other than that, it's nice.
November 9, 2015
Reading a lot of books has a drawback: one may come across one which is not quite on par with the rest, i.e. worse than average. Unfortunately, this series happens to be one of my worst reads.
I really feel that the author needs a lot more writing experience, which partly comes from reading a lot, as well as attending writing classes. This shows in the quality of the book. The most striking sign of inexperience is that the author has a lot of word repetition, combined with very simple sentence structures. A character's power is often represented by repeated lines, where the only thing that changes is the damage dealt. This would be normal in a game, not so in a book, even if it belongs to the LitRPG genre.
Going further, the story is somewhat unique, however character description is lacking, especially when it comes to the main character. We rarely read about his emotions, unless it is influenced by the current situation, e.g. anger due to a cheating contestant, etc.
The human characters are extremely naive. It is perfectly normal if they make mistakes, however these are ones that an adult would rarely make. Trying out a recipe, for example, would never, ever end in someone storming out of a house.
Would I recommend this book to anyone? No, not yet. It still needs a lot of work. This does not mean, however, that the book has absolutely no potential. The greatest stories often start out as a two-word note.
I really feel that the author needs a lot more writing experience, which partly comes from reading a lot, as well as attending writing classes. This shows in the quality of the book. The most striking sign of inexperience is that the author has a lot of word repetition, combined with very simple sentence structures. A character's power is often represented by repeated lines, where the only thing that changes is the damage dealt. This would be normal in a game, not so in a book, even if it belongs to the LitRPG genre.
Going further, the story is somewhat unique, however character description is lacking, especially when it comes to the main character. We rarely read about his emotions, unless it is influenced by the current situation, e.g. anger due to a cheating contestant, etc.
The human characters are extremely naive. It is perfectly normal if they make mistakes, however these are ones that an adult would rarely make. Trying out a recipe, for example, would never, ever end in someone storming out of a house.
Would I recommend this book to anyone? No, not yet. It still needs a lot of work. This does not mean, however, that the book has absolutely no potential. The greatest stories often start out as a two-word note.
October 11, 2015
Not very well written. An editor to tighten up both the story and the
wording/grammar would be a big help.
A cool concept though, both the character's journey as well as the job they get and its properties.
It also offered the feel of mmo mechanics, with the grinding and achievements and the stat/skill raises. Since this is something I like, I was happy with its good use.
wording/grammar would be a big help.
A cool concept though, both the character's journey as well as the job they get and its properties.
It also offered the feel of mmo mechanics, with the grinding and achievements and the stat/skill raises. Since this is something I like, I was happy with its good use.
December 14, 2015
I really wanted to go higher on my rating for this book. Unfortunately, there were too many translating/grammar errors and the story could have flowed a bit better.
Overall a great book. I will definitely read number two. I really like this new genre.
Overall a great book. I will definitely read number two. I really like this new genre.
February 9, 2020
This story started out well enough, after it got into the meat of the story though, it became a combination of too much slog, and not enough information to carry the story. It's almost like the author couldn't make up their mind whether the story was LITRPG, or a standard story, then at the last moment, decided LitRPG, so cut everything that would interfere with the stats. It leaves one with a distinct impression of a draft version instead of a completed product. The fact that it needs a serious proofreading may add to this impression, but in general, it wasn't a bad story, just one that didn't seem to solidify into anything substantial before it ended. Interestingly enough, the portions of the book that were about sierra were better done than those about what was supposed to be the main character. I don't know if that's because her story was shorter, and thus better outlined ahead of time, or if it's just because her story was easier to write, but either way, the second part of the book (in my opinion) is better done than the first part. I'd actually give this book 2.5 stars, with a solid 3 stars if it went through a proofreading/editing session, but it wasn't a good enough read to keep my attention solidly all the way through, possibly due to some inconsistencies in the story.
September 12, 2016
I love this Series, a great read
October 1, 2015
At first I was a bit skeptic since I read LMS and since then every other MMORPG stories doesn't come quite right. The first chapter reminds me alot of LMS, making me felt like reading LMS fanfiction/spin off. But as the story progressed, it's starting to take its own shape.
The story itself is really good. I like the plot and the characters are interesting. But sadly the character is too shallow..? Perhaps because it's all NPCs, idk. And I'm sorry because I keep comparing Zectas to LMS but it's from the same genre so... Unlike LMS, I don't think that the characters are likeable. They just are there. Their story is interesting, but I have no interest whatsoever with the characters.
But the story is good and I'd like to know what will happen next.
The story itself is really good. I like the plot and the characters are interesting. But sadly the character is too shallow..? Perhaps because it's all NPCs, idk. And I'm sorry because I keep comparing Zectas to LMS but it's from the same genre so... Unlike LMS, I don't think that the characters are likeable. They just are there. Their story is interesting, but I have no interest whatsoever with the characters.
But the story is good and I'd like to know what will happen next.
January 17, 2016
Good but annoying at times
If proper English is an issue. You may not care for this book. The storyline is ok/good. Little far fetched at times with the kids earnings and spending. But the time in Zecta is good. His real life is way off base with what could be real. I know it's a fiction and he'll it has magic in the story but if you read it, you'll see what I mean. It's worth the price and I'm guessing a lot of the issues with the writing is a translation issue. Just have to bear with it is all.
If proper English is an issue. You may not care for this book. The storyline is ok/good. Little far fetched at times with the kids earnings and spending. But the time in Zecta is good. His real life is way off base with what could be real. I know it's a fiction and he'll it has magic in the story but if you read it, you'll see what I mean. It's worth the price and I'm guessing a lot of the issues with the writing is a translation issue. Just have to bear with it is all.
January 5, 2016
Generally, this is a typical LitRPG book, but there is one thing which this book has which none of the others have: It passes the Bechdel test and this book contains (strong/usefull) female characters who don't fall in love with the protagonist.
For German speakers there are a lot of funny names, like a vendor with the name 'Billig Verkäufer'.
For German speakers there are a lot of funny names, like a vendor with the name 'Billig Verkäufer'.
September 22, 2015
Quite nice, a good shot at the typical vrmmorpg, it's nothing super special, but still a good read
September 27, 2015
A good read but I am really hoping the MC isn't one of those oblivious types. Looking forward to reading the next book.
Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews