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Quantamancy #1
Rise, the Quantamancer
On 3rd October 2003, Science stopped... Cars stopped. Phones went dead. Planes fell from the sky. In the years to come, the billions dependant on technology would die, leaving a people coming to terms with what came next. By the following day, the art of magick had already started to reassert itself. Magick and myth and monsters, once confined to fairy tale, was loosed onto the world. The world of science and technology was a thing of the past; the realm of magick had taken its place. It is a dangerous place, no matter what path you take, no matter what side you’re on. For astrophysicist Edgar Cole, science was his world and his world of science was destroyed in just one day. His path would lead him through the changing face of North America, encountering adventurers and monsters, all the way to an unexpected discovery. A thousand years ago, the wizard Thaddeus Gonne lost almost everything. Magick was stripped from the world, to be reduced to fodder for your Monday night Dungeons & Dragons game. A thousand years later, magick has returned, and while the why must be asked, the politics of wizards and warlocks is first to grab his attention. And after seeing visions of the world brought to its knees once more by the horrors created by technology, young witch of Providence RI, Danika Netherton strikes out to ensure her world of mystery and magick and witches and wonder would not be so easily destroyed. Through these three very different perspectives, Rise, the Quantamancer begins the Quantamancy saga with aplomb!
436 pages, Kindle Edition
Published July 15, 2020
54 people are currently reading
72 people want to read
About the author
A.R. McNevin
9 books17 followersA.R. McNevin is not a pirate. He is, however, one of the finest curmudgeons one could ever hope to meet. His likes include hitting people with sticks, Peking duck on a bed of fried rice and a hearty & healthy debate about the media of the day, which may or may not result in the aforementioned hitting people with sticks. His dislikes include… well, pretty much everything.
He may have been told that this blurb was meant for a match.com profile.
He may have been told that this blurb was meant for a match.com profile.
Ratings & Reviews
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Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
January 13, 2021
So flawed, so cliched, so good!
This has to be self published. It is seriously flawed. Spelling and grammar errors abound. It incorporates every fantasy and post-apocalyptic trope out there. And even manages to incorporate a few science fiction saws for good measure. BUT!!! Despite the abundance of amateur errors, it sucked me in and kept me through to the seriously flawed ending. And now I'm looking for the next in the series.
Seriously, with an editor (or even just a subscription to Grammarly), this would be great.
This has to be self published. It is seriously flawed. Spelling and grammar errors abound. It incorporates every fantasy and post-apocalyptic trope out there. And even manages to incorporate a few science fiction saws for good measure. BUT!!! Despite the abundance of amateur errors, it sucked me in and kept me through to the seriously flawed ending. And now I'm looking for the next in the series.
Seriously, with an editor (or even just a subscription to Grammarly), this would be great.
December 8, 2024
Great story, but...
Okay, first the good. I enjoyed the story, becoming interested in the individual characters, and caring about what happened to them. The bad? Numerous, and I mean NUMEROUS, grammatical errors were distracting and annoying. It seemed the errors increased the farther I got in the story. It's not that the writer didn't have a good vocabulary. I could easily deduce what the author meant, but the constant misspellings et al took away from the flow of the story in a major way. If that stuff doesn't bother you, jump in! It IS a good story, just needs a good editing. I'd like to see what happens in the next book, but am considering whether or not to purchase given the poor editing.
Okay, first the good. I enjoyed the story, becoming interested in the individual characters, and caring about what happened to them. The bad? Numerous, and I mean NUMEROUS, grammatical errors were distracting and annoying. It seemed the errors increased the farther I got in the story. It's not that the writer didn't have a good vocabulary. I could easily deduce what the author meant, but the constant misspellings et al took away from the flow of the story in a major way. If that stuff doesn't bother you, jump in! It IS a good story, just needs a good editing. I'd like to see what happens in the next book, but am considering whether or not to purchase given the poor editing.
dnf
December 23, 2024A few notes thus far:
"Passed" is not the same as "Past"
Every time the author is referencing the past, it is spelled passed. It jars the brain.
Was there REALLY "An app for that" in 2003? I don't recall that being the case.
Grammar is important. Also, read through a sentence to make sure you aren't saying the same thing before AND after the side note. In the same sentence. If you want to say something - & I believe you felt it was important to the story - if you want to say something (see what I did there? Yeah, don't do that).
I realize I came upon this book for free, and am learning that I often have to lower standards for these books, but seriously. FIND AN EDITOR.
I've almost relegated this thing to DNF more times than I can count, and I haven't made it to 20%.
"Passed" is not the same as "Past"
Every time the author is referencing the past, it is spelled passed. It jars the brain.
Was there REALLY "An app for that" in 2003? I don't recall that being the case.
Grammar is important. Also, read through a sentence to make sure you aren't saying the same thing before AND after the side note. In the same sentence. If you want to say something - & I believe you felt it was important to the story - if you want to say something (see what I did there? Yeah, don't do that).
I realize I came upon this book for free, and am learning that I often have to lower standards for these books, but seriously. FIND AN EDITOR.
I've almost relegated this thing to DNF more times than I can count, and I haven't made it to 20%.
December 30, 2024
What would happen if technology and science stopped working. No cars, buses, airplanes, phones, electricity at all. This book is the story of what happens after tech stops. Magic does work and wizards who were in hiding can show themselves again. This book focuses on a wizard, his familiar, a green witch, and a few others. Fantasy creatures as zombies, werewolves, and wolf spiders can be found. The one scientist that it focuses on makes of the term quantamancy to explain what he discovers. It is a long book and is not the end of the tale. I might want to read more - this had over 500 pages and was on line. Read for alphabet challenge/
August 27, 2020
It was a book
A long and winding road. I didn't see the result of the characters. They were there, searching, but not meeting. A bit confusing, convoluted. So many typos the sentences barely flowed. Hard to read
A long and winding road. I didn't see the result of the characters. They were there, searching, but not meeting. A bit confusing, convoluted. So many typos the sentences barely flowed. Hard to read
December 8, 2021
You just need to get past the writing style.
Very distracting, convoluted, error filled writing style. Getting past all that the storyline and interesting characters were enough to keep me reading.
Very distracting, convoluted, error filled writing style. Getting past all that the storyline and interesting characters were enough to keep me reading.
December 23, 2023
Was not very gripping, more like someone telling you about a story then the story itself. Found it difficult to stay with it a ND finally gave up before ending. Narrator does a good job with what he had to work with.
September 12, 2024
Excellent Novel
It took a couple chapters for this book to grab me. And grab me it did! The world has changed, and all technology is gone. Most science is gone, with books left with only blank pages. Magic is back.
It took a couple chapters for this book to grab me. And grab me it did! The world has changed, and all technology is gone. Most science is gone, with books left with only blank pages. Magic is back.
November 14, 2020
Although the premise is intriguing, the constant spelling errors and grammatical weirdness makes this book impossible to read. I would highly recommend the author look into spell check.
June 9, 2023
Book: ***
Performance: ***
An interesting if confusing fantasy
This is a difficult book to review. The initial publisher’s blurb was very interesting; however, the book struggled to deliver on that promise in several areas. Perhaps the most significant critique would the the overwhelming tendency to describe verse show that made it story something akin to reading an encyclopedia. There were long sections of data dumps that, while vaguely interesting, were also boring. The undifferentiated voices in the narration didn’t help with that as each chapter seemed to bleed into each other. There were for PoV hijinx as well where for some reason the storyline following the witch Danika was told by her bard companion where Edgar told his own story and Thaddeus had more of an anonymous narrator. Not a big deal … but when you title your chapters on the character PoV and then not tell it from their perspective … I found it to be a tad disorientating. Then there is the execution. The basic idea is that science stopped working, but the way that was actually done was extremely inconsistent and also confusing. It was not until the end that it started to makes sense and frankly my wife had already given up on the book by then. I did manage to stick it out until the end though and I found that the story does get better as it evolves.
The basic plot revolves around three (3) characters as they try to figure out their “post-science” world. Edgar is the science guy and has to totally reinvent himself after everything he knows no longer governs how the world works. For the most part, he drifts around the Washington DC area until he eventually aligns with the anti-magic (formerly known as science) faction and slowly corrects and adds nuance to the idea that science has failed. Along the way, we see a third faction that also seems to be opposed to the new world order … religion … and as expected, it was not portrayed in the best light. Danika is an earth witch in the Connecticut/NYC area and is basically on a quest (accompanied by her companion bard/narrator Jaskier wannabe) to make sure the evils of science don’t come back (as can be imagined, there is a lot of overly simplified pontificating by both sides). Thaddeus is the last character and arguable the most interesting … since he is over 1000 years old and a survivor from the original fall of magic to modernity. For this book, he adds a few interesting side quests but no real help in advances the plot … of which there is a minor resolution at the end as well as a huge epilogue and setup for the sequel. Over all it was a super light, if mildly entertaining, story that struggles to rise above the standard fantasy tropes.
I was given this free advance review/listener copy (ARC) audiobook at my request and have voluntarily left this review.
#RiseTheQuantamancer #FreeAudiobookCodes
Performance: ***
An interesting if confusing fantasy
This is a difficult book to review. The initial publisher’s blurb was very interesting; however, the book struggled to deliver on that promise in several areas. Perhaps the most significant critique would the the overwhelming tendency to describe verse show that made it story something akin to reading an encyclopedia. There were long sections of data dumps that, while vaguely interesting, were also boring. The undifferentiated voices in the narration didn’t help with that as each chapter seemed to bleed into each other. There were for PoV hijinx as well where for some reason the storyline following the witch Danika was told by her bard companion where Edgar told his own story and Thaddeus had more of an anonymous narrator. Not a big deal … but when you title your chapters on the character PoV and then not tell it from their perspective … I found it to be a tad disorientating. Then there is the execution. The basic idea is that science stopped working, but the way that was actually done was extremely inconsistent and also confusing. It was not until the end that it started to makes sense and frankly my wife had already given up on the book by then. I did manage to stick it out until the end though and I found that the story does get better as it evolves.
The basic plot revolves around three (3) characters as they try to figure out their “post-science” world. Edgar is the science guy and has to totally reinvent himself after everything he knows no longer governs how the world works. For the most part, he drifts around the Washington DC area until he eventually aligns with the anti-magic (formerly known as science) faction and slowly corrects and adds nuance to the idea that science has failed. Along the way, we see a third faction that also seems to be opposed to the new world order … religion … and as expected, it was not portrayed in the best light. Danika is an earth witch in the Connecticut/NYC area and is basically on a quest (accompanied by her companion bard/narrator Jaskier wannabe) to make sure the evils of science don’t come back (as can be imagined, there is a lot of overly simplified pontificating by both sides). Thaddeus is the last character and arguable the most interesting … since he is over 1000 years old and a survivor from the original fall of magic to modernity. For this book, he adds a few interesting side quests but no real help in advances the plot … of which there is a minor resolution at the end as well as a huge epilogue and setup for the sequel. Over all it was a super light, if mildly entertaining, story that struggles to rise above the standard fantasy tropes.
I was given this free advance review/listener copy (ARC) audiobook at my request and have voluntarily left this review.
#RiseTheQuantamancer #FreeAudiobookCodes
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews