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Lightning Is The Only Way : Book 1
- GenresFantasy
Kindle Edition
Published October 23, 2021
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
July 31, 2022
2.5/5 partially liked, partially okay
Quit on 80/1329. Raws and tl finished, skimming after chapter 60.
This novel has several interesting ideas. I really appreciate the author changing things up. However, the bad writing and lack of side-characters meant I couldn't bring myself to care about reading this.
Disclaimer: My ratings reflect my enjoyment of the book unless stated otherwise. The scale from 1 through 5 is disliked, okay, liked, greatly liked, and loved. The scale is not set with 3 as 'okay' because preserving a normal distribution and "using the whole scale" while reviewing is more important to me than aesthetics (also Goodreads recommends this scale). (webnovels aren't normally distributed, and center closer to 2/5 instead of 3/5. oh well.)
Writing: disliked
I don't usually have a writing section. However, the writing in this book annoyed me enough that I have to talk about it. The writing is bloated. Needlessly many sentences are used to describe things, and sentences are often repetitions of previous sentences with slightly different word-choice. Here's an example: "The woman fet a little angry that Gravis just changed the topic like that. She was obviously showing her interest in him, yet he didn't seem to care. She felt a little insulted. She thought that her charm was better than this. ... Gravis didn't seem interested, and she didn't want to prolong the conversation anymore. She could take a hint." Notice that her feelings/ideas are touched on four times despite nothing additional really happening and that there were two obvious restatements of what just happened despite the book already describing what happened in the previous paragraph? Does the book really need to narrate itself?!? Also, there is a lot of tell-don't-show in this book. It is the type of book who will tell you how everyone is feeling and what they think instead of just showing it to you through actions and words. (While the book tells you feelings, it will repeat itself several times on top of everything.) I find it mind-boggling that a western novel has worse writing quality compared to the translated stuff, but then again, I guess the translated novels are derived from the work of good authors while this stuff comes from a random author? Oh, several turns of phrase are used incorrectly. It is annoying.
Characters: mc is slightly liked, side characters disliked
The mc here is fine. Good even. He is much more normal than many xianxia main characters and is written to seem more like a human. I like that. However, I greatly dislike the lack of side characters. Due to the nature of mc being cursed to have the worst luck, he doesn't want to get close to people since they will all become unlucky and die if he does. This makes the story quite boring because there's the idea that all side characters are transitory. Ironically, many cultivation novels rely on the comforting young masters, old experts, jade beauties, fellow disciples, and demonic cultivators to keep the story engaging. Here, people seem to be normal and reserved. Realism is boosted but engagement is reduced. Theoretically he has his family who are also cursed and so don't care if he hangs out with them, but he fell into a lower world and you just know it will take 700 chapters for him to reunite with his family.
Main character characterization:
World:
Generic. They don't tell us all the power-scaling, but at least they do tell us the layout of the major sects of the lower world so that we understand the path the mc will take as he works his way up in the world.
Story: sort of liked
There are some REALLY cool new ideas here. The mc is the son of the universes most powerful person. His dad fights the heavens, so he heavens functionally give him negative luck and try to obstruct his progress. The negative luck seems like the perfect solution to avoid the annoyingness of an mc with unlimited hacks who runs around finding treasure. However, it backfires big time. The story says that 'because the heavens want the mc to become complacent and lose his killing-intent, the heavens gives him easy enemies and paves his path to the top.' I stopped as soon as I read that. You heard that right. Instead of slightly annoying victories where the mc uses his treasures to scrape by a win, we will get bullshit victories where anytime the enemy loses it's because the heavens are paving the way for the mc. That is the most boring thing I could ever think of reading. I love power fantasies, but only when I can pretend that it is because the mc is special and extra-awesome. Here, the power fantasy is because the universe is inting. Oh, also this book does the usual western thing of spending multiple chapters showing the mc fight random monsters just to get some money or parts at the end. It's very dry. I respect the need to show how powerful the mc is, but I still don't like this method of doing it. I know I've read other novels which do it without spending so much time on something of so little value to the plot.
It is very possible that the story gets better, but I don't have the inclination to sit it out at the moment and take the risk. I would rather just move on to the next novel. I still believe that there are many more likable novels out there waiting to be found by me.
Quit on 80/1329. Raws and tl finished, skimming after chapter 60.
This novel has several interesting ideas. I really appreciate the author changing things up. However, the bad writing and lack of side-characters meant I couldn't bring myself to care about reading this.
Disclaimer: My ratings reflect my enjoyment of the book unless stated otherwise. The scale from 1 through 5 is disliked, okay, liked, greatly liked, and loved. The scale is not set with 3 as 'okay' because preserving a normal distribution and "using the whole scale" while reviewing is more important to me than aesthetics (also Goodreads recommends this scale). (webnovels aren't normally distributed, and center closer to 2/5 instead of 3/5. oh well.)
Writing: disliked
I don't usually have a writing section. However, the writing in this book annoyed me enough that I have to talk about it. The writing is bloated. Needlessly many sentences are used to describe things, and sentences are often repetitions of previous sentences with slightly different word-choice. Here's an example: "The woman fet a little angry that Gravis just changed the topic like that. She was obviously showing her interest in him, yet he didn't seem to care. She felt a little insulted. She thought that her charm was better than this. ... Gravis didn't seem interested, and she didn't want to prolong the conversation anymore. She could take a hint." Notice that her feelings/ideas are touched on four times despite nothing additional really happening and that there were two obvious restatements of what just happened despite the book already describing what happened in the previous paragraph? Does the book really need to narrate itself?!? Also, there is a lot of tell-don't-show in this book. It is the type of book who will tell you how everyone is feeling and what they think instead of just showing it to you through actions and words. (While the book tells you feelings, it will repeat itself several times on top of everything.) I find it mind-boggling that a western novel has worse writing quality compared to the translated stuff, but then again, I guess the translated novels are derived from the work of good authors while this stuff comes from a random author? Oh, several turns of phrase are used incorrectly. It is annoying.
Characters: mc is slightly liked, side characters disliked
The mc here is fine. Good even. He is much more normal than many xianxia main characters and is written to seem more like a human. I like that. However, I greatly dislike the lack of side characters. Due to the nature of mc being cursed to have the worst luck, he doesn't want to get close to people since they will all become unlucky and die if he does. This makes the story quite boring because there's the idea that all side characters are transitory. Ironically, many cultivation novels rely on the comforting young masters, old experts, jade beauties, fellow disciples, and demonic cultivators to keep the story engaging. Here, people seem to be normal and reserved. Realism is boosted but engagement is reduced. Theoretically he has his family who are also cursed and so don't care if he hangs out with them, but he fell into a lower world and you just know it will take 700 chapters for him to reunite with his family.
Main character characterization:
World:
Generic. They don't tell us all the power-scaling, but at least they do tell us the layout of the major sects of the lower world so that we understand the path the mc will take as he works his way up in the world.
Story: sort of liked
There are some REALLY cool new ideas here. The mc is the son of the universes most powerful person. His dad fights the heavens, so he heavens functionally give him negative luck and try to obstruct his progress. The negative luck seems like the perfect solution to avoid the annoyingness of an mc with unlimited hacks who runs around finding treasure. However, it backfires big time. The story says that 'because the heavens want the mc to become complacent and lose his killing-intent, the heavens gives him easy enemies and paves his path to the top.' I stopped as soon as I read that. You heard that right. Instead of slightly annoying victories where the mc uses his treasures to scrape by a win, we will get bullshit victories where anytime the enemy loses it's because the heavens are paving the way for the mc. That is the most boring thing I could ever think of reading. I love power fantasies, but only when I can pretend that it is because the mc is special and extra-awesome. Here, the power fantasy is because the universe is inting. Oh, also this book does the usual western thing of spending multiple chapters showing the mc fight random monsters just to get some money or parts at the end. It's very dry. I respect the need to show how powerful the mc is, but I still don't like this method of doing it. I know I've read other novels which do it without spending so much time on something of so little value to the plot.
It is very possible that the story gets better, but I don't have the inclination to sit it out at the moment and take the risk. I would rather just move on to the next novel. I still believe that there are many more likable novels out there waiting to be found by me.
March 28, 2023
Eastern Fantasy Cultivation style novel with some great concepts but poor writing
My review is for all 1329 chapters comprising 41 volumes.
The author felt different from others in the same genre, he is more systematic and got a different approach to the usual cultivation troupe. The whole story idea and the way he approached this world are also quite creative.
While he is full of some new ideas in this otherwise stale genre his writing itself is very amateurish making for a difficult read, I myself skimmed over a lot of portions. Initially, he overexplains and gets repetitive with each and everything and the latter half of the book is just on levelling up laws, these chapters don't add colour to the story or move the plotline. The author could have got the same story done in 1/4th the length without losing out on anything content.
My review is for all 1329 chapters comprising 41 volumes.
The author felt different from others in the same genre, he is more systematic and got a different approach to the usual cultivation troupe. The whole story idea and the way he approached this world are also quite creative.
While he is full of some new ideas in this otherwise stale genre his writing itself is very amateurish making for a difficult read, I myself skimmed over a lot of portions. Initially, he overexplains and gets repetitive with each and everything and the latter half of the book is just on levelling up laws, these chapters don't add colour to the story or move the plotline. The author could have got the same story done in 1/4th the length without losing out on anything content.
April 3, 2022
WIP, posted here through chapter 1276:
https://mtnovel.com/lightning-is-the-...
https://mtnovel.com/lightning-is-the-...
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews