The tags say, Fantasy, Science Fiction, and Steampunk. It should read Urban Fantasy, Crime, LitRPG. It reminds me a lot of the Darkness comic if Estacado were card based. It’s gritty mafia action with a heavy urban fantasy element.
I’m about half way through at the moment and I’m really enjoying it. I give a lot of LitRPG low ratings for things like being un creative, having interchangeable or flat characters, and for voice acting that makes a bad script worse. This was a breath of fresh air. Well, a breath of gritty smoke filled air, but you get the idea.
First, let me talk about the voice acting. It was a notch above what I am used to. Each of the voices is distinct and it’s almost as good as having a full cast. The occasional sound effects were a nice touch which I am going to miss after I am done with the book. I don’t give five stars to many voice casts, but this deserves the rating. I’ll be seeking out these voice actors in other things.
Next let me shine a light on the characters. Each has a different personality and they seem like real people who have real motivations and real quirks. They remind me of people I’ve known. They are self destructive and egotistical with sparks of brilliance that make them unique. I know that this sort of thing can be hard for a writer to really capture, but hats off to John Stovall for that.
Now for the bad. The book is not perfect. I think the explanation of the game mechanics and rules were a little overdone. I want the feel of game mechanics without being able to completely reproduce the game myself. It’s not enough to ding a star for, but it was enough to bug me a little.
If I have to change my rating after I finish, I will, but at the moment it is in my top six LitRPGs. (I have read dozens of LitRPG at this point, but I don’t quite have a top ten yet. Most are quite terrible.)