Sorcerer

Dear Spellbook, Volume One

De: Peter J. Lee

Narrado por: Travis Baldree

Hello stranger, my name is Tal, and I’m not an adventurer—those people are crazy. I’m just a sorcerer who is masquerading as a wizard. Oh, and I’m searching for answers about my parents’ mysterious deaths. Also monsters and other foes seem to show up wherever I go.

All right, I see it.

My new traveling companions are seasoned adventurers and are teaching me their ways—or at least they were before something happened to Time.

The same day is repeating itself over and over, and I’m the only one aware of the resets. If I ever want to get past this day—and the horrific hangover it always starts with—I’ll need to find a way out by myself.

It turns out there are mysteries aplenty to unravel in this remote forest town of Crossroads, where I’m living the same day over and over. But my most vital resource might already be in my possession. My previously useless Spellbook is starting to exhibit some very strange abilities, and they could be just what I need in my quest to escape this temporal prison.

This is my story. My diary of sorts. Don’t judge too harshly, I had a rough day.

©2023 Peter J Lee (P)2023 Portal Books

More DnD then the DnD movie! You should read this.

It low key is more DnD (or what ever your TTRPG of choices is) then the new DnD move.

Its a time loop story that dose not start with someone screaming good morning. Even better the loop is varied and relatively short with events from before the loop starts thrown in to mix it up. It honestly gave me big vibes from Stargate SG-1's time loop episode and from The Adventure Zone (DnD podcast) time loop arc The Eleventh Hour.

Zero stat block clutter

The MC is likeable though spends a GREAT deal of time stuck in his own head.

It is a solid sword and board entry in to Progression Fantasy and should be celebrated.

Great

I really liked this book. It had a good balance of world building, mystery and humor. I liked the other characters a lot as well although I wish they had a bit more page time.

Looking forward to the sequel!

Finished in 4 days. Which is near "can't put it down" territory. The 12 hours went by fast, as the author did well keeping it interesting with a good mix of lore, action, dialogue, and character development. The lead characters have distinct personalities, which Travis did great portraying. I'd recommend this to any fantasy addict.

It’s good

Good time loop book with a progression system I like, wish the ending was different but will definitely get the next one.

I must have more of this!

I really enjoyed the MC and his struggles. The groundhog day'ish template from the dear diary vantage took me a few minutes to sink into and now that I am done I just want more. The thing this book reminds me of the most is running the same d and d modules with dif groups of friends. Wicked Fun!

This story is perfect for Audible

This is a story from the perspective of a book, specifically a Spellbook. Every single word is something that the main character purposely wrote inside, and if it’s not, it’s something that he copied into it and chose to show at that specific part of the story. Weirdly enough, this makes it absolutely perfect for an audiobook. It’s extremely well narrated, Travis Baldree is very good at his job, and he gives the characters a life of their own that makes this well worth listening even if you’ve already read the book. This isn’t just an audiobook adaptation to let people read it in a different form, it actually adds to the experience of the story itself.

good read

very good much good
ends to early need the next in the series good

Knows what a time loop needs

Perfect time loop story. The main problem with time loops is only the main character can grow and progress. This story fixes the issue by avoiding the other character inside the time loop an having half of the story be focused on before the time loop so yo can get to know the other characters and see them grow.

Hard to Follow

I keep having to back up because the author switches around the order of the narrative so frequently. Instead of going back and relating events in order, we get them peppered in like it's an episode of Lost. However, even Lost stays chronological in the flashbacks. At first, these flashbacks were just a few days before the loop and now they are going back to when the characters met.

What I find annoying is that there doesn't seem to be any benefit from the weird structure. Usually, writers do far less jumping around in the chronology of a narrative and they have a good reason when they do. Maybe I'll be rewriting this review after I finish the book because it will all be worth it, but right now it's a lot like my ex-boyfriend: difficult for no reason.

Least annoying time-loop book I’ve listened to…

This book was a surprise. I normally approach time-loop books with trepidation. This is because the vast majority of them eventually devolve into frustrating outlandishness due to the corner the author writes themselves into, or they just get really boring.

To be honest it was only because Travis Baldree was the narrator that I took the chance. On the whole this is a well written and interesting audiobook. It’s definitely worth the credit if you are into the S & S genre. That said I have two complaints: The first is that, while the jumping around from pre-loop backstory to “current” loop plotting is a big part of why the story stays interesting, the way this back and forth is written will be confusing for listeners who are not fully engaged.

With audiobooks most of us are listening while performing some other task, and in this case it’s very easy to suddenly realize you have no idea when or where the action is taking place due to the abruptness of the narrative bouncing around. My second complaint is the ending of this book…

The ending comes out of nowhere. It’s as if the book had anywhere from an hour to 15 hours left, and the author just arbitrarily dropped their pen at the end of a random chapter. At the very least they should have written an epilogue or afterward. As it stands now the ending leaves the reader/listener feeling particularly unfulfilled.

In spite of all this I did find this book unique and compelling in a number of ways, and I think it is worth the credit. I am looking forward to the next installment.