Another Online

Clockwork

By: Terra Snover

Narrated by: Shannon Nicole Hamilton

War has come to the massive multiplayer online role-playing game known as Another Online.

Var now faces enemies on all sides. The Alliance wants to destroy her empire. The Game Masters treat her and those like her as puppets. The Clockwork Princess will stop at nothing to kill her. Even her allies seem to have their own motives and squabbles. And above it all, the ever watchful eye of the System Hivemind rules AO by pain and fear. Some wish to control, some wish to destroy, where she looks to find a way to free herself and all those enslaved in Another Online.

Every choice she makes will shape Another Online into something new, but what will this new world become?

©2021 Terra Snover (P)2022 Terra Snover

Dark Fantasy Dystopian Nightmare Online

Another Online: Clockwork, by Terra Snover, is the second book in the Another Online series and one I've been waiting to get my hands on since I first heard about the print book dropping. I was a massive fan of the first and having re-listened to it a few times now, I still am. I plugged into this one as soon as possible and burned through it over the weekend.

Life in Another Online has moved on a little since the events of the first. Var Zargronith, our heroin, has settled into her role as the Red Queen and embraced the madness. Such things as weekly battles to the death have become commonplace for her and her army. The Game Masters have noticed and are spicing things up with the addition of some new races.

The Clockwork Princess from a race called the Machina adds in some mecha-like elements to the otherwise fantasy dominated world of hellspawn, vampires, undead and the like. I suspect we'll see more of these new races in future novels.

Looking back, there's a massive amount of action and story packed into the almost 11 hours of this book. There's a lot going on, but I never felt like I'd missed a step. Snover does a great job at keeping it coherent in the midst of battle or during a system glitch.

This book expands on the characters, not only Var but also many of the side-characters. Fleshing them out to give them lives and motivations of their own. This, of course, adds to the dark tone of the book of enslavement and punishment by the system AI. The real minds behind the NPCs are living through their own personal hells.

Audio quality in this one was a decent step up from the first - a greater sense of depth and better editing. You can feel the fun narrator Shannon Nicole Hamilton had with this. Her reading was enthusiastic and enjoyable to listen to.

Overall, it's an excellent addition to the AO series and certainly one I want to see more of in the future. If you like dark fantasy mixed with litrpg and lots of action, then give this series a listen today.

I was given this audiobook at my request and have voluntarily left this review. I have not let this gift affect nor influence my opinions of this audiobook and have left an honest review.