The Wastes

Underdog Series, Book 2

By: Alexey Osadchuk, Andrew Douglas Schmitt - Translated by

Narrated by: Derek Shoales

Length: 8 hrs and 48 mins

Publisher's summary

Eric has survived where people much stronger than him have found their deaths. And not just that: He's managed to activate his magic supply, tame one of the most dangerous dungeon monsters, find the ancient city of monster hunters, and rescue Jay, the girl abandoned by the scouts in Gulper's lair.

He left the Dungeons of the Crooked Mountains behind him. Now his path leads him to Orchus, where our freshly-minted mage intends to finally free himself of his debt-repayment oath.

But as soon as Eric and Jay descend into the valley, they discover that the local barons have been attacked by young Corwin's men who have swept through their neighbors' estates, pillaging and plundering.

This makes Eric's task all the more difficult: he has to return to his home city without ending up in his enemies' clutches. You'd think his natural cautiousness and the acute instincts of his pet Gorgie would make this journey a walk in the park - but fickle Lady Luck has her own ideas.... Once again Eric is being pulled into a bloody vortex of dangers.

©2019 Alexey Osadchuk; English translation copyright 2019 by Andrew Schmitt (P)2020 Tantor

Everything’s great, I only feel like venting about one thing

As I said, I really enjoy it and will look forward to the rest of the series.

That said, I only have one thing I feel like venting about. This is all just one dummy’s opinion btw. Maybe it’s some writing technique to describe events more fully/give more context, but Rick (Ric?) gets lost in thought far too often. More often than not he just zones out in the middle of events to ‘contemplate/analyze the positives and negatives/consider eventualities and possibilities, etc’. His allies are constantly snapping him out of his own thoughts. It’s a silly complaint, but to me the flow of events is significantly more important in storytelling than making sure the reader knows literally everything there is to be thought about what the protagonist is experiencing. Thats all I had to say.

The great underdog story continues.

I think what I love about Alexey's stories the most, is that they mostly don't turn into a huge clan/raid managing story, just the main character and a few supporting characters. He keeps the battles short an exciting and focuses on the characters interaction and story instead of describing RPG combat numbers and such. The Narration was good but personally I didn't like Mii's voice.

Different type of story

This was included free in membership. I would honestly never spend a credit to get an 8 hour book, but since it was free I listened to it. I do really like it and it was interesting. The main character is unique and I have not encountered a main with his certain problem. I would suggest this if it is free, but not long enough to warrant a credit imo.

why not

spends too much time re-reading over character stats apparently I have ADD as start to lose interest

Becoming What of my favorite rpg series

Love the young protagonist.
"When you're
the underdog,
you just lay
low and work."
Amari Cooper

Not usually a litrpg fan but surprised!

A perfect title. the "hero" is an imaginative character, never encountered anything similar. lovable characters well developed. The weaknesses of the underdog are limiting but quirky, and with the storyline, believable advantages.

fun listen

i enjoyed listening this audiobook, looking forward to more in the series and hope the author writes more

Great continuation

Man, this book threw me for a loop at a few points. I kept wondering what's next the whole way though. Can't wait to see where the next book goes, considering the ending here.

Amazing

Amazing I love this story every chapter just keeps getting better. Thai is definitely one of my new favorite books.

This was almost a 3

This is a hard review to write because there is some really solid parts of this book. T

he problem is that certain parts are just so very bad YA cliche junk. The MC's attitude toward the treatment of people is too overdone that it seems fake. Maybe it was the narrator but I just rolled my eyes a million times when ever the MC cries out about the injustices of the world. And he actually cries out and yells, many many times as if it was a Shakespearean play.

Then there is the mismanagement of skills and grinding. The MC, as you know from the first book, gets radiant tablets from killing lvl 30 mobs. this gives him 10 lvls of a stat from the mob, a skill, a spell, and 10 points that can be put into stats or skills. Instead of farming said lvl 30 creatures, which there is an abundance of them in the cave. And using the tablets to make his character even in stats, and then properly maximizing his stats. The MC decides to not do that, leave the easy leveling caves, and then continues on to make "too stupid to live" choices and just so happen to get out of the bad situations he gets in because he is secretly inspector gadget. You really feel like smacking the MC sometimes.

However the places and things that happen around the MC is very interesting. It is like you have to put up with the MC to enjoy the rest of the book.

The book ends up with the MC becoming waaaay to OP. If the next book balances the OP MC by continuing to have him do stupid things I will have to stop reading this series.