Aether's Guard

Aether's Revival, Book 2

De: Daniel Schinhofen

Narrado por: Andrea Parsneau

Gregory’s life changed when his aether sparked to life during the Age Day ritual. He left his old friends and his old life behind, and was taken to the Magi Academy to start training to serve the Vela Empire. Suddenly alone and out of place, he prepared for the worst.

When the beautiful novice, Yukiko Warlin, asked if they could be friends, his life changed again. After six months of duplicity from the people who they had thought of as friends, Gregory and Yukiko isolated themselves from all the other novices.

Gregory chose a path considered impossible for his training, and Yukiko followed, pushing each other to strive ever harder. When Yukiko’s betrothal was annulled, the two friends were free to express the deeper feelings that had developed between them.

The first tournament for the novices was brutal on the two young lovers. Both of them were pushed to the absolute limit, but they endured. When they took the top two spots, their fellow novices dropped the pretense of friendship, when neither would bow to the machinations of their peers.

Now, the rest of their first year stands before them. It’s become clear that they should join a clan, but where can they find one that would treat them both fairly and equally?

©2020 Daniel James Schinhofen (P)2022 Daniel James Schinhofen

Still good

The quality and pacing stay the same as in the first book. There was a lot of groundwork in this one so I'm really looking forward to the next in the series. Narration was amazing as always.

love this series.

I really love this series. and the bloopers at the end are fking hilarious. Love this narrator

Understated delight

This series doesn’t use fast highly-charged action: it’s more a steady slow-burning drama with brief moments of action. Likewise the magic system is detailed, and growth is slow. Even with some advantages, our MC has to fight for every gain. Further, all of the relationships in the story are slower paced as well, so each change therein is noticeable.

I enjoy how much detail the author uses in his books, and how the pacing (and content!) changes in each one. This series is like a slow dinner with good friends: the delight is in all the detail, and in the careful plot exposure. Each book’s content is another dinner course being served, with attention paid to everything, in order for all the nuances to be appreciated. The characters grow, their abilities and relationships grow, and new characters and understanding, are brought in to enhance the setting. It all makes for some powerful investment in the story. Readers will not just understand or accept where everyone will be in a few books’ time - they’ll have lived those experiences with the characters, walking with them to get there. The characters are richer and deeper for it.

There’s some sex in here too, but it’s definitely not the main part of the story. It appears appropriately due to the relationships. It’s also done tastefully, with some detail, and some “fade to black”.

Altogether this is a great series, and a welcome change from rapid-fire action. It’s not boring at all for that though, and the plot is a fun journey of discovery.

Definitely recommended (16+) and I can’t wait for the next book.

Love it

Amazing! I love this story., and Andrea Parsneau really makes the characters come to life.

Thank you Daniel and Andrea for another fun read.

I very much like Daniel Schinhofen’s writing. Once again, he has produced a book with good character development and depth along with fun action and a little naughty time. I am looking forward to the next in the series. Andrea Parsneau does her usual amazing job in bringing the story to life, I wish we could clone her 10 times so she could record more books.