Aether Knight

A LitRPG Light Novel

By: Tracy Gregory

Narrated by: Matt Jenkins

Length: 4 hrs and 50 mins

Publisher's summary

Aether Online sounded like Alex's dream. Now, it's his nightmare.

Cheating his way to the head of the line, Alex is one of the first to play Aether Online, the world’s first full-immersion VRMMO. Alex quickly learns that once you're in, you can't get out.

Trapped in the Aether Lands, Alex must become an Aether Knight to survive. Struggling in a world under siege, Alex must learn to fulfil his new role, hunting the deadly machine beasts known as Machina for parts. Every kill brings him new materials, new equipment to forge, each beast slain making Alex more powerful.

Hunting monsters is only the first step. Alex must gather allies and master the mysterious powers of the Aether if he ever hopes of getting home.

©2020 Tracy Gregory (P)2020 Tracy Gregory

Different take on LitRPGs

I thoroughly enjoyed this book and look forward to the next book. The premise is interesting, as is the "leveling" system. I only docked it one star due to its length (an 8 hour minimum is my typical cutoff for a book).

Deca-Dence meets Monster Hunter

I enjoyed this one. The setting is like Deca-Dence and the game mechanics are like Monster Hunter. The writing is solid, descriptive, and engaging. The characters are rather undeveloped, being cardboard cutouts of "gamer" and "casual", but this didn't really bother me during the read. At only 5 hours, the strength of this book lies in its setting: a VRMMO set in a unique clockpunkish world where humanity takes shelter in a single bastion against the dangers of the encroaching wilds.

A solid intro to a new Litrpg

~Disclaimer: I received a free audiobook copy of this book. ~

The narrator does a decent job and I didn’t hate any of the voices he used (although some of the female voices were a bit annoying).

One of the reasons I requested an audiobook of this book was litrpg with a male protagonist and no harems. I get tired of that particular wish fulfillment in litrpgs. Alex and Casey aren’t super fleshed out in this book, but because it is short and it has a lot of world-building I think that is to be expected. I did like both Alex and Casey and the other characters seem like they have potential.

I think this is a solid introduction to the world of Aether. I wish it wasn’t so short, but I suppose this way we can expect to get more releases quicker than if the author aimed for 300 pages per book. I did end up following the author's page on Amazon because I am intrigued enough to keep following along (plus I pay for kindle unlimited and I might as well find more authors who use it).

A decent take on LitRPG

Amost more of an Isekai but the items have stats and there's a sort of leveling up system within the guild. Good for people familiar with the subgenre but don't want to get bogged down in stat lists, or for people new to LitRPG looking to dip their toes.

The narrator was fine, but I found it a little difficult to distinguish between the two main characters sometimes. Since he was doing some different voices for minor characters it would have been nice if the two mains were a little more distinct.

Overall it wasn't amazing but I'll give book 2 a chance when it arrives.

I received this book for free.

Waiting for the next one

Loved it, reminded me of a Monster Hunter/Horizon Zero Dawn. I was sad by how short it was but can't wait to see whats next!

Decent tale, needs better narration.

I listened to the audiobook version of this book. The writing is a little weak (I would say slightly above a "beach read") but the story and characters have a lot of potential. The narrator, Matt Jenkins honestly is detrimental to the tale, and I hope that when the author continues the tale that a new narrator is chosen.

You join Alex as he has won the ability to play the newest VRMMO which has been billed as the final breakthrough that will make VRMMOs extremely life like. As soon as he enters the new world he knows something has gone horribly wrong. With nothing else to do Alex starts to explore his new world and figure out how this game will be played. Alex meets, friends along the way and after "days" within the game begins to realize that something is terribly wrong.

Overall this is decent introduction to a new universe. Some further editing would have been helpful but it does not take away from the overall story. I would recommend against the audiobook as the narration almost had me stop the book a few chapters in. My biggest complaint about the story is it almost feels like a teaser with how short it is. I received a free copy of this book in exchange for an unbiased review.

Very interesting

Loved the book, real interesting take on the VRMMO idea, only complaint is the way it ended, loved the ending but so abrupt. Hope book two is in the works because I finished this book too fast.

Fun listen!

This is a solid fantasy title. It's not breaking new ground or trying to be subversive, but it sets a good stage, with an interesting world and fun characters. I'll be listening to the next one

good shit

it was good from the first page to the last and unlike a lot of the other LitRpg's I've read it didn't make the main character seem op from the very start him and the others have to think there way out of different situations and stuff and that was refreshing anyway great book give it a listen

Really nice story with an OK narration

So the story is quite simple. MC is trapped in a game (quite similar to Horizon Zero Dawn) and needs to get better gear to improve as there are no level-ups or anything like that. Characters are well done, but nothing too fancy. Overall quite good story.

Now for the narration. This was the first audiobook I listened to, so I'm not sure if some of the practices are common or not. Either way, I really enjoyed that sometimes the narrator modifies his voice according to the situation, that means if the character is an AI or is speaking with a megaphone his voice changes accordingly. What I didn't enjoy so much is that some conversations were hard to follow and sometimes the narration felt quite flat.

However, I do recommend this short story as it was enjoyable and simple.