Armsmaster's Summons

By: James Solomon

Narrated by: Benjamin Fife

Asa Ward is a reasonably content man. He was working at his own small town gunsmithing shop and is caught unaware when he was summoned to a different world.

Now he must cope with what to do in this strange new world of magic where people and even gods are after him for his knowledge of weaponry. All he wants now is to find a way home. Forced to learn the magic system in his newfound world if he wants a way home, he never knows when others are watching to steal his knowledge of non-magical weapons.

Armsmaster's Summons is a fantasy isekai adventure featuring some LitRPG elements, a unique magic system, and a protagonist watched by the gods themselves as they all begin to uncover the very nature of their authority.

©2022 James Solomon (P)2023 James Solomon

Ok first start

So, to start with the narration was the best part of this book. The story was average for the isekai/cultivation style books. The biggest drawback was the several instances of the MC begging for God to help him, and then a literal deus ex happens. I was fully into the story when it just seemed like the author realized he wanted to make it into a series and just fast forwarded thru the ending.
Most of the book was paced pretty well. It's just right at the end that it sped up to the point that I had to re-listen to the last about 5 chapters to figure out why it ended so abruptly.
I would buy the next book just to figure out what happens. But if the next book speeds up right at the end when the story's really firing up, I would have to very much reconsider any more after that

Gunsmith in a Fantasy World

A bit of a slow start, but solid world building. This was a pleasant surprise.

Outstanding

The book is outstanding. As a Christian myself, I generally don’t care for Christian stories as they are typically full of cliched tropes done poorly, preachy sermons in the form of dialogue that don’t fit the plot, etc., but this book was SO well done. Seriously one of my favorite reads all year! Extremely interesting magic system. Well thought out main character. Satisfying ending while leaving me excited for book two.

In the category of Christian fiction, this book takes the gold medal and makes it look easy, but that category aside, this is genuinely one of the best books I have read all year long. I enjoyed this right up there with Mistborn, Ender’s Game, and Bobiverse. Outstanding book.

The performance was well done, the narrator did a great job with the characters. Had to speed it up to 1.35, but that’s not uncommon for me. My only real complaint with the narration is there are a number of recording mistakes later in the book where sentences in the same flow of narration have obvious cuts and sound very different in quality. That said - great narration and I have literally no idea how difficult to fix that minor complaint would even be. It also did not pull me from the story.

Excellent story with lite LitRPG elements

I really enjoyed the story. Like most LitRPG the MC experiences isekai into a new world/universe, there a plenty nerdy quips and sly nods to cultural references that no one from the new world understand.

Unlike other LitRPG that I’ve read, the MC doesn’t fall into a quest to level up and become the strongest. Asa’s goal is simply, figure out a way to get home to his wife and kids. Asa maintains his fundamental beliefs and principles throughout the story despite some intimidating trials.

The narrator’s pacing and cadence was pleasant and didn’t detract from the story at all. There were a couple points that I felt could have used better inflection to play up the emotional aspect of the story which is why I gave the performance 4 stars.

A little heavy on the christian crap

Overall the concept story and pacing was great. the constant christian fan boy babble was a bit off-putting.