Cultivating Chaos

VeilVerse: Cultivating Chaos, Book 1

By: William D. Arand

Narrated by: Andrea Parsneau

Length: 13 hrs and 16 mins

Publisher's Summary

Ash led a very normal life by his own standards. It had its ups and downs, much like anyone else’s. Being a talented martial artist had definitely been an up, while high school as a whole was a down. His own father was not a great role model, and his uncle was everything he wanted to be.  

To Ash, it felt like a very normal life. Right up until he was literally pulled into a portal that spat him out into another world. One that was full of martial arts. And martial artists who could use magic. To set the very air on fire with a punch or to turn their skin hard as diamonds. To fly through the air, if they had enough power. A world where the strong ruled and the weak died.  

Three years of living his life as one of the citizens, those without power, and Ash has figured out how to survive with his adoptive family and a lot of persistence. His goals in life have become to give back to those who gave to him. And he’d do whatever he had to to do that.  

Except Ash is about to get his life turned around again. Turned around and altered completely. He’s about to discover a treasure from a time long lost. Forgotten. A treasure that is going to change his destiny and give him another direction to go. If he wants it.  

A cultivator.  

This is a VeilVerse novel. Warning and minor spoiler: This novel contains graphic violence, undefined relationships/harem, unconventional opinions/beliefs, and a hero who is tactful as a dog at a cat show. Listen at your own risk.

©2018 William D. Arand (P)2018 William D. Arand

reasonably entertaining but with significant flaws

This was actually a fascinating book to listen to. That wasn't because it was so good, but because it was in many was so similar to 'super sales on super heroes'-- Arand's earlier series-- and yet worse on a surprising number of levels. First, unlike Super sales, this one violates Sanderson's Laws of Magic. The magic is not well explained and the limitations of the system are not made clear, and yet it is the primary way that Ash and his allies solve problems. As Brandon pointed out, in order to have magic be the way to solve problems, it needs to be limited. Absent that, there is no tension, and frankly no story. It's not that Ash's magic is entirely without limits, but it generally turns out that the things he can do are more or less exactly what he needs to win, even if he didn't know it ahead of time. After the first couple of battles, you just get to assume 'some new facet of his talent will turn out to be the reason why he can defeat an apparently stronger enemy'. His martial art skills are almost the same way. It is glancingly referred to that on Earth he was a competitive martial artist, which explains why he can keep up on this world. But these people have been training their entire lives just like him, so why should he be so much better than them? Was he some sort of prodigy? The lack of explanation extends to Ash in a more profound way. How did he get to this world? Why was he not enslaved when he got there as most outlanders seem to be? How long was he with his host family, that he connected to them so strongly? Why was he put in training with magic users when there was no indication he would ever be able to use magic? I'm not against a story where the world only gradually becomes clear as the story moves along, but in this case, we don't really ever get an idea what makes the world tick. What are the various sects for? What is the difference from one sect to another? Is their purpose entirely based on raiding other worlds for slaves? If so, where are all the slaves? If not, what the hell do they do to generate their wealth? It's possible the sects are taken straight from some medieval Asian society and someone familiar with that society would just 'get it' but most of Arand's readers would probably not be familiar with such a society. Again, this is completely at odds with Super Sales, where the world is our world but with superpowers. The society is immediately clear to a western reader and follows the rules you'd expect. Felix has to make money like anyone else, protect his property in a city that he made clear is basically lawless etc., but the world is made clear enough that we understand what he has to do and can be very entertained with the surprising ways he goes about doing it. This world remains almost entirely a mystery throughout the book. Given Ash's outlander nature, Arand could have taken advantage of his lack of knowledge to have him ask the kind of questions a reader would like to know the answers to, but he basically does not.

What's so surprising in all this is that it is so at odds with Super Sales. In that story, the protagonist is introduced with a type of magic that initially appears close to useless, but we gradually discover is actually astonishingly powerful, without seeming contrived. We discover his powers along with him, but they are all reasonably natural outgrowths of our initial understanding of what he can do. There is also something humanizing about the fact that in Super Sales, despite all of Felix's power, he is actually quite vulnerable. Ash, on the other hand, claims to be dead meat if facing an elder or similarly powerful cultivator, but when faced with one, somehow is able to destroy him handily. Why? What exactly makes him so different from others with his experience. What is a 'fated one' anyway. Given that Ash seems to be even more than a 'fated one' it would have been nice to know what the rules are for fated ones and how Ash's power differs, but we never get even that.

The basic tropes of a harem story are all there and reasonably entertaining in their own way. It's a nice reminder that the fantasy of a harem story owes little of its enjoyment (for a guy anyway, not sure what a female reader gets out of this kind of story) to graphic descriptions of sex.

Lastly, I was also a little surprised at the way the book was edited or rather not edited. Arand makes completely ungrammatical use of 'himself' over and over again, which any editor with a high school education could have fixed for him basically with a 'find and replace' script in a word processor. It's not a huge deal in that it's always clear what he means, but it was a little jarring to me every time he did it.

Anyway, I'm probably being a little too harsh here. The book was readable-- or I guess 'listenable'-- despite its flaws. But the easy comparison to his prior work just makes it so obvious where he went wrong in this story in comparison, and for me, exploring the parallels was a big part of what made me listen to the end.

Amazing

This book kept me enthralled from start to finish another outstanding title form William D. Stand and Andrea Parsneau absolutely killed it on her performance can’t wait for book 2

Ann interesting premise ruined by too much progression and a weird harem fantasy

I made it 60% through this book, but then gave up. It’s not a bad book, and the story is interesting, but it wasn’t for me.

The initial premise was great. A boy was sucked into another world where he was taken in by an adoptive family. This world contained fantastic powers that could be manipulated by people using qi. The main protagonist couldn’t utilize qi until he found a rare object that unlocked great powers within himself. And that’s where the story took a turn for the worst.

This is a western spin on the classic Wuxia genre. But it fell flat for me because of the direction the author took. The main character (MC) starts off as this polite, if timid, potential hero. But as soon as he gains powers, he becomes cocky, boisterous, and kind of a jerk. He wins every fight he gets into with little to no repercussions. He gains skills and money with basically no effort. By the time I reached 60% of the book, the MC had defeated every single enemy he encountered and had amassed more money than a small town had altogether. It was too much progression too fast.

While this starts off as a Wuxia novel, it slowly starts to morph into a LitRPG one. The MC even gets a HUD that shows other characters health and what not.

And that doesn't even get into the harem part. The worst thing about this book for me was that the MC, more or less, develops a harem from the very start. Which some might enjoy, but it was very off putting for me. Before he even leaves his hometown, he gathered 3 women, one of whom was a slave, and they were all trying desperately to get into his pants.

I finally gave up when he got his second slave, went into his sect, and defeated every single opponent he came across without so much as a scratch.

Finally

I've been waiting for such an entertaining book. It follows the path of the martial artist within Xianxia novels, yet holds true the aspect of a teenage American. Keep it up.

Possibly missing parts if the story?

I enjoyed it but it just seems like bits of the story are missing. I found myself going back and re listening to chapters cause I thought I missed something.

Dont bother with this book

Narrator isnt very good and the story is honestly worse. Im always looking for new books and this book isnt worth the time to finish I tried for 2 hours to get into the book and I just cant anymore.

Good Story

I like the way this one was told, though fast paced and the main character never seems to run into a problem where he doesn't just walk right through whatever's standing in his way, might be interesting to see how it develops into the next book.

Grab some popcorn, this is a good one....

This book is just plain fun. I found it to be similar but also very different than some of the other books that Arand has written. It's a great boo with fun characters that you can't help but to like with an compelling story that makes you want to keep on reading. I can't wait until the next book in the series.

killer just killer,

I've been a fan of William D Arand for a few years now and it seems his stories just get better and better. Definitely worth a listen if your a fan, and a solid place to start if your not

I love this book

A bit much of only girls in my party and they are all mine vibe, but other then that I loved it.
A bit more of a deep dive in to making and building stuff and less looking at girls and it would have been a clean 5/5

Wow just wow

A bit hard to follow at the start but... What a fantastic story. I can't praise enough. Mr Arand you have done it again with another fantastic story in the vile verse.
I just wish there was a book two to dive into.
Andrea parsneau dose a fantastic job with the audio as per usual, each character is brought to life and you feel invested in each character.
All in all simply AWSOM.

Absolutely love this new series, Andreau ftw!

Loved it, and eagerly awaiting the sequel. sincerely wish blaise corvin other veilverse was available on audible.

my first wuxia litrpg fantasy. very clever characters, riveting plot and excellent narration.

my only gripe was Yui voice was anime-ishly high pitched and squeally everytime, and i noticed it every time she spoke, even during her more emotionally heavy moments.

Overall, Andrea Parsneau smashed it, as she normally does and William has created another the sky is the limit power/abilities system, rooted it in very strong world building, and left open tons of mysterious and lore to explore.

this sequel when announce is headed straight to my wishlist.

Ahh Typical William D Arand(but that’s a good thing)

It starts slowly but then it really pulls you in. The main character is a quite funny guy who fortunately doesn’t act like a unaware of anything little boy, he even says so himself which I found quite funny. I can’t wait to see what will happens in the next book as knowing William he will do another trilogy.

slow

I found this book very slow to get going and in the beginning it was my perception that it didn't establish the story or main character that well against the backdrop of the summary ... once into the book though the concepts were interesting if not quite stereotypical.

Ash always has a lack of awarness

He always seem to be lost in his thoughts and dosen't notice when people talk to him or if someone is sneaking up on him. It's really annoying.

Simply Brilliant

Great Arch and story wonderfully read, eagerly await part 2 ,well recommended to all book worms

excellent book!

excellent book I am really looking forward to the next one!! the characters are all engaging and the story line compelling.

thoroughly enjoyable!

i had a great time with this book, the magic is interesting the characters are well thought out and easily liked and the story keeps you wanting more!

hard to put down

loved this book, the story really captures my imagination and I want to hear more,

the only problem was that there seemed to be places that were missed and not included in the story and then picked back up again the next day or hours later and I feel it would have been more engaging to include these parts.