Goblin

By: Gerhard Gehrke

Narrated by: Gareth Richards

Length: 7 hrs and 8 mins

Publisher's Summary

He’s a pint-sized goblin with a dragon-sized problem. 

Spicy never wanted anything more than to spend his days in the goblin library as the sage’s apprentice. But his sister Thistle already had the job. Spicy’s dreams are shattered when a human army burns down his village. His sister is abducted and the sage vanishes. 

Forced to leave the ashes of his home behind, he must abandon the only place he has ever known, and venture into the land of humans and monsters. Saving his sister will mean uncovering what the raiders were after. For, some things are worth more than gold, and goblins have secrets of their own. 

Goblin is the first audiobook in this fast-paced dark fantasy series. Buy it and join the adventure!

©2019 Gerhard Gehrke (P)2019 Gerhard Gehrke

Goblins are the Good Guys

My first read/listen with Goblin protagonists, and I quite liked it. Their culture here is well developed, along with the characters therein. The human are not nearly as developed, but hey, they're the bad guys... Plenty of action, and magic, and even a dragon. Give it a try, I recommend it!

3 of 3 people found this review helpful

The trials of a lone goblin!

Goblin
Goblin Reign, Book 1
By: Gerhard Gehrke
Narrated by: Gareth Richards
This is an audible book I requested and the review is voluntary. I really enjoyed this book! This poor goblin, Spicy, is bullied by his peers, then disasters happen and Spicy is alone to face so many of them and bullied all the way. But as the book progresses, Spicy continues to try, and try!
There is so much in here but I can't say much without spoiling it. Just that the book is a non-stop adventure, great characters, wonderful world building, has humans, goblins, trolls, and more!
Made for teen or young adult due to a few gore scenes ( probably seen worse on regular tv) otherwise it would be great for middle grade too! Adults would like it too!
The narration was good too!

2 of 2 people found this review helpful

Human raids from a goblin point of view

We always see the view of the heroes...humans and elves and dwarfs as they slaughter evil goblins. Welcome to a different point of view, the view of the goblins whose homes are burned, people slaughtered, all for the humans to discover a secret the goblin lore keepers have kept for centuries. Embark on a journey with an unlikely hero to save his friends, family, his peoples history and their future. I was voluntarily provided this free review copy audiobook by the author, narrator or publisher

1 of 1 people found this review helpful

Interesting world and series opener

I love non-human protagonists, so I was immediately drawn to this book. It also slowly opens its worldbuilding to an interesting premise as the plot proceeds. Characters felt realistic, in part because they often did not act the way I wanted or expected them to. It is well-written, and I had no issues with the grammar or diction. I enjoyed most of the banter, and the narrator did a good job with emotion, and an okay job with differentiating characters- though there wasn't a huge range among the goblins and humans,

My complaint with the book was simply that the main character is "good" to a (huge) fault, when it is worst to be so. At times he does bad things, but when I thought he SHOULD do bad things (or even just neutrally do nothing), he creates more problems by doing stupid "good" things. I'd equate it with Batman desperately rescuing the Joker, even though the latter keeps murdering people. It wasn't enough to pull me away from the book, but it did leave me frustrated with the choices several times.

Overall, an enjoyable first book, with a good enough ending that isn't a terrible cliffhanger like so many other first novels. I'm curious to see the world expanded in book 2.

This audiobook was given to me for free at my request and I have voluntarily left this review.

1 of 1 people found this review helpful

So much fun!

This book was just fun to listen too!! So I am a gamer and I was expecting, well goblins! Mean viscous, evil little creatures that attack in swarms anything they think they can overwhelm lol, But what I got was an English narrator who game me proper sounding British goblins Spicy and his sister Thistle which had nothing evil about them. He and sister are smart clever creatures with more civility than I would have ever thought possible. I cant wait for book 2 which should start out with "A dragon, a goblin and a Troll go into a tavern"!!! lolol!!! This book was given to me in exchange for my opinion and I must say to you the reader of this review that if you are looking for a fun intriguing book to listen to or read, this is it!

1 of 1 people found this review helpful

Fun

Good story with narration that brings the characters to life.

A story of perseverance.

A goblin who wants to become a Sage goes through hell on his journey.

The struggle is real.

1 of 1 people found this review helpful

Entertaining Adventure

I received this book for free. I am voluntarily leaving this review and all opinions expressed herein are mine.

This is the first book in the Goblin Reign series. It is a standalone book with no cliffhanger ending. It does set up the premise for next book in the series.

Here, Spicy is a goblin who dreams of becoming an apprentice for the Sage, but his sister already has the job. Spicy must learn to become a hunter - something for which he is an underachiever. Suddenly, the humans overrun his village - killing many and kidnapping others. It's now up to Spicy to figure out how to rescue his sister and determine what the humans want.

This was an enjoyable read told from Spicy's POV - I really enjoyed the growth of his character and his resiliency throughout. I particularly enjoyed Spicy's interactions with Hog, the troll - very humorous. I was disappointed when Hog disappeared for half the story. The book was a really fun story and I look forward to Spicy's next adventure.

The narrator did a great job - providing different voices for multiple characters which were distinct. I felt his enthusiasm for the book - especially with Spicy and his trials.

1 of 1 people found this review helpful

The Goblin story we never knew we needed

I was extremely excited for this audiobook. I love goblins and they are an under utilized race in a lot of fantasy novels. the development of the world was brilliant, and gave life to a common monster race that you don't normally see. not only that, but it's extremely difficult to not care and get attached to the main character, Spicy. the drive he has is something that we should all strive to have. beyond that, i liked the elements that other side characters had. i also applaud the author for creating a constant sense id mystery and confusion surrounding the plot, leaaving you just enough in the dark that you feel like you're discovering pieces with Spicy. overall story was well written, filled with many emotional peaks/dips, that leaves readers attached to the world created.

as for narration. i love the narrator, but my only complaint ia the level of volume and consistency within their voice. there were many times you could tell a piece was cut and rerecorded. but this is something that can be fixed with practice and experience. but overall enjoyed the narration.

this was given to me as a free copy. but my opinions are my own

1 of 1 people found this review helpful

Loved it.

Let’s get this out of the way.. I was given a free copy of this audiobook in exchange for my honest review.

The narrator was perfect. Even with his accent, I was able to listen at faster speeds and that’s usually impossible when the narrator has an accent. His voice was pleasant to listen to as well.

The story was cute and fun. I think adults and teens alike would enjoy this book.

1 of 1 people found this review helpful

Pleasantly surprised!

Here we have a BRILLIANT non-human fantasy with a phenomenally slightly-below-average main character and some awesome things going on!

Gareth Richards gives a pretty solid narration. I personally feel the goblin voices sounded too human, but apart from that his voices are great and his vocal inflections were spot on. His main weakness is the whole thing was pretty close to the same tempo throughout and, like most narrators, he struggles to create believable opposite-gender voices.

Now, anyone who follows my reviews should be aware that I LOVE non-human POV characters, but am frequently disappointed by how they are portrayed.

But fear not! Such is not the case here. I can't say I personally agree with every culture decision made by the author, but he definitely made the goblins feel like non-human characters that were interesting to read about.

The references are mostly pretty vague until a blatant one close to the end, but this is clearly meant to be a post-apocalyptic world where humans have lost almost all technology and rather than feeling gimmicky like so many post-apocs do, this was brilliantly done and makes for a fascinating world.

Now, there are a few hiccups in the writing, but nothing show stopping.

I really enjoyed his the ending came together. My one disappointment is that the TROLL largely disappears without trace for a rather large chunk of the story. I really enjoyed her part in the story.

I'm definitely looking forward to reading the next one!

1 of 1 people found this review helpful

Great story

Colourful story, and beautifully narrated. Listened whilst eyes closed which made the characters come too life. Great narration

1 of 1 people found this review helpful

Needed to be more distinct, feel more Goblin-like

I want to like the story but felt like I was going through the motions of just listening to the chapters instead of enjoying them or looking forward to hearing more.

Gareth Richards voice choice for the MC was a bit too generic and didn't sound like a goblin. He had a good clarity but throughout the whole book he used very much the same tempo. This lead to the lack of excitement or any urgency. Also he struggled with conveying a believable female voice

Apart from the the book mentioning they were goblin a few times I could easily forget about that fact and the MC could be a young human. The MC didn't have much to like about him and didn't have much progression for me to care much about him or his actions. The side character were much the same. Nothing really drew me to any of them.

The most memorable part of the book was the interactions with the Troll. This was interesting, distinctive and had a whole different perspective on the world around them.

This was a bit too tame for my liking and probably aimed more towards very young adults as the violence, gore and action was very mild.

[Note - I was given this free review copy audiobook at my request and have voluntarily left this review.]