How I Built a Magic Empire, Book 1

By: Konstantin Zubov, Ben Hooson - translator

Narrated by: Hannibal Hills

I have been reborn from an advanced techno-magic world into a world where magic is still in its infancy.

In this new world I have the body of a young baron and my entire worldly possessions are one village—a village surrounded by monsters and hostile aristocrats on the fringes of a young, rapidly expanding empire.

The other thing I have, though, is knowledge beyond what this world has dreamt of, and nothing will stop me from building my own magic empire!

©2024 Konstantin Zubov; English translation copyright 2024 by Ben Hooson (P)2025 Tantor Media

it's a really good story

I would recommend listening to it I personally liked it a lot but I will say there's a couple things that Go against the story which seems to hurt the ratings I think

in my opinion the constant back and forth transition between the villagers and the main character is quite frustrating sometimes You're in the middle of a battle scene with the main character only to go back to what the villages are doing and talking about that day which is relatively pointless discussion I don't mind transitions it's just that it happens so much in the story this at one infuriating time in the story specifically towards the end of the book battle your left on the fringes of finding out what happened only to go back to the village 2 hours earlier to talk about what a bunch of girls are doing which just takes away from the entire anxiety of the consequences of the battle


also it's the constant life and death attacks that the main character has to constantly put up with that doesn't make much sense The first day he arrives pretty much to the next week is just constant fighting.... I understand that this is supposed to be on the fringes of civilization in the frontier so there's going to be a lot of attacks and monsters sure but it just feels too much for a story....

also the whole Go rescue the downed airship part of the story they had to travel 4 km and that entire time they constantly fought monsters which doesn't make any sense The villagers made a point in the beginning of the series that monsters didn't attack the village all that much yet for some reason it seems like everywhere the main character goes every 5 seconds there's a monster

but there's a lot that I really really like about the story as well I enjoy the main character the narrator the story and his knowledge how he has used his knowledge really well so far that the story takes place in a world that's relatively young usually we don't get these kinds of stories most of the time the story starts thousands of years after and all of a sudden cataclysm starts Right after the main character shows up like a year later I don't feel like that's going to happen in this story and it's quite nice to see a young world and thinking the main character has many years to potentially grow his town / empire

Glad I gave it a chance.

I really like the story, and a protagonist that is a decent person without entire chapters of mental trauma dumping after having killed a few bad people.
Hannibal Hills has a good range of voices, and it's obvious that he can do great things with the right creative direction especially when he narrates the MC's internal monolog.
However...
The direction in this book has him sounding like everyone is shouting and the reviews made me hesitate to pick it up for a long while.
I did finally give it a chance and buy it now that I'm in between other releases, and I'm glad I did. I got used to the shouting voices as I listened so it wasn't a deal breaker and I have bought the second book.
But that is DESPITE the poor creative direction, and would have preferred a more measured approach to the characterization of people instead this "bombastic" approach.

narration could use work, nothing special yet

the narrator seems to enjoy making it so literally every character sounds like a 90 year old man trying to yell. Story isnt terrible but also isnt really that good yet as of this book. probably going to skip the next ones.

Enjoyable story ruined by narrator

I really wanted to return this book but I enjoyed it so much I couldn't stop listening to it. However, the narrator absolutely ruined it for me. The narrator has talent but he decided to incessantly scream. I kept repeating in my mind for him to just shut up and voice the characters. I doubt that I'll ever purchase a book narrated by this same individual unless he learns to control the shouting. I hope the author replaces the narrator for any future books in this series.

Story was kinda standard.

The book is alright but i found the story to be rather standard and nothing really stood out other than the crystal and cystal portals. Even then the whole portal/rift thing is pretty common in thses types of books, I didnt really learn much of the mc to care what he does in book 2. And the story is just to grow the village.