Mark of the Fool

A Progression Fantasy Epic

By: J.M. Clarke

Narrated by: Travis Baldree

The gods chose him. He said no.

After his parents died, Alex Roth had one desire: become a wizard. Through hard work, he was accepted into the University of Generasi, the world’s greatest academy of wizardry....

Fate, however, had another plan.

On his 18th birthday, he is Marked by prophecy as one of his kingdom’s five Heroes, chosen to fight the Ravener, his land’s great enemy. But his brand is "The Fool". Worst of the marks.

Rather than die or serve other Heroes like past Fools, he takes a stand, rejects divine decree...and leaves. With his little sister, his childhood friend, and her cerberus, Alex flees for the university, hoping to research the mystery of the Ravener. He’ll make lifelong friends, learn magic from mad wizards, practice alchemy, fight mana vampires, and try to pay tuition.

There’s one small problem. The Mark insists on preventing the Fool from learning and casting spells, while enhancing skills outside of divinity, combat, and spellcraft...that is, unless he learns to exploit the hell out of it.

Explore a coming-of-age magic academy fantasy with a weak-to-strong progression into power, a setting inspired by D&D, detailed world building, and magical science, action, comedy, slice-of-life, and GameLit elements.

With nearly 10 million views on Royal Road, this popular web serial has been completely revised and relaunched into this definitive version now coming to Audible, narrated by Travis Baldree!

©2022 Aethon Books (P)2022 Aethon Audio

Finally a Mc that’s not dumb or overpowered

So for the most part it starts out like a lot of these monster hunter dungeon core books. I enjoyed the characters and I will say so far the story development has been pretty good. Gets a little slow once Mc gets to the university but it sets up a nice set of obstacles and challenges to overcome. It is lacking some action but at least the MC isn’t an idiot that is always running into things and having to be saved or picking fights that end up getting him in trouble. I can not tell you the number of books I read that the MC is a complete fool and the fact this time he’s smart, calculating and patient is refreshing. I think it’s missing a little bit of story of what’s going on with the battle. I let’s getting a little repetitive at times. Also the endless skill learning is at least not over done and at least has some restrictions which is also refreshing. I would say for a first book it definitely leaves me wanting more. It’s my hope that this will become a great new series. As always Travis Baldree dose an amazing job with narration.

pleasantly surprised

1/3 through the book (just getting to university) and pleasantly surprised. I think the reviews are generally correct, even the ones that have the lower star rating, but i dont agree with the low rating. I expect it to slow down based on the reviews. if you are wanting a fast pace monster burn with an obvious end goal, you might be a little disappointed, but the character progression seems more reasonable. it is a nice counterpoint. let's see how the next 1/3 progresses.

loved it!

after a few boring books, this was an incredible find.
loved every minute!!
highly recommended, looking forward to future books.

So sad it is over :,(

I could binge the whole series if it was out!!! January can't come soon enough now hahaha 😂

MC was actually interesting

A lot of what happened in the boon wasn't the best. Sure it makes sense and was fun but there was a lot of down time. I understand that he was growing, that he was learning. This is shown in the second book. it's like the first book was setup for a much better second book. on its own, it wasn't terrible, the MC grew as a person, did a lot of believable things in this world. He overcame challenges using wit more than raw power. The MC was by far the most interesting thing in this book. As for the voice actor, didn't love him but he suited the book, the noises made me chuckle at how bad they were at first but got a little annoying later on.

Solid story

I’ve enjoyed the story so far. It’s not my absolute favorite story, but I’ve enjoyed the laid back pacing and the theme of magic school. I’m excited for the next book.

Absolutely loved it!

Not sure how many series those who complained about the book's sudden ending have read, but I'd venture not many. it ended as many do: setting up for the next book.
This was well written, and kept me engaged the entire time. It was a lovely companion on a long drive. Looking forward to book 2

The simple overview.

There is not a lot of action after the first few chapters. It is a very slow build on character foundation and with that being said. The narrator definitely saves the slow parts of the book. I still enjoyed the book and I will be listening to the second in the series.

just started this series looks good

really good book for the length and actually has its funny parts interesting twists and turnsabd has me wanting more definitely going to get the next one

Great fun

This book starts slow but man it picks up! A lot of fun and look forward to the sequels!