Renaissance

Assassin's Creed, Book 1

By: Oliver Bowden

Narrated by: Gildart Jackson

Length: 12 hrs and 44 mins

Publisher's summary

Betrayed by the ruling families of Italy, Ezio Auditore embarks upon an epic quest for vengeance. To eradicate corruption and restore his family's honor, he will learn the art of the Assassins.

Along the way, Ezio will call upon the wisdom of such great minds as Leonardo da Vinci and Niccolò Machiavelli, knowing that survival is bound to the skills by which he must live. To his allies, he will become a force for change in his fight for freedom and justice. To his enemies, he will become a threat dedicated to the destruction of the tyrants abusing the people of Italy. So begins an epic story of power, revenge, and conspiracy.

©2010 Ubisoft Entertainment (P)2012 Tantor

its an amazing continuation of the games. excelle

the audio book is a great continuation of the game. its a nice recap for some one who hasnt played the gamea in years.

Entertaining mix of alt history, scifi and fantasy

a fun mix of historical characters, places and events, mixed with intrigue, action fantasy and historical sci-fi.

Great story, Great Narration.

Would you consider the audio edition of Renaissance to be better than the print version?

I don't own printed books.

What other book might you compare Renaissance to and why?

Sadly, I can't think of anything. Which is good. I think of this as unique in a way.

Which character ??? as performed by Gildart Jackson ??? was your favorite?

All of them are excellent.

Did you have an extreme reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?

Anxious. Ode to no more credits!

Any additional comments?

This is a great adventure. The book is longer than I'm used too but the action is constant and driven. The action is always leading to something greater. The author thankfully drops all illusion of grandeur and moves from place to place with pertinent descriptions only. This is actually fantastic to me, I grow tired of authors who describe surroundings and laundry lists that bare no meaning to the characters overall actions or results. Overall thoughts are described in actions not long winded monologues. Fantastic!

The narrator is brilliant! I enjoyed all of his representations of characters and his ability to pronounce proper Italian names and places (granted I am not Italian and have never been to Italy) but his talent helped with the immersion process. I thoroughly enjoyed his work and will buy the other books in this series partly due to him.

The only negative I found and this could be nitpicking, is the mass of Italian places and random Italian words used in place of English. I only had one year of Italian in college and it didn't always help here. Also, there are so many places involved they should hand you a map of old Italy when you buy this book.

This was originally a video game. Excellent. Since I am blind I do not have the ability to enjoy it as such. However, this is a fantastic adventure story on it's own and I highly recommend it! I only wish they would make more books out of video game story lines, it beats listening to my friends playing them. Maybe they'lll do Bioshock next!

Made me replay the game

Listening to this after watching The Medici, I got so captivated by the story again, that I just had to get the Ezio collection for the PS4. Even though it's been years since I finished ACII, I was reliving the memories with this book. The reader does an amazing job.

Port?

Any additional comments?

I was hoping for a story that was meant to shine more light on the Assassins Creed universe, whether it was to focus more on the Brotherhood as it exists today compared to the Renaissance or to cover parts of Ezio's story that we didn't get in the games. Instead, we get a literary port of the game, with subtle tweaking. The narrator does a pretty good job, the accent is acceptable and the voices range enough to tell the difference between most characters. The story is still good, as great as it was in the game but it just wasn't what I really wanted. I have to give it a 4 star overall though, because I did buy and enjoy its sequels, complaints aside.

Awesome!

Well read! Loved the fact that Gildart knew the language! Such an awesome story and I can't wait to get started on the others.

Reading

Great story. Just starting to read the AC books. I will continue to do so

A lot left on the table

This is a story that left a lot on the table. It's a really cool story that unfortunately reads to much like the lines you get if you were reading the lines in the game. So much wasn't covered that could have made the story so much richer and so much better. Granted you would have had a much larger book, but I think the author missed an opportunity to take a good story and make it into a great story. So if you're a fan of the game and don't mind reading the same basic lines from the game in this book, I think you'll enjoy it. If, however, you like books with a richer content, I think you'll be a little disappointed.

For Fans of the Game

Would you listen to Renaissance again? Why?

I would probably listen to Renaissance again. I am a huge fan of the Assassin's Creed games so I am definitely biased.

What does Gildart Jackson bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?

I have to say I was very impressed with Gildart Jackson's narration of the book. The narration was a big concern of mine as I already had many of the character's voices in my head from the game. While he obviously does not try to mimic those voices he does an excellent job of keeping each character's voice unique and truly brings it all together.

Any additional comments?

If you are a fan of the games you will likely enjoy this book. I recalled most of it from when I played the game and it was a fun refresher of the storyline without having to sit down in front and play through the game again.

Recommended

Great world building and characters. I enjoyed the story and reference to historical figures. The narration was fantastic.