Sentinel

A Troubled World, Book 1

By: Stephanne Payne

Narrated by: Erin Bateman

Length: 11 hrs and 38 mins

Publisher's summary

Magic, mysteries, monsters, and mayhem. A new world awaits....

Finding herself in a strange new realm, in a sleek new body not her own, Nikole must learn to survive fast. She quickly befriends an elite healer and his masterfully skilled crew, hoping to find safety in numbers.

But bigger problems lurk on the horizon than just monsters of the wild. This new world is on the brink of war.

Nikole, whose main starting skill is...well...being unskilled, is forced to take on a role far larger than she’s comfortable with. She’s torn between helping her new friends and a desperate desire to go home.

How could anyone so ordinary be expected to do such great things?

Don't miss the start of an exciting new LitRPG Series from Stephanne Payne. Elvish archers, mages, and more...what else could a listener want?

©2022 Aethon Books (P)2022 Aethon Audio

Wonderful LitRPG adventure with great narrator

Nikole is on her way to work, listening to an audiobook. But the playback gets flaky. When she looks up, a deer is trying to cross the highway, and to avoid hitting it, a big truck crosses into her lane...

And she wakes up in foggy woods. In a new body. A blue one. With pointed ears. And she quickly figures out she's not on earth anymore. But she figures that she is in a coma in a hospital somewhere or that she has died.

So begins this new LitRPG adventure from a new author, Stephanne Payne. Stephanne does a very good job at describing the world and building the backstory of all the many races that populate it. She also has great characters that are very relatable, in some cases very humorous, and seem true to life. Lastly, Stephanne does a great job describing the terms for LitRPG game systems and how the characters - live and NPC (non-player characters) interact with the world. Some scenes and descriptions of Nikole trying to figure out how the game controls she can see work are very funny.

Nikole's main sidekick is Taco, a healer, a wizard, and a nonpareil, meaning he is an elite character - the best of the best. Tako reminds Nikole of her recently deceased son, and because of this, that threat winds throughout the story as it influences many of Nikole's decisions.

The narration by Erin Bateman is skillfully done. She is very good at articulating different characters with different accents and speech patterns, both male and female. The narration was good enough to add to the story and make it more enjoyable overall. This is my first book with Bateman as a narrator, and for me, she did a good enough job to rate 5 stars. I was switching back and forth between the ebook and audiobook, and it was a great way to check names, spellings, pronunciations, and such. I enjoyed the narration.

In the world Nikole finds herself in, Hadria has a serious problem. All the races seem to hate the dragons and feel oppressed by them. Well, not all of them, but a significant faction by an evil autocrat gathers an enormous army trying to defeat the dragons and all who stand against them.

Oddly enough, it is Nikole, a character who starts with no skills, no abilities, and no knowledge, who comes to the rescue. But how can she defeat an army and a tyrant?

This is a great, frolicking adventure. I enjoyed the gameplay aspects of the story, I loved the worldbuilding and the characters, and I found myself really looking forward to reading and listening to more so I could find out what happened next. Stephanne Payne has created a truly unique perspective on this world and the races and characters that live in it. It was a very refreshing and enjoyable read, and I highly recommend it. I, for one, cannot wait for the next book!

pretty good

this book was pretty good, it has a strong cast of characters. book two looks promising, this book had a pretty good ending. the narration was pretty good.



Erin does a pretty good job narrating this book, she has some different voices at her disposal. most of them sound different. overall, 4 star.



the characters are pretty well written. I feel it's a strong cast of characters that were worked through alot, the mc does do some dumb things, but overall I like her.



I like the plot, It follows without much guidance from the author, the story has some foreshadowing to it. it's also pretty entertaining.



this book was pretty good, I don't have much complaints. I think book two will be a fun ride.

meh

like teaching your mom about litrpg. definitely some serious under tones. ok humor, decent characters but just meh

And So It Begins

As far as I can tell this is the author’s first effort. I will try to evaluate it as a first book from a new author. Nikole is driving in her car listening to her audiobook. Something seems to be not working with the audiobook going in and out. She tries to fiddle with it, to fix it and she looks up, she sees a deer with its eyes wide deciding to cross the highway. The driver in the lane nearest hers, swerves to avoid the deer and comes into Nikole’s lane.

The next thing Nikole knows she is waking up in a forest, nowhere near the highway, she can’t even hear it. She starts checking out her surroundings and feels a bit odd as well. She realizes she is in a forest but doesn’t hear any animals. Her body is changed as well, she has gone from a middle aged mom to a muscular blue woman. She meets a shade who explains the way of her new world while trying to understand her language and phrasing. She decides to join him as he teaches her, helps her find a class and learn to use her bow. The arrows and strings are mana instead of what she is used to. Her friend is a healer and is heading to a council of sorts to discuss a prophecy and he asks her to join him.

It is a decent enough start for a first book, so of the dialogue needs a little work and a few things could have been done a little bit better. For now, I will recommend based on it being a first book and we will see how the second book turns out.

Takes you out of your world to thiers.

The story line and characters are great. the detail description of the world makes you feel like you are there. I can not wait for more novels from Stephanne

Good overall story

Good story line that mixes real with gaming. I especially liked how she explained how crazy the world is for trying to do away "him" and "her".

A good story

This story is big on characters and world building, plenty of interesting people and lots of detail about the world based on MMORPG logic.

The author does a good job of bringing characters and the world they live in to life.

Not a lot of litRPG however. This book has none of the detailed skill descriptions and status screens usually seen in litRPG, instead showing the gaming aspects from the perspective of someone from the real world.

I enjoyed this book, but someone looking for the usual power leveling might want to skip this one.

Great Story

This was a great story, it also had an amazing and brave stinking cat, enjoy.

that's one long umbilical cord!

Taken from one world somehow to another to look after someone who seems just like her son she has to figure out the world that has different rules. A fun listen full of Taco.

not a gamer and still enjoyed

I'm not a gamer but this isn't overkill with gamer things, so it was perfect on that front. Entertaining and I enjoyed the character dynamics. Overall story was relatable and no quirky twists just to force a fit. Enjoyed the narrator - didn't know of her before this but enjoyed her voice and pace.