Siphon

A Touch of Power, Book 1

By: Jay Boyce

Narrated by: Samara Naeymi

Length: 10 hrs and 4 mins

Publisher's summary

Jade has spent her life fighting boredom in the terminally ill ward. Surfing the net or reading, she always envied the ability of others to go out and experience the world. She knew her wish to live a normal life was far beyond her reach, but after waking up one morning without the sounds of her life support, she opens her eyes and finds herself with a weak but healthy body in a magical world. 

As blue gamelike system notifications fill her vision, she knows she'll have to adapt quickly in order to survive, but this is all she ever dreamed of, so Jade is up to the challenge. She will soon realize that you need to be careful what you wish for. 

This is Andara, where her true adventure finally begins.

©2018 Mountaindale Press (P)2019 Mountaindale Press

Disappointing and boring

Siphon is an interesting book, but not because of its story. Rather, seeing the goal of having a strong female protagonist facing adversity and earning a new life that it had in mind completely missing the mark is sadly disappointing. The main character is the definition of a Mary Sue after a very limited amount of effort, and after such is treated like a Disney Princess through the entire book. Not once did she face any true challenge that wasn't either dismissed or handled by someone else, and through the entire story every person that she met was kind, immediately loved her, and gave her more than she asked for. I can only think of one character who was rude to her, and they were "put in their place" within minutes.

I listened to the entire book hoping that after so much build-up we would eventually see some incredible challenge that the heroine would have to face, but in the end this was just a young girl's powere fantasy. I wish that the heroine could have surpassed challenges in a way that was truly visible to us, and proved that she was worth everything that she was given. In the end, the entire book feels like someone being given every opportunity simply because they didn't have it in the past, despite not earning anything. A few changes could have made this an engaging read with a strong role model, but sadly we are left with an interesting concept used with a lazy story.

On the bright side, the narrator is quite good overall!

Maybe if you're 9...

The story might entertain a 9 year old, but it just did NOT work for me. The main character is excessively juvenile for someone who is supposed to be 18. She behaves more like a pre-teen. She faces no hardships, at all. She turns up in a new world, and everybody falls all over themselves to give her everything she wants. Without any opposition, hardships, or internal conflict, the story is simply flat and boring, and the main character doesn't experience any emotional growth or change. Utterly UN-entertaining. In addition, the long long LONG lists of "skills" that are read over and over, ad nauseum, are simply ridiculous. It felt as if the author was trying to meet a word-count, and just couldn't come up with enough story to tell.

In addition, the narrator's choice of voices was irritating. She made the main character sound like a muppet with a sore throat. Very grating on the nerves.

I REALLY wanted to like the main character, but between the lack of character growth and the annoying voice, it was just impossible.

its Good

It's a good start and has potential but pretty much goes no where fast, literally. She never travels outside the town or even questions the motivation of towns people. The character herself is turning into a jack of all trades but master of none path. Let's hope the next book has her leave the city and train her to be less dependant on others to stay alive.

Great right from the start

Litrpg is my jam, and this is one of the best starts to a series I've had the pleasure of listening to.


The character Jade is a Sassy girl that looks like a breeze could bowl her over. Which makes it all the more satisfying when she steam rolls everyone around her into doing her bidding. I found myself laughing whole heartedly during most of this book. She's incredibly endearing, and every other character gets rolled into "team Jade" one after another. Her personality, look on life, intelligence, and talent for all things magic, make her fun to listen to. She's a sweet girl with a dangerous side. Once she gets her some momentum with her special ability she'll eventually be OP but that's a long way off.


The game system is unobtrusive, flexible, and simple. No character levels, just stats and skills level, both of which grow through effort. The system seems to just be there to inform the user what there capable of, and how good they are at it. Like a scoreboard. Wish the author would have cut down the reading of it though. Like, only show changes from last check or something like that. Regardless, it's not a real problem, not as bad as others I've listened to. Jade collects a laundry list of skills by the end of the book. If it continues at this rate it'll take 10 minutes to list out her profile by the end of the next one.

World building is.. Well it's not much. Inn, library, palace, restaurant, wall.. That's about it. I have a feeling most of the story will stay within this city, which isn't necessarily a bad thing. I'm actually hopping she spends some time on research and development in the next book.


All and all I'd say it's a solid entry to the genre.

One of my favorite LitRPG novels to date

This is a great start to a new series. Interesting ability, not too overpowered, female MC, and one that doesn't make ridiculous choices outside their character in order to move the story along. I cannot wait for the next one.

Lacks engagement

The writing is strong from a technical standpoint, but I found the story itself lacking. It has no conflict, and I don't mean just combat. A good story does not require action/fighting, but all stories require conflict. The MC has no struggles, nothing to overcome. Everyone loves & fawns over how amazing she is for the majority of the book, and she doesn't have to try to succeed.

So...

I really want to give this book a higher rating there is some great stuff going on in it are Leading Lady Jade is lovable and there's a nice healthy mix of cool and interesting characters there's some Mary Sue like bits but overall extremely enjoyable the thing is there's no conflict here and that's the problem Jade is automatically the best at everything everyone loves her and goes out of the way to help her and they do put in a good explanation for why this is done right into the story so it makes sense within the world but when there's no conflict and we know that everyone loves her and that she's the best there's no tension I'm at the start to get boring so while this was nice and I enjoyed it I'm going to have to pass on the rest of the series

Love the singing

I love how the narrator sings the songs even if the words are changed. This is such a. Nice change compared to other books. Great listen overall.

Siphon Wanted

I want a Siphon so I do not need to wait for Book 2 and following. Jay Boyce has written a marvelous story with Jade, being a believable protagonist with a great supporting cast. This my first experience with Samara Naeymi and I hope it will not be my last. She was the perfect compliment with characterizations, voices, tempo and rhythm. They made a great team and she brought Boyce's incredible story to life. More Please!

Another i know better than you do book

Yet another book were the MC acts like they know whats best and how this new world should be like. Instead of trying to understand the hard truth about the world she is placed in i mean her power is to steal from others hard work and then acts like she is better but if she truly believed that she would be telling the truth about how here power really works instead she lies and keep stealing from others to make her gains all the while taking from others and then tells them that they should be doing things her way i bet if this mc was placed anywhere else in that world she would be dead

Loved it

A fantastic book with an adorable and loveable main character.

Not your typical affair for this genre with no main antagonist and not a great deal of struggle, much more of a feel good escapism story.

The narrator is fantastic and really brings the characters to life.

My one complaint would be the stat reading, it is quite lengthy and often mid chapter, I would have preferred a more summarised highlighted version but I can recognise that could have taken away from the original story.

All in all I look forward to the next book and hope that it adds a bit more challenge to the mc, but still keeps the same adorable charm.

Just horrible.

What is this book even about? Nothing happens exept the MC meets people that love her and she gets some powers.
The bad is that there is no plot in the book and the MC is probably the worst MC! She is so very entitled, everybody MUST love her or she gets mad but she can do and say whatever she wants to anyone.
Her powers are meaningless and everything she does is to be what I guess the author thinks is cool. The books feels like it was written by a 14 year old.

great narration repeating storyline

the narration was great but the story just goes like this jade meets someone they become friends or they act entitled she does a thing they become friends that leads her to meet someone new rinse and repeat

Loved this book - not your average

Really liked the character development, the idea of a siphon and the main character was lovable and believable - bang on. Thanks Jay - more please!

recommended

excellent spin on the litrpg story. really enjoyed listening to this book. made me laugh in parts about the pop culture references.

a refreshingly nice story

though i am averse to the oft touted marketting phrase 'heart warming tale of-' i have to admit, this story fits that descrption for once. though neither as intricate nor clever as some stories, this author's style tends to lighten the mood of the reader. optimism and hope are woven through the main character like fabric and better still, she refuses to become disilisioned. in fact, bad turns spur greater efforts to optimism. and despite a few lacking elements of realism where people act, i.e. everyone beind quite friendly rather than back-stabby as people really are, it's an acceptably believable world to listen to.
the narrator did and expert job at charcter tones and quirks, though better on wome than men, naturally.
in the end, it's an anime with a touch more sense and a dollop of fluffy!

A beautiful story

I received this as a free review copy. It’s a really lovely book with an interesting female lead character, lots of snark, intelligence and compassion all set within a well crafted world with a narrative that flows brilliantly. I enjoyed the book and will be purchasing the rest in the series.

Great story

it's very difficult to find a good storyline where the character is not OP, but this one hit all the marks. It's a really amazing story. enjoyed it.

a nice book

Don't think my title as ow it's just a nice book. I mean it like it's a kind book toward the main character.
The realistic situation the main character is in makes you hope and wish for her happy ending.

I love the tempo of the book. It glides into emotional and dangerous situations. I'm looking forward to the sequal seeing as I feel like I just got my bearings of the land and the people and all it's potential.

Personally I prefer male narators but Samara is the first female I really enjoyed but this is just personal preference. She articulated very well.

The only part that did bother me was the extremely long list of stats but maybe they are skipable but I didn't check at the time. It only happens like 4 or 5 times so it's not like overpowering the story. It was just to much in 1 go but also fitting the story. (can't ellaborate without spoilers ... so go listen or read it :p )

feels like a prequel

Feels like an introduction with a bit of spoilers.

first half feels boring, too long useless skill list,
the end is more likeable