The Savior's Champion

The Savior's Series, Book 1

By: Jenna Moreci

Narrated by: Nick Denton

Length: 20 hrs and 36 mins

Publisher's Summary

Tobias Kaya doesn't care about The Savior. He doesn't care that She's the ruler of the realm or that She purified the land, and he certainly doesn't care that She's of age to be married. But when competing for Her hand proves to be his last chance to save his family, he's forced to make The Savior his priority.

Now Tobias is thrown into the Sovereign's Tournament with nineteen other men, and each of them is fighting - and killing - for the chance to rule at The Savior's side. Instantly, his world is plagued with violence, treachery, and manipulation, revealing the hidden ugliness of his proud realm. And when his circumstances seem especially dire, he stumbles into an unexpected romance, one that opens him up to unimaginable dangers and darkness.

Trigger warnings: this book contains graphic violence, foul language, and sexual situations.

©2017 Jenna Moreci (P)2019 Jenna Moreci

Story Didn't Have To Be This Long

This is one of those stories in which I found myself sighing in exasperation, because the lead female character has an obvious secret--and if she had revealed it earlier on in the book, a lot of people would not have suffered and/or died. She doesn't reveal the secret until the very end, and her reasoning for being secretive is pretty weak, when compared to the loses that result from the secret.

The reader can figure out her secret pretty early in the book, which makes the lead male character look a little dim witted, since he somehow keeps missing all the clues.

I think I'd have a more positive impression, had the book been shorter. It was one thing to be annoyed by the lengthy reveal, but it was definitely exacerbated by the multiple teaser scenes. She'd announce that she has a secret, he'd, say, "what is it?" But instead of revealing it, she'd waver about how she was worried about his reaction... then they'd get distracted, and I'd yell, "AW, COME ON! NOT AGAIN! JUST TELL HIM YOUR DAMN SECRET!"

The story isn't bad, I just felt that it dragged on further than it needed to.

Oh boy

Genuinely shocked at the positive reviews for this work. I'm not one to write reviews normally, but if someone could find this which is in contention with the outrageous four stars, and this saves them some money, then it was worth writing. I feel bad for the voice actor, who wasn't quite as awful, although the random accent changes were extremely confusing.

First, its a romance novel. Don't allow the advertising and author to convince you otherwise. That doesn't automatically make it a bad book, don't get me wrong. Not all romance novels are awful. This just happens to be one that is not only a bad romance book, it is one marketed as an adventure fantasy. The political intrigue and power dynamics are as shallow as a high school teen flick. Nothing makes sense and everyone is dumb. The cliches are murderous. From ceaseless and casual phrases, such as "in another time, you and I could have been friends," to entire characters that start to meld together into bizarre caricatures. The main characters are depicted in such a strangely "aren't they so perfect" way they become completely unlikable. Add in hefty exposition, poor and weak world-building, confusing contradictions, absent descriptions that result in characters seemingly acting as floating heads arguing on a white stage, and bizarre dialogue that will make you cry "who even talks like this??"

There is so much wrong with this book, it's hard to even summarize.

The entire conceit begs so many unanswered questions. How could our Mary Sue Savior, who banished all the bad in the world just by virtue of being born, have a competition to the death for her hand in marriage? The book will hand-wave this with "isn't tradition so bad and sad? We should challenge tradition!" This is, of course, without an examination into how traditions are formed or sustained. It is what it is and isn't it bad? Our main character, Tobias, enters the competition because of his sister, who is positioned as a burden and not a person, despite being vehemently opposed to it and after literally a single night of thinking about it. We're never told why he is so exceptional as to question this tradition and think it is stupid, other than that the author herself holds that point of view.

In all the men in all the areas who tried out for the competition, wouldn't you know that Tobias' best friend and neighbor, who convinced him to join in a single night, also makes it in! What are the chances? It makes the world seem incredibly small, despite another Champion claiming to be from another kingdom ruled by another Queen, and a scene near the end where a bunch of foreign rulers show up for apparently no reason other than to bet and give Tobias a reason to talk smack. These sort of convenient set ups are continuous, making little sense and receiving little explanation. The Evil Dudes are evil for no reason, even when it would be in their self-interests to be "good." (The black and white morality of this book is also a huge point of contention for me.)

Even after reading, I have so many questions. Not "ohhh whats going to happen next" questions. No. Questions like: Why all the "cock," Moreci? Why did the main character have a scene touching himself? Why do they speak like teenagers, except the near constant and maddening "apologies?" Why do the characters use the word "God" in a world with a walking Goddess, is this in line with their religions, what are their religions?? Why?

Basically, this reads as a first draft. It is a first draft that needs hard editing, from the world to the writing. There was a concept here that might have worked, given the time and effort and editing required, and the removal of the Mary Sue Savior who cures the world of all Bad Things. Adult concepts are clumsily handled in the style of a middle grade fiction, with characters straight out of a sexist nightmare. There are just so many times a good editor would have gone, "yo, what, dude?"

Such as when a character explains its okay his wife died in childbirth, as she was destined to be with him.

Or when the love interest comforts the main character that, even though his sister's life must be the worst ever because she can't walk, she has him and he is "good."

Or how the quasi-Roman crowd expose their chests to flash the main character in a way that reads like a bad concert fic.

Or how the only other women allowed to exist are either mentally disabled, related to the main character, lesbian, or Evil. Other than the perfect love interest, of course. Which serves to make her exist in a vacuum where she is free of sexual competition, which is bizarre. We are gifted entire conversations between male characters which revolve around how superior love interest is to the Evil female character, who only has "shallow beauty."

That's before we even touch on the sexualized "more girl than woman" who is only added at the end to discuss how she wants to sleep with the Champions. This child is also Evil and begs her much older husband to purchase one (with the biggest cock) for the night for him to watch uh yeah, something he apparently enjoys. Again, what?

Oh, and Tobias' first kiss was with a much older girl who sexually assaulted him??

Clearly Moreci has a big issue with women.

She also positions sexual promiscuity as going hand in hand with being morally evil, and being sexually chaste with morally good. She reinforces this over and over. It's so outdated and strange, I didn't even catch it at first. But there it was, all along. This character is good because she has restraint and won't sleep with Tobias, this character is bad because she wants to sleep with Tobias. Ironically, this traditional message is inherent in the text despite Moreci constantly going "isn't tradition bad??" The cognitive dissonance is so prevalent. It's also prevalent when Tobias' superiority complex rears its head and he laments on "how anyone could love this character they've had one conversation with." All the while, he's willing to die for someone he's had a handful of (often antagonistic) exchanges with. All the conflict between the love interests, which spans pages and pages of fighting and hurt feelings, is entirely because of a failure to communicate.

Wow this review is long. I could go on. I have gone on, already, but this is just touching the surface of the issues within the book. It would take a review exponentially longer than this one to properly go through how awful it is. In sum, what, dude?

A Struggle..... For the listener

So........ I wanted to like this book, I really did. The author is an amazing youtuber with great advice, but this book didn't live up. It has a great concept, great ideas, but it was very poorly executed. Though the Nerrator was doing great, the rest of the story as well as the concepts explored in this book fell flat.

The characters, though they held some interesting qualities(and only very little at that), I found myself not caring about them, including the protagonist. I found myself wanting scenes to be over so that maybe, just maybe, the next one would be good. I've owned this book for some time and struggled with every step along the reading process. Not due to any complexity, but due to the lack of drive, the boring "action" scenes, and the dragging plot. She seemed to choose to tell rather than to show.

The story has a soft magic system, which is perfectly fine, however it produces several ex machina throughout the book, resolving any and all tension without any payoff.

As good as the authors writing advice is, this book makes me question the authenticity of her tips and advice, for she didn't seem to follow any of her own tricks.

The Pacing and Characters were Poorly Written

I enjoy this author's YouTube videos, so I bought the ebook and audiobook. It was a good thing I got both. I primarily listened to the audiobook but sometimes the narration was difficult to understand. After trying to repeat the same section a couple of times, I would have to refer to the ebook to figure out what the narrator was saying. Sometimes it was because he was mumbling, and other times it felt like the editing cut off the middle of words.

As for the story itself, the pacing was off. It moved slowly for the majority of the book with all the high stakes action happening in the last five hours or so. Also, all the characters were one dimensional. None of them felt developed or that they had changed much by the end of the book. The main character was an idiot and the rest of the men were caricatures of the worst kinds of men. The women were also one dimensional. Very little is known about them other than one is a lesbian and is in charge of making the men look "appealing" to the Savior, and another has a mental disability. Nothing else is known to make them more likable. Also, there is a prologue at the beginning, but like most prologues, it doesn't add anything to the story that isn't already revealed or discussed in the story.

The author knows what she is talking about in her YouTube videos. The Savior's Champion makes me think that she is still trying to figure out how to execute her own advice properly.

Premise was nice but was pretty basic.

The overall idea was pretty solid, but the execution could have been so much better.

I'll give credit where credit is due. The author worked her butt off for this book, as evident with her YouTube channel. I applaud her for this. Even the narrator was pretty decent, and he did his best.

But the plot twist was evident the entire time. Maybe that was the author's intention, maybe not. The other plot twists didn't exactly appear evident, but they weren't hinted enough either. One was mentioned earlier on in the book, but another one, not so much. The information wasn't given in a consistent manner.

The main character did not seem to evolve, at least to me. He remained relatively the same, other than falling in love. He had a lot of things spelled out for him when it could have been used as a great plot point for suspense.

** Mild spoiler ahead**

The biggest example was one of the best scenes of the book, in my opinion. Before the competition moved to the palace, Leila told Tobias to not look at the statues. So much suspense and terror could have been implemented in the garden when the statues came to life, trying to kill everyone. It would have been such an amazing scene if he didn't know something was wrong with looking at the statues and telling everyone beforehand.

I get it, it was written this way to expose Tobias's kind nature as a reflection from earlier when he saved Flynn, but in my opinion, he shouldn't have been given this ONE thing like he had been given everything else.

I feel this book could have been so much better. Maybe the second book will answer many of the questions that I still have.

It reads like a YA novel, although it's classified, at least by the author, as an adult dark fantasy/romance. So if you haven't really read a ton of adult novels, but you want to read adult words like "cock" a lot, then this book is for you.

Overall, it was an alright story. I've seen a lot of people enjoy this book, and I've also seen others who were not as charmed. I'm of the latter group.

"The Bachelorette" for newer readers

*Spoiler Free*

At first, the worst thing I could say about this book is that it was adequate....until I got to the half way point. I love romance books, and I love stories that get "dark", but this felt like it was written by someone who has only a shallow understanding of what makes each of those ideas great.

Let's start with the main character, Tobias. In the beginning, he's fairly proactive, and there's a lot to like about him. He's hard working, has a good relationship with family, etc. He joins the death game style tournament willingly, and seems poised to lead us on a harrowing journey to survive. Unfortunately, his goal is already met as soon as he enters the tournament. Whether he lives or dies doesn't matter anymore outside of him being the audience surrogate, so the stakes are non-existent outside of surviving for his own sake.

That wouldn't be a problem, except that the book never frames his survival as result of his choices. The challenges are essentially a stick that get used over and over to prod him into action, and it robs him of his agency. Several times it's mentioned how the competitors have "had their humanity robbed of them", and its true in all the worst ways. What started as a promising protagonist has slowly been beaten into a handbag whose only purpose is to be carried all the way to the finals. It's not fun, entertaining, or even suspenseful, since we know he'll survive everything anyways.

It's not just Tobias either. A majority of the supporting cast are underdeveloped, reduced down to their archetypes. "Nice hunter guy", "Horny nobleman", "Honorable but stupid dude". They're all fairly one note for the majority of the story, except later on when the author starts telegraphing that its their turn to die soon in an attempt to get you more attached before the "shocking reveal". Anyone we're not meant to get attached to gets a limited vocabulary that revolves around "cock", "cunt", and "fuck", and exist as puppets to show that Tobias is clearly the contestant to root for by comparison.

The antagonists are particularly disappointing. Over the book, there are four primary forces that try to get in Tobias's way, or outright kill them. Except, they don't nearly as often as you think they would in a death match. While there's a later explanation about why there aren't any assassination attempts on Tobias between matches, you'd think there would be a lot more...direct effort from people who have killed other competitors without a thought earlier on.

Perhaps its because the villains are just dumb muscle. None of them have a personality beyond "I am big, tough, and clearly better than you." Imagine having three copies of "The Mountain" from "Game of Thrones", and they all say more or less the same three sentences. As intimidating as the man's supposed to be, it gets boring, repetitive, and kills any chance at satisfaction since he beats them all the same way.

But even with all of that, the book was still passable if bland. The real trouble starts in the second half, once all of the competitors finally leave the tunnel.

Throughout the book, there's a running sub-plot about Tobias falling in love with a secretive and tight-lipped woman. They're early interactions are cute, and it was nice to see them slowly getting to know each other. But once they're out of the cave, the slow and nicely paced romance gets thrown out the window for desperate proclamations of love, despite having known each other for only a few weeks, and still feeling each other out as people. Tobias's emotional IQ drops several points in order to stir up lazy drama between him and his partner. It frames him as an emotionally abusive/manipulative asshole that isn't worth our investment.

One scene is particularly hair screechingly frustrating because Tobias's partner is begging him to let her share his secret. But Tobias is so far up his ass that he refuses to hear her out. Later, when the secret is revealed, he starts biting her head off about how "she lied", about how she was "using him", despite the fact that he was the one shutting her up and refusing to listen. There are at least two or three more scenes like this, and it is so frustrating to see such lazy and artificial conflict ruin what could have been a serviceable relationship.

Speaking of twists and secrets (I won't give spoilers), but the book burns all of its good ones within the first act. There are ~3 deaths to start, and the book makes it very clear that everyone WILL die eventually, so why bother getting emotionally attached to any of them? One character's "twist secret" can be figured out with her introduction, and makes dragging out the reveal incredibly frustrating and unsatisfying. While there is a massive backstory to explore, this book hasn't given me any reason to care about it.

Older teens and new adults who haven't explored books like this may get to enjoy this title, and more power to them. For someone who actively reads books in the "dark", "fantasy", & "romance" genres, however, all of the above represent tired, overused tropes that serve as crutches for writers that aren't willing/able to come up with better solutions.

Overall, this book isn't worth your time. It's a chore to get through and you'd be better served spending your money/credits on another title. Personally, I will not be buying any of the author's other titles in the future because, as this book so poignantly says, "Fuck the Savior".

DNFed because of story

The narrator was great, but that really doesn't make up for a predictable story with a poor setting and bad characters. I had a lot of hope for this book, but between the dialogue and Gary Due characters, I'm just disappointed.

Ladies and Gentlemen, Your hero... is an idiot!

So, let me start by saying that Jenna Moreci is a very technically sound writer. Technically, she is rather exceptional even. As an avid reader, a voracious listener of audiobooks, and a burgeoning writer in my own right, I think that her ability to write at a skillful level is unquestionable.

However, I didn't like her story as a fantasy novel. If someone were to describe this as a fantasy novel, I would question the taste of the individual who would say such a thing. For those who aren't eager to read the long drawn out version, I'll be brief. The Savior's Champion is The Bachelorette meets The Running Man while being wrapped in fantasy gossamer. If you like your fantasy near non-existent and your romance heavily leveraged then you may very well like the book much more than I did.

Now, to preface this full on review, I will start for why I even picked the book up. I watch Jenna's YouTube videos from time to time. In one of her more recent videos she made a comment that I took some bit of umbrage with. It was towards her personal feelings with those who like/listen to Brandon Sanderson.

Her words leaned towards "Those who worship at the alter of Brandon Sanderson" in reference to readers and writers who look up to him and his brand of fantasy. Her mentioning his name gave me a bit of pause, and her tone told me much about what she might have been alluding to with her own obvious distaste.

So, I decided that those who want to be critical of a prolific writer and a solid overall individual within the writing community to such a degree as to impugn the man's good standing in any way, that at least she should be his equal or better. So, I compare fantasy novel to fantasy novel. First published book to first published book.

Elantris vs The Savior's Champion.

Some may feel that this is unfair, but I disagree. Elantris is his very first published book, and it doesn't compare to anything he's written Post-Wheel of Time.

First lengthwise, Brandon has an audiobook that is 28 1/2hrs compared to Jenna weighing in at 20 1/2hrs. And for the record, though Brandon's book is 8hrs longer, it doesn't feel as overlong as The Savior's Champion does. If Jenna's book was half as long, it would be tighter and better by far. When I heard Daniel Greene mention this as a fault, I agreed immediately. I don't even like that guy, and I agreed with him on this one. That move alone, tightening up the story by shortening its length would do great things for this work. Yet, it's not just the length, but what it does that matters.

It does nothing in Jenna's case, and builds the world, plot, subplots, and drama in Brandon's. Technically, I think Jenna's book has a strong system of writing. Her scene/sequel rhythm is well done, but it feels mechanical through most of her book. Her info dumps within the first 4 chapters are narrative based and not with anything to cover it up better, like dialogue. No dialogue really happens until her protagonist, Tobias, gets to his house. That's a lot of chapter 1. She also has a prologue that gives you a scene where minor action happens, but in essence gave me enough to know almost the entire ending before I finished chapter 1. In comparison, Elantris does its good bit of chapter 1 info dumping, but Brandon covers it with Dialogue, internal thoughts, feelings, and world building narrative that gives you a great deal of information while painting the picture of his protagonist's surroundings and predicament. Raoden starts off alone, but unlike Tobias, gets a second person named Galladon to talk to and gets a lot of information. This makes info dumps supremely better and easier to conceal in dialogue, bringing the audience into the world through action and conversation. Drawing us in with every word and action between the two.

Tobias doesn't have a good conversation until half way into chapter 2. No one consistent to speak with until his friend Milo appears. Tobias is entirely too vanilla until he gets consistent people to talk to. Alone, throughout the story, he is boring and rather blank.

He is also reactive. His story drags him from point to point, without him having any real agency. He makes no decisions, really, but walks forward because the plot forces him to do so. He even complains about having to do so on numerous occasions. Raoden, in contrast, makes decisions and works to effect the world around him.

Next, her world building is gossamer at best. It's not even sheer curtain thick. It's literal smoke and mirrors. You get a street full of random people, then a sugar cane field, then a window for an artist's shop, then a dirt road and finally a hovel with a small hearth. All of that happens in chapter one and none of it is really explained or leans on any description that matters to develop the world. And then, it vanishes to never be seen again until the end of the last chapter of the book. So, I guess that explains why she doesn't do anything with it, but it's still the opposite of fantasy. You're not immersed in the world in the slightest. And again, nothing memorable happens until chapter 6. That was her first really solid chapter, and where the book truly begins. By this point, two things are obvious about the book.

First, her cast of characters are either awful individuals or punks. And of course the protagonist, who falls in the middle of those extremes. Secondly, they're all idiots, including her protagonist. Yet, I believe he's supposed to be an idiot most of the time. Though, I believe that this was a stylistic choice, so I will chalk it up to myself not being her target audience.

Again, this isn't a fantasy novel. Next, let's talk about magic.

Magic saves the protagonist EVERY time. And the protagonist, a laborer and artist by trade, uses bows and swords without training while beating trained killers with a paper thin reason for it occurring. It didn't even read too poorly. Again, her writing skill has never been in question, but her storytelling is poor. She has stellar moments, but most of them occur exclusively with romance portions of her story. Elantris, in comparison, let's the protagonist find his way with his own hands. Achieve his own victories, and struggle in his own way. No magic saves Raoden. Raoden saves Raoden. And on occasion, Raoden's allies save him. His romance is a subplot and it's serviceable. When something is a subplot, serviceable is acceptable. Magic and world building are not subplots in fantasy. They're the feature! Which is why I don't think this is a fantasy, but a romance wrapped in the gossamer robes of fantasy.

The romantic story is where things really happen for the better. The romance is the feature of this book. And I'm not mad at that. Yet, Jenna's writing pushes the fantasy to the back immediately. It shows up briefly in the beginning, and then for the sake of plot contrivances and progress only. Oh, and to save the protagonist, of course.

I can go on, but I think I've said enough. This ISN'T a fantasy novel. This IS a romance novel, however. As a fantasy novel, it's a horrible story. As a romance novel, it takes too long to get started to be called 'good'. I won't talk about Jenna's choice of colorful language, horrible cast of characters, villains or assumed plot twists. I believe all of those are choices that were part of the original package. I believe she wanted her cast of 'bachelors' to be awful, her villain to be hated, and her female characters to be dynamic and interesting.

She has succeeded in all of those things. Yet, her hero is boring, her fantasy is nonexistent, and her magic is soft as clouds. That being the case, I think she shouldn't make her own comparisons to someone like Brandon Sanderson who actually writes fantasy. When she writes a fantasy novel, one with actual magic and a world that feels real, maybe she can.

But for now, I don't think she can. Writing well isn't enough to make a good story.

But Jenna...

Jenna Moreci wrote an amazing first book in a series I’m looking forward to continuing. The ending was shocking, and tied up the whole story.

Nick, the narrator, only made the whole experience of reading the book itself, while being read to, all the more enjoyable. It was like hearing the book as it were intended to be read, with the tone Jenna meant the words to be read.

Story isn't worth it

The reading of the book was great. The narrator was able to deliver it well, but the story wasn't good. It was too cliche, at some point I got tired of hearing the words, something and apologies...The plot was also predictable... early on I was able to predict the main twist of the story.

I love sufferation

I'm glad I picked up this book. It's filled with so much angst and dread, at every turn the hardships pile on, even when you think "oh! it can’t POSSIBLY get any worse for them", it just DOES. In a completely rational way it just continuously throws you for a loop, it gives you clues that become blatant when you actually get to the plot twists... it just does everything right. The characters are fully fleshed, the plot is engrossing and plausible and the scenes and sets are well placed and described. It's just marvellous. But of course, I’d expect nothing less from Jenna. She’s been a great help with writing for my friends and I. Even her on-the-spot examples from her videos sound wonderful. If you haven't already, READ THIS BOOK!!!!!

Must read for Dark fantasy romance lovers

I adored this story, hooked from the first chapter with an amazing cast of characters, fantastic world building and a thrilling climax, despite the twist not being so twisty. I did see the ending coming from about midway and feel it could have been disguised better. Despite that, it didn't take away from the satisfying ending or the emotional coaster ride Tobias' trial took me on, and I will definitely follow it up with the next book of the series.

That was fabulous

Buckle your seatbelt, it's all go.
Violence, curse words and romance in galore. I hate romance as a general rule, but this has to be the exception. I routed for this, and I loved both participants in this relationahip, which is a first for me.
Loves me some strong violence and foul language, and this book has it in abundance, and in appropriate places. Nothing seemed unnecessary in my opinion.
All in all, it's a very exciting read/listen. Nicely narrated with a good range of voices and emotion.
Highly recommend.

Fantastic!!!

5 stars in every category! The story itself is great and the telling by nick Denton was an absolute blast! Nick does a great job at making you believe there are many different characters before you and keeps the story telling interesting and never boring! Fantastic! Not once was I bored by the writing or by the audio! Highly recommend for people who love adult fantasy!

*clears throat*

AAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH THAT WAS AMAZING HOLY CRAP WHAT THE GORE LEILA TOBIAS THE ENDING THE PLOT TWISTS FLYNN JENNA MORECI I LOVE WHAT

Masterfull storytelling!

So, I haven't read for a while, and have been dreading to do so for the longest time since I have a hard time finding the focus needed to accomplish such a task. But when I heard about this book I had to give it a try! And OMG I WAS NOT DISSAPOINTED! The story is just masterfully written, with compelling characters and a great plot. I was moved to tears, screaming in rage and jumping up and down for the romance! Truly an amazing book!
Loved listening to every word narrated by brilliant Nick, and perfect for me who has trouble with sitting still and reading!
Jenna has written a true masterpiece and I can't wait to read the continuation of the story of Leila and Tobias!
Many thanks from Sweden!

An absolute masterclass

This book is a delight of storytelling at its best. The characters, battles and emotions all come together to form one of the best things I’ve ever heard!!
Can’t rate it highly enough

absolutely amazing did not want to stop listening

can't wait for a sequel I just love this book it is amazingly well written

Really great listen

Couldn’t put it down! Would highly recommend it. The story was fast and gripping. Buy it!

Amazing!!!

This book was amazing from start to finish. I can't remember a single moment I wasn't eager to listen on. Denton's performance elevated the writing further, with amazing accent and character work and a fully believable performance. I've fallen in love with audiobooks thanks to Moreci and Denton. Brilliant work. Outstanding, even!