An Engaging Story

I have to admit, this story didn't grab me right away, but I'm glad I stuck with it and kept listening. I'm looking forward to listening to the sequel as well!

The world building and magic system was very interesting. The way Ward grew in confidence and came to be respected by those who got to know him was really well written, and the character development of his team members was great too. The details of the story all came together in a surprising and exciting conclusion!

I just thought the story started off rather too slowly. I thought the relationship between the nobles and crumbs would have been better explained more organically instead of being spelled out several times. However, once Ward got out of his village, the story started developing nicely, and by the end the pacing and the writing both were much improved. I'm really eager to find out what happens next.

The one plot point that confused me what who exactly Ward's brother Cal is, who his parents are, and how he fits into the story. But maybe that will be covered in the sequel?

The narrator also took me a bit to get used to. I was distracted by the way he took breaths in odd places in sentences much of the time. I'm not sure if that got better as the story went on, or if I just stopped noticing it because I was caught up in the story. I also thought he made some strange choices with the character voices. People from the same village (and even the same family) had really distinctly different accents and that seemed odd to me. The variety of accents within the apparently small country seemed a bit too much. But I definitely could tell distinctly which character was talking in any scene, so I guess there's that. I thought the narrator's female voices were particularly good, and the narrative was very engaging.

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