The Narrator is bad

There were a few things that I disliked about this audiobook. The most being the narrator as he brought very little to the production. With the main characters, there were barely any differences in their tones and it made it a difficult listen trying to figure out who was talking at which point. My second most disliked aspect was the story itself. It screamed teenage romance the whole way through and honestly, it sucked.

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Worlds first and lamest superhero?

Okay, as a teen and YA book, it's not that bad, but it does have real issues that anyone with a brain will struggle with. The basic plot of the first three books is a problem and full of holes. The plot is based around an ongoing war supposedly between dimensions - I'll get back to this - where you have two sides called light souled and dark souled, where apparently the light souled are losing, which I find hardly surprising having read these books

This opening plot gives me my first problem. It's never explained, not in the first three books who they are, what they are fighting for/over, or any detail at all other than that basic information. Fine if someone asked and got stonewalled, but honestly none of them push for any answers, and that doesn't seem at all realistic to human nature.

Nor did I understand the dimensional angle. It's possible he should have just gone with other planets or based on what happens in book three alternate realities. Not sure other dimensions fit with what little information crops up in the books so far.

Next is that the light and dark souled that enter our world into the bodies of dead people, as they are apparently some sort of energy or soul based entities. Here is where it gets odd and why the light based would lose. The light souled send only one soul into a dead person that animates and becomes the protector for a living soul. This is a living human that the light souls have granted powers to in order to fight the battle on a new world that is under threat from the dark souled. However, the dark souled can take over as many as they like as all they do is a ritual and have the person killed by a human hand.

At no point does anyone ask, or does it get explained why only one light souled comes through, or why a human hand has to kill the human they are trying to kill and convert. Nor does it explain how on earth they managed to get anyone on earth if they have to do this ritual in the first place. Nor why the dark souled can't make a living soul as well.

Lastly, our hero, and why I called him lame. Well, imagine Superman and all the amazing things he could do any all the enemies he defeated. Now give all those enemies Krytonite and how good would he look? The dark souls can wave his powers away if he directly attacks them, and he can only get around this using his power to pick things up to hurl at them. I could vaguely accept this as it made a way for him not to win easy, though the authors might have thought of a better plan. The problem is that in book three all of a sudden they can literally stop his powers working if they are looking at him. Never happened in two books and they change the rules with no reason or surprise to it happening.

The list of horrible inconsistences that ruined the book from more than three stars occur too often. Lizard creatures that can flip a car and have bullets bounce off them, but then can be beaten up by a human girl in a fist fight. Which is what bugged me about the girls. They were overdone. It was like feminism turned up to 11. I'm sorry, I can't see a girl no matter how much basketball she plays beating up eight feet tall bulletproof lizards that can flip cars over. Can't see a boy doing either. And the girls are more often the dominate presence in everything including the fights, often doing far more than our supposed hero. Hardly surprising when the protector is a fighter with superhuman strength that doesn't lose it when fighting the dark souled conveniently - unlike the hero.

In short the book is fine for the younger teens maybe that won't ask to many questions as they read, but I question if young adults or adults will enjoy it too much. Average fair if you are in that age group.

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