Bookstooge's Reviews On the Road: Dan Koboldt

Showing posts with label Dan Koboldt. Show all posts

Tuesday, August 29, 2023

Silver Queendom 1Star DNF@60%

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Title: Silver Queendom
Series: ----------
Author: Dan Koboldt
Rating: 1 of 5 Stars DNF@60%
Genre: Fantasy
Pages: 350/ 210
Words: 114K/ 68K

DNF’d at 60% for the usual reasons, sigh.

★☆☆☆☆

Sunday, August 06, 2023

The World Awakening (Gateways to Alissia #3) 3Stars

Title: The World Awakening
Series: Gateways to Alissia #3
Author: Dan Koboldt
Rating: 3 of 5 Stars
Genre: Fantasy
Pages: 286
Words: 89K

CASE Global, the big bad business, sends in hundreds of armed mercenaries to take over Alissia and use its resources for themselves. And said mercenies are armed with the latest technology and weapons. No more fake bows and arrow, we’re talking guns, grenades, etc. So I was wondering how Koboldt was going to wrap up what was the start of a World War and he does it by destroying the gateway so the mercs get zero reinforcements of both personnel and equipment. Kind of takes the teeth out of things that way.

Quinn wasn’t as selfishly juvenile this time around AND he starts to use real magic and not use any fake tricks. But he was very much just a cog in the machine instead of being the main character. There wasn’t one person I could point to in this and call them THE main character. It kind of was spread all over, which was ok but I was hoping for more from Quinn to show a Hero’s Journey. Oh well.

I do like that Koboldt pretty much states that this was the end of his journey into Alissia. I like it when an author makes a clear cut ending and doesn’t come crawling back. Of course, this was only published in 2018, so there’s still plenty of time for him to do some crawling, but I really hope not. This series ended well and I would like my memories of it to stay positive.

★★★☆☆

From the Author and Bookstooge.blog

Quinn Bradley has learned to use the magic of another world. And that world is in danger.

Having decided to betray CASE Global, he can finally reveal his origins to the Enclave and warn them about the company’s imminent invasion. Even if it means alienating Jillaine…and allying with someone he’s always considered his adversary.

But war makes for strange bedfellows, and uniting Alissians against such a powerful enemy will require ancient enmities—as well as more recent antagonisms—to be set aside. The future of their pristine world depends on it.

As Quinn searches for a way to turn the tide, his former CASE Global squad-mates face difficult decisions of their own. For some, it’s a matter of what they’re willing to do to get home. For others, it’s deciding whether they want to go home at all.

Holt dies, the woman who was in love with him takes over as the ruler, one of the mercs makes it back through the gates, the magician is able to destroy the gate, thus cutting the link between our world and Alissia. Overall, all the good guys get a semi-happy ending and Quinn ends up with the girl. The end.

Thursday, June 15, 2023

The Island Deception (Gateways to Alissia #2) ★★★☆☆

Title: The Island Deception
Series: Gateways to Alissia #2
Author: Dan Koboldt
Rating: 3 of 5 Stars
Genre: Fantasy
Pages: 310
Words: 97K

From the Publishers

What happens in Las Vegas stays in Las Vegas. But what happens after you step through a portal to another world, well...

For stage magician Quinn Bradley, he thought his time in Alissia was over. He'd done his job for the mysterious company CASE Global Enterprises, and now his name is finally on the marquee of one of the biggest Vegas casinos. And yet, for all the accolades, he definitely feels something is missing. He can create the most amazing illusions on Earth, but he's also tasted true power. Real magic.

He misses it.

Luckily—or not—CASE Global is not done with him, and they want him to go back. The first time, he was tasked with finding a missing researcher. Now, though, he has another task:

Help take Richard Holt down.

It's impossible to be in Vegas...

Sigh. Quinn Bradley goes through the portal to the fantasy world and is supposed to be spying for his corporate masters, again. His secret goal is to learn real magic. What frustrated me was that he was enrolled in classes to learn magic and instead of allowing the teachers to break his resistance, continually tries to use his sleight of hand/magician skills and the tech from our world to fake it. It was like he didn’t actually WANT to learn magic. By the end of the book thankfully it was forced upon him but his resistance to the training made him look stupid to the reader and like a stubborn jackass. It detracted from the enjoyment for me.

Then you have Richard Holt, the guy who defected in the first book who is THE expert on this fantasy world. He has plans and plans to defend it against the corporate raiders. And everyone who we read about (in fairness they are employed and by the end of the book coerced by CASE Global) is on board with hunting Richard down. It was like no one even thought to question why he was doing this or to even ask themselves if maybe he had some justification for it. Nope, it was the Company Line straight down the page.

While not bad, the issues of Quinn acting so immature and the supposedly special forces people just blindly accepting what their civilian overseers state were enough to knock off half a star. I’ll be going into the third and final book with some VERY adjusted expectations.

★★★☆☆

The Rogue Retrieval (Book 1)

Sunday, May 07, 2023

The Rogue Retrieval (Gateways to Alissia #1) ★★★✬☆

Title: The Rogue Retrieval
Series: Gateways to Alissia #1
Author: Dan Koboldt
Rating: 3.5 of 5 Stars
Genre: Fantasy
Pages: 263
Words: 90K

From Fandom.com & Bookstooge.blog

Stage magician Quinn Bradley dedicated his life to a single purpose: headlining for a major casino on the Las Vegas strip. But just before his dreams come true, two modern mercenaries show up to make him a puzzling offer. Half a million dollars for six months on a private assignment. Their corporate employer has discovered – and kept secret – a gateway to a pristine medieval world called Alissia.

For fifteen years, they’ve studied it beneath a shroud of secrecy. Now, the head of their research team has gone AWOL, with a backpack full of disruptive technology. They’re sending in a retrieval team, and they want Quinn Bradley to come along. His talents for illusion, backed with the company’s considerable resources, should make for some convincing magic.

It will need to be convincing. Because Alissia has the real thing.

The AWOL guy is now the King of the most powerful country on Alissia and Quinn finds out the hard way that impersonating a magician is a very serious matter. Quinn ends up in Magician Land and the rest of the crew try to make it back to the portal as they dodge assassins from a rival corporation.

Everyone who is still alive makes it back to Earth and the book ends with Quinn getting contacted for another mission, which he is eager to take.

SEPARATOR

Mogsy reviewed Koboldt’s latest book, Silver Queendom, back in October and that put him on my radar. Glad she did.

Portal fantasy. Pretty decent. Plan on reading the rest of the trilogy. Not much else to say. Not because anything was bad but because I’m tired of writing. Maybe I’ll have more to say about the next book. Probably depends on how many other reviews I write the same day.

Oh wait, there was an awesome He-Man easter egg in this book. I chortled quite jollily when I read it. Yep, now I’m done.

★★★✬☆