On the Shoulders of Titans

well performed, good story

Wish there was more, climatic battle not as epic as last one. Feels like a foundation or bridging book to the overall story.

11 of 12 people found this review helpful

Fills a void.

I was super excited for the second book in the series with the ramp up of the previous. I just couldn't get into this one the same way. There was interesting magic, a few exciting scenes, but it was also very fluffy and dragged in many parts. Corin can get very annoying, and it starts to grate on you. I'm not saying to skip it, but don't expect the same excitement as the first book.

14 of 16 people found this review helpful

Great series but pushes unnecessary politics

So I loved the story. The things I don't love are the unnecessary addition of lgbtq politics. In the first book the author basically made one of the most mysterious characters into a stupid love interest and that character hasn't found a way back into the story in real vigor because of it, way to ruin a great character making them senselessly gay. Now there's another character who "identifies" as a man/woman but it was done with that being a character quirk and not even a real aspect of her character, just that she is to be referred to as "they". I can live with that because it doesn't take from the story, like the first lgbtq injection, but the author doesn't stop cratering and has to re explain the politics multiple times. As a reader it's takes you out of the immersion to see an author that already recites things multiple times because the main character has the confidence of a shrew but to have to push through bs modern politics in a book that doesn't need them or just feeling as if the author thinks you're an idiot needing to include flash backs from the previous chapter.

Overall I really like the story and the characters. My gripes are the injection of LGBTQ politics senselessly and the authors disbelief that readers can remember what happened a chapter before. The series reminds me og a Korean manga called tower of God a lot. Would recommend to those who can stomach useless lgbtq politics.

12 of 14 people found this review helpful

not too bad.

good book. love the magic system in this world. it shall be interesting to see where it goes from here.

as a side note:
could have done without all the look at me I include non binary people in my book and it is perfectly normal in this world, and here are their pronouns cause that is only polite. it was so in my face during that explination to Keras. It was cringe inducing. There are much better ways to add twists to the norm or be inclusive without being so in my face about it. It totally ripped me out of the story.

11 of 13 people found this review helpful

I really dislike the chapter on gender neutrality. it felt fake and nearly ruined the entire story. focusing so heavily on one religion of the society and breezing over the many other religions make it seem as a ploy to express the writers whim or real world beliefs. I dont want a book with a sprinkling style of writing to force political beliefs down my thought all at once but by slowly dispersing the information threw out the book building to a clear picture like all the other aspects of the world so far.

31 of 38 people found this review helpful

good concept full of shit

too much political garbage, and 1D characters. however the magical world the author created is amazing.

it felt like an entire chapter was dedicated to gender identification, super annoying. worst of all referred to the genderless person with a plural pronoun making it rather annoying to figure out if the author is talking about 1, 2, or 3 of the siblings. turns out there 2.
the character are really flat and new characters are only introduced to further story progression. with this bad habit of the author you know any person the start to talk about is ether going to play a large part helping the mc. or be a bad guy fight or embody what the author sees as evil.
I dont even want to get into the mc. issues.
however the world created is s great amalgamation of the video games we grown up with and fantasy books. the idea to break apart magic into different schools is an old one but the way the author did with different types of magic was very enjoyable. I believe this idea could of gone as big as harry potter if not for the above issues and political garbage. I will however be looking forward to the next book in Hope's that it improves and to see how he grows the world

33 of 41 people found this review helpful

good besides the forced SJW junk.

good world building but his forced use of modern trans nonsense pulls you out of the great story he is crafting. Having to use non-gendered pronouns really shows how ridiculous our current culture has become. otherwise it had a great story

10 of 12 people found this review helpful

The author tries awfully hard to be hip and modern

The author likes to talk about using gender-neutral pronouns, and mixes in our cultural biases without any explanation of how it fits into the fantasy society. It's often distracting and haphazard at best. Sarah seems more likable than our main protagonist. Other than that the story is good for the most part. Neat ideas and directions are taken that makes the story still enjoyable. I just wish our author introduced the society a little better, it just takes away from the story when you add in random modern day political beliefs into a fantasy story without even doing it smoothly. I read these kinda of books to get away from all the political stuff on TV today. Not be reminded of it again in a random way that doesn't even fit with a medievalish society.

73 of 94 people found this review helpful

Eye roll of dissatisfaction.

so not bad not great mostly comes down to our main character. I get with the writers going for I really I really do and sometimes it's it works and it's good but all the progress he made in the first book was gone at the beginning of this one all of the things that annoyed me from him in the first book work ramped up till like 11 in this one and it wasn't towards near the end when once again he made progress and grew as a character I was also deeply annoyed that my favorite character his sister was sidelined for so much of this book it wasn't good and I didn't like it but all that aside at the end of the day this is a really interesting world and our hero is an admirable character who is hard to dislike when you realize the reason why he is the way he is if you can get past the flaws which aren't major deal breakers they're just little Annoying bits it's very good

2 of 2 people found this review helpful

Improved on much, but...

I appreciate the author didn't beat us to death with the word "disconcerting." In fact, he probably got so much negative feedback from using it 1000 times in the first book that he omitted the word completely this go around. However...this time he decided the word of the day would be "presumably." He presumed, I presumed, presumably this and that, all the way through Book 2. It isn't always necessary to explain presumptions are being made. Most of the time it's obvious because the majority of the author's writing style is to write a story utilizing the main character's thoughts (much of the book is what is happening inside Corin's head, although less this time).

Story: I don't know why, but I found myself not caring one bit about the characters' academic life. I actually skipped three entire chapters as the children completed their final exam because I just didn't care. I wanted them to get on with it so they can continue the larger plot, which is by far the interesting parts of the story. Their growth and development is more rapid, defined, and interesting when they're training at the mansion, meeting with the researcher, obtaining information from sources that aren't teachers, tracking spies, and/or developing their relationships off campus. The school aspect adds very little to the story whatsoever, as the main character predominately teaches himself through experimentation and research on his own. The school portion of the plot is neither exciting nor inspiring. All of the characters with actual depth, aren't part of their school. More of that please...

As mentioned in the other reviews, the author also hits you over the head repeatedly with the asexual nature of Corin. We got it the first few times it was mentioned. He doesn't understand love and doesn't like to be touched. Every single time somebody touches Corin we have to hear about how he doesn't like to be touched... He doesn't like relationships, dating, being touched romantically or otherwise, and doesn't like being social. Great. We all understand him now. There is absolutely no reason to constantly remind the readers that touching him makes him wince. (redundancy intended)

I appreciate the fact that the author found a way to make Sarah less of a raging "B" this time. She was utterly unlikeable in the first book, and just as in the first book, the magic system is really well done and continues to be developed nicely. Also, Nick Podehl continues to shine. I just don't think I have another two books worth of "Hogwartz: Sophomore Year" in me....I'm hoping I'm wrong.

5 of 6 people found this review helpful