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literarypenguin's review against another edition
adventurous
funny
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.0
Where do I begin to explain Battle of the Linguist Mages. It has some good and some bad and a lot of confusion after the first half for this person.
The first half of the book was very interesting and introduced us to our main character Isobel, a gamer girl who is slightly obsessed with a game called Sparkle Dungeon. A game that she is very good at and is top of the leaderboard. In that way Isobel is a relatable character to me as I love gaming and love to learn about the mechanics of a game. The idea of Sparkle Dungeon and using vocal prompts to play the game was very fascinating. I loved how the author made this mechanic into the game and created a whole world within this game.
The plot I really can't say what happens, the first half was pretty easy to understand to me. Isobel was hired to be a game tester because of her skill and abilities at Sparkle Dungeon but while she was working there she discovers a more sinister plot behind the scenes. They are trying to gather power morphemes, vocal codes that people can use to control other people just by speaking a series of phrases and words. They want to use this for their own nefarious purposes and Isobel breaks away from them to stop their pursuit of this. After this the book loses me and my investment in the plot was lost with it. I can't say what the plot was or where it was going. I struggled getting through the last half of the book and couldn't figure out what was going on with it.
Things that I didn't like in this book were how every character was introduced using their pronouns, like he/him white guy it got old really fast and kind of took me out of the book a little bit. I also didn't like how insta lovey the relationship between Isobel and Maddy was, I felt like it went to fast and quick for me. It didn't feel believable to me and could have used more development. The humor was funny at first but quickly lost it's stride in the first half and got more dated and cringy as the book went on.
Not my favorite book and was hard to get through at the end but some things like the game itself were things I wished could have been done more and what I hoped for.
The first half of the book was very interesting and introduced us to our main character Isobel, a gamer girl who is slightly obsessed with a game called Sparkle Dungeon. A game that she is very good at and is top of the leaderboard. In that way Isobel is a relatable character to me as I love gaming and love to learn about the mechanics of a game. The idea of Sparkle Dungeon and using vocal prompts to play the game was very fascinating. I loved how the author made this mechanic into the game and created a whole world within this game.
The plot I really can't say what happens, the first half was pretty easy to understand to me. Isobel was hired to be a game tester because of her skill and abilities at Sparkle Dungeon but while she was working there she discovers a more sinister plot behind the scenes. They are trying to gather power morphemes, vocal codes that people can use to control other people just by speaking a series of phrases and words. They want to use this for their own nefarious purposes and Isobel breaks away from them to stop their pursuit of this. After this the book loses me and my investment in the plot was lost with it. I can't say what the plot was or where it was going. I struggled getting through the last half of the book and couldn't figure out what was going on with it.
Things that I didn't like in this book were how every character was introduced using their pronouns, like he/him white guy it got old really fast and kind of took me out of the book a little bit. I also didn't like how insta lovey the relationship between Isobel and Maddy was, I felt like it went to fast and quick for me. It didn't feel believable to me and could have used more development. The humor was funny at first but quickly lost it's stride in the first half and got more dated and cringy as the book went on.
Not my favorite book and was hard to get through at the end but some things like the game itself were things I wished could have been done more and what I hoped for.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Cursing
Minor: Sexual content
sarah984's review against another edition
adventurous
lighthearted
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
1.0
This book really disappointed me. None of the characters felt like real people and they were impossible to tell apart, the game did not feel like a real game (and making the game VR felt pointless), every single plan was stupid, there was no character growth, and the magic system was both barely related to linguistics (it's basically dragon shouting like in Skyrim) and impossible to understand (it just did whatever the plot needed it to do). Like outside of the purpose in which they use it in the story Headphone Splitter is a completely pointless spell that can be better accomplished by existing technology. A bunch of stuff (especially around the Scientology plotline and the nature of the punctuation marks) is brought up but never resolved.
Every character is introduced with this weird title card featuring their name, race and (presumed) pronouns but this both feels clunky and borderline offensive on occasion and highlights how almost all of the characters are cisgender white people so I'm not sure what the point was. Half the plot is descriptions of things that happened that are just glossed over.
This book feels like it really wants to be the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, but it isn't.
Every character is introduced with this weird title card featuring their name, race and (presumed) pronouns but this both feels clunky and borderline offensive on occasion and highlights how almost all of the characters are cisgender white people so I'm not sure what the point was. Half the plot is descriptions of things that happened that are just glossed over.
This book feels like it really wants to be the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, but it isn't.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Death, Blood, Genocide, Injury/Injury detail, War, Body horror, Gun violence, Confinement, Vomit, Drug use, Violence, and Torture
Minor: Sexual content
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