The Bookwyrm's Review of Battleborne by Dave Willmarth

 

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Rating: 9.5/10 Stars

Synopsis

Max was a professional soldier, and extremely good at his job. Right up until it killed him.

At the moment of his death, he meets Hildi the Valkyrie, and is given three options. Serve Odin in Valhalla as one of the Einherjar, fighting each day and celebrating each night until the battle of Ragnarok. Accept his death as final, and end his existence. Or be reincarnated as a Battleborne on a random unknown world.

Max chooses to gamble! To live a new life, whatever that might entail. Favored with a blessing of the Valkyries, who gift him with an unusual bloodline, he is reborn on a world of magic and monsters. In fact, his own new body is half monster!

Thrust into the world with nothing but a canvas diaper, sharp teeth, and claws, Max must use his skills as a soldier to improvise and survive. There are no respawns, and at level zero, nearly everything can kill him.

With his new status as one of the Battleborne, much is expected of Max. Dangerous and difficult quests are presented to him, and the loot ranges from filthy goblin loincloths to epic weapons!

Join Max as he learns to navigate his new life, struggling with the instincts of his monster bloodlines, and taking advantage of them at the same time.

Review

I always enjoy when authors manage to mix in real world action with traditional fantasy elements, and cross it into a LitRPG/Progression type universe. In Battleborne, Dave Willmarth manages just that feat. Mixing in realistic modern combat at the beginning of the story, it quickly mixes with a bit of Norse mythology, leading to a reincarnation in a fantasy progression setting with LitRPG elements that is just seamless. There is some real creativity involved in mixing these elements successfully.

The world Max finds himself in is a great example of a fantasy world with some excellent LitRPG/Progression twists. It's a world of magic and steel, a world where dwarves, humans, orcs, goblins, gnolls and dragons exist, not always peacefully. It's a world where you can meet a god  who gives out quests, where you can get everything from riches to experience that will help level you up. Its also a world where life can be taken in so many ways. It's a visceral experience, as if someone's D&D campaign came to brilliant life. There's a feeling that this is a vast world to explore, and the journey is only just beginning. 

The characters are the real strength of this story, especially Max. His story arc is very intriguing, starting as a soldier under fire in a war in our world, given a second chance at life by a Valkyrie after an explosion puts an end to his war. He is not a gamer, so getting set in a world with some game type rules like classes and stat building is  foreign to him. He is also much changed from his human form, since his new form, Chimera, is a cross between human, dark elf, troll and stone talon. This mix makes him strong, hard to kill, and have potential to use magic, with the weaknesses of his monster half of being too dense to swim and being more flammable to contend with. Not a bad trade to Max's way of thinking. It makes him even deadlier in a fight than he was as a soldier in our world, and Max is determined to make the most of this new opportunity. Especially after a run in with the dwarven god of smiths, Regan, who points Max on a quest to earn his favor, something Max would be a fool to pass up. We get to see Max progress quickly, as his unique build is fantastic for gaining experience through combat, and he is given plenty of opportunity as the story progresses. He also takes advantage of the dwarves generosity to learn some non-combat skills too, such as smithing. When Max makes a hasty decision after a battle to accept becoming a king, he has a whole new set of problems to overcome, but with the help of his companions, he may just be able to rise to the occasion.

The secondary characters are a nice mix. They range from a goblin shaman that is now the leader of his goblin tribe, now that Max has eliminated his competition, to the king of the Dwarves, who sees Max as a powerful fighter who can help solve several of his own problems. In addition, there is a dwarven lady that Max becomes better than good friends with, who teaches Max a thing or two about combat in this world, as well as just what honor means in this setting. These are just a few of the examples, and they never come across as just two dimensional cutouts there to make the plot move, but fully fleshed out characters in their own right who you grow to care about. 

The main antagonist so far in the story is the War Leader of the orcs that live in an abandoned human city to the north of the dwarves. He is ambitious and greedy, and willing to do what it takes to accomplish his goals. The orcs in this world are not necessarily evil, and can have honor, but this one is not one of those. He rose to power by killing his predecessor, and will do whatever he can to gain more power, including betraying those who come to him in peace bearing gifts of friendship. In other words, he's a right bastard who can't be trusted to not stick a knife in your back the second your back is turned. He makes an excellent foil to Max, who doesn't appreciate duplicity in the slightest.

The audio book version is narrated by the talented Daniel Wisniewski and Jessica Threet. They both do a fantastic job bringing emotional resonance into their characters, so much so that you are drawn into the story. You can feel their triumphs and tragedies as though you were living them yourself. They do a great job differentiating each character, and the listener is never in doubt about what character is speaking. You can tell that both narrators had some fun working on this, and it made it all the better.

This is a book that I think can appeal to a broad range of people. Whether it be people who like epic fantasy, LitRPG, dark fantasy or even comedic fantasy, I think that there is something here for everyone. It is just a good story with some great characters and world building, and who wouldn't want to read that? I highly recommend checking this book out.