I've found this novel when searched for kingdom building novels. I'm writing this review (actually my first review here) because this frustrating "has not enough reviews" is unfair to this well written novel and I believe can deal harm and demotivate author. Unfortunately there is not so much of kingdom building currently (as of chapter 40), first book is focused more on introduction of characters, merchant stuff and brandy (you know the deal, as usual divine knowledge from the other world makes genius prince somewhat richer, in this case knowledge is about brandy but not only about it, though). Second book focuses on political stuff and... brandy. So far author delivered everything promised in synopsis and that is good. Surely there are some not very polished plot twists, background setting and story development, personally I find it unbelievable that there are no navigation instruments yet when there are lengthy sea travels and guns in the world. But whatever, it is fantasy world after all. First book covers about five years of main character life, but I didn't feel that story is rushed. Considering all things together there are no THAT BIG and obvious plot holes, character decisions seems logical and rational, fitting setting. There are different religions in this novel and they seem to affect politics. No much focus on cultivation as in the most Chinese novels with levels, qi and stuff. No gaming elements. Magic is not mentioned explicitly, however there is some kind of mysterious stuff I guess. Battle scenes are reasonably detailed, characters are powerful but not completely overpowered. No questionable romance, no harem, no all this crap, at least yet. No misogyny, though. As far as I remember there were no any female characters until last couple of chapters. BTW, chapters itself are lengthy enough. Overall this is one of the most interesting novels I've read on this site up to date. If you enjoy Release That Witch, Kingdom's Bloodline or Rise of the Lord, then you're likely to enjoy this novel as well, though this novel is different from the mentioned once.
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Thank you very much for your kind review. I've actually noticed the lack of female characters in the first volume before, and it's a bit of a missed chance, since the two main cultures so far treat women very differently. I intend to fix that in a future version of this story. Apart from that, I'm finally back to posting. Expect many chapters over the next couple days. :D
Hello what do you mean by "future version" :)
SociableHermit:Thank you very much for your kind review. I've actually noticed the lack of female characters in the first volume before, and it's a bit of a missed chance, since the two main cultures so far treat women very differently. I intend to fix that in a future version of this story. Apart from that, I'm finally back to posting. Expect many chapters over the next couple days. :D
Hello what do you mean by "future version" :)
SociableHermit:Thank you very much for your kind review. I've actually noticed the lack of female characters in the first volume before, and it's a bit of a missed chance, since the two main cultures so far treat women very differently. I intend to fix that in a future version of this story. Apart from that, I'm finally back to posting. Expect many chapters over the next couple days. :D
If I ever publish this story (on amazon and such), I will completely rework this first book. One of those changes will be the inclusion of female characters (female nobles to be exact) to show some more cultural differences. I probably won't do it for this version though. I'm still pretty happy with what I have up right now, and a rewrite seems hardly worth it, with how relatively unpopular my novel seems to be.
Sphook:Hello what do you mean by "future version" :)
In terms of female character's share of spotlight next chapters that I've read after this review are more balanced. It adds more breadth to story. I'm a bit curious about future of those characters (and wouldn't mind to get more depth in this area, I'm loyal supporter of Sumaci), but kingdom building is what I'm really into. Chapters in the third book are pretty good in this aspect, less fine-grained details of nobles politics, more focus on region and local governance issues. IMHO, it fast-forwards a bit sometimes, leaps to next year in ten chapters or so, would be interesting to read somewhat more details on continuous development of a new tech and products, maybe a short arc on local soldiers training (even prisoners get more attention to theirs life than local soldiers), population loyalty improvements (banquet arc shows great result, I believe it might be better with a couple of intermediate steps towards that result), or more overview of improvements in economics and such. Good novel, nevertheless. Thanks for writing it.
SociableHermit:If I ever publish this story (on amazon and such), I will completely rework this first book. One of those changes will be the inclusion of female characters (female nobles to be exact) to show some more cultural differences. I probably won't do it for this version though. I'm still pretty happy with what I have up right now, and a rewrite seems hardly worth it, with how relatively unpopular my novel seems to be.
In the next book, the armies will actually be important, so I'll show some more of the army training then. I had much more planned for this novel, but cut out a lot because I felt it might slow down the tempo too much. Might go back and add an extra chapter or two in at a later date.
th_:In terms of female character's share of spotlight next chapters that I've read after this review are more balanced. It adds more breadth to story. I'm a bit curious about future of those characters (and wouldn't mind to get more depth in this area, I'm loyal supporter of Sumaci), but kingdom building is what I'm really into. Chapters in the third book are pretty good in this aspect, less fine-grained details of nobles politics, more focus on region and local governance issues. IMHO, it fast-forwards a bit sometimes, leaps to next year in ten chapters or so, would be interesting to read somewhat more details on continuous development of a new tech and products, maybe a short arc on local soldiers training (even prisoners get more attention to theirs life than local soldiers), population loyalty improvements (banquet arc shows great result, I believe it might be better with a couple of intermediate steps towards that result), or more overview of improvements in economics and such. Good novel, nevertheless. Thanks for writing it.
