5/5 stars
Synopsis
Warning! This section contains spoilers, if you would like to avoid these spoilers, jump to the review below.
Montana, when he escaped from the dungeon, was granted a boon from the god of monsters. The boon was a monster companion, and he received the monster companion in this book.
Montana tried to get workers who would help him build a city, but he ran into some problems.
The city was attacked by monsters, and Montana helped defend the city. Montana hired people to help build the settlement. Before he could leave the city, Montana had to complete a quest for someone in his group. However, when he went to do that, he got sucked into another quest. This quest was to deal with a woman in the city who was murdering children.
They traveled to the area that they were going to build in, and Montana had to empty his bag of holding to see what construction materials there were. A child was stolen by goblins when they were trying to build a tunnel. Montana got the child back.
Montana had a problem due to the fact that he had no money to fund the building of the settlement. So he went to the lair or the wyrm he had killed in a previous book to try and collect the hoard. But he didn’t realize that there was an ancient wyrm in the cave, and needed to fight it. He defeated the wyrm, claimed the treasure, then, when he got back to the settlement, claimed the dukedom. That action led to more difficulties.
Review
I enjoyed this book. Once again, my favorite part about the book was Montana. His character has been really well-developed. In this book, he faced difficulties, and he was able to overcome some, but others he was not able to overcome. He wasn’t always successful, and that helped make the story interesting. I do not enjoy books where the main character never struggles. I think they are boring because I am never worried for the main character. I know they are always going to be successful.
In this book, Montana also struggled with who he was trying to be, and who he had been back on Earth. He was worried that he was just trying to be a good guy to compensate for his past, instead of actually being a good guy in his core. I thought this was really interesting, and showed more of Montana’s character. He genuinely wanted to be a good guy, and worried that he wasn’t good enough. As a character, Montana just wanted to help everyone. It was endearing.
It was interesting seeing the way Montana had to fight against the culture (people hated nonhumans and magic). This book did have some humorous moments, like when Montana was trying to complete a quest, but it led to a side quest, which led to another side quest, and he was getting frustrated. And then when he finished the side quest and traveled back to his people, he realized that he had forgotten to do the main quest and had to go back and complete the quest.
Fireheart Books 