3.5/5 – With a fierce and loyal protagonist, dragons, epic fight scenes, dragons and a video game-like style there was a lot to love about this novel (also did I mention the dragons?!?). Strangely addictive and action packed from start to finish, Richard Hummel had me staying up all hours of the night to find out what was going to happen next!
Title: Radioactive Evolution
Author: Richard Hummel
Published by: Richard Hummel
Year: 2018
Genre: LitRPG, Dystopia, Fantasy
Synopsis: “Decimated by nuclear war, humanity stands at the precipice of extinction. The rich and powerful take to the oceans and skies on floating utopias, escaping destruction and forcing everyone else to fend off mutated creatures that roam the world.
At the turn of the third millennium, earth’s remaining survivors glimpse hope when a brilliant scientist invents nanotechnology, and mankind finally has a chance to push back against the walls of their radioactive prisons.
No longer enslaved within the safe zone, Jared embraces the new technology. He plunges deep into the twisted, scarred wastelands and unwittingly binds himself to a being of great power. But a discovery breeds doubt and fear; the nanomachines surging inside his body are killing him!
Faced with this new reality, Jared must become an apex predator to survive. He must surpass human limitations to defeat those in power and bring justice to any deserving.”
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/42514577-radioactive-evolution?from_search=true
This novel was new territory for me! I’m not much of a gamer, and I haven’t read any LitRPG style books EVER, so I was a little nervous accepting this review request, but boy am I so glad I did! I was so pleasantly surprised by this novel!!! I found it strangely addictive and had trouble putting it down to do the life things (eating and sleeping and assignments… oops).
Anyway, first off I just want to say Radioactive Evolution is Hummel’s first novel. It shows. There were a couple of little mistakes throughout and the descriptions and dialogue could get a little repetitive, but this is common with new authors and it did not distract or interrupt my reading flow at all (in fact I barely noticed it, but I still have to mention it because I’m obsessed with the little details). Overall I was pretty impressed by this work and give my props to Hummel on the creation of his first novel!!
So now that’s out of the way, let’s get into it a little more. The setting of this book was fantastic! It’s set in a futuristic America that’s kind of gone to trash. Hummel’s descriptions of the landscapes abled me to form detailed images in my mind and they weren’t over the top (which I loved – there’s nothing worse than pages upon pages of descriptions of a tree, ya know what I mean). I would have liked to explore a few more places outside of the main locations, but I loved what we did get to see.
The plot was well placed and super unique (to me anyway, I don’t have much experience within this genre). There’s lots of action!!! Like, lots. The fight scenes were epic, although verging on a little long for me personally, but they weren’t like one after another after another so I could like calm down and breathe and not stress about Jared’s life sometimes. There was actual storyline and developing characters and there were no points that I felt myself bored and not wanting to continue with it (I kind of devoured this novel in a week, which with my schedule right now meant I’ve had a few sleepless nights – but they were WORTH IT)
The story is written in third person (excellent!!!) and follows protagonist Jared and his bonded dragon (YES DRAGON, I KNOW IT WAS AWESOME) Scarlet. At first I really didn’t know how to feel about this and it took some time to get used to the way they communicated and such, but by the end of it I was absolutely in love with Jared and Scarlet’s bond and friendship. There’s a colony of people that Jared comes across about halfway through the book (this was such a cool storyline by the way, like I LOVED the way these new characters came into the book – I’m not going to expand on this though cause I don’t want to spoil it for anyone, you’ll just have to trust me on this). Vanessa (the unofficial leader of the colony) became one of my favourite characters and I’m so excited to see how her character and her relationship with Jared develops in the books to come!
There wasn’t really anything in this book I didn’t enjoy. The only thing I will say is the dialogue could sometimes come across a bit robotic/unnatural. Again, I believe this is just due to the fact this Hummel’s first novel and it didn’t impact reading or connecting with the characters.
Overall, I thoroughly enjoyed this book and want to give the author a huge thank you for providing me with a copy of the book in exchange for an honest review. I look forward to watching Hummel grow as a writer and to finding out what happens next in this series!!
Love always,
Lola xx
Links for the book and author:
Richard Hummel Goodreads:
https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/322529.Richard_Hummel
Radioactive Evolution on Goodreads:
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/42514577-radioactive-evolution?from_search=true
Lola's Library 