How far would you go to change humanity's fate?

Jared Cartwright has spent the last two years delving into the twisted, scarred wastelands of an earth ravaged by nuclear war. The rich and powerful have taken to the oceans and skies on floating utopias, escaping destruction and leaving the rest of humanity to fend off the mutated creatures that roam the earth.

To face his new reality, Jared must become an apex predator if he hopes to survive. He must evolve beyond human limitations to confront those that left mankind to die.

Jared's quest takes a new turn when he discovers dragons are real.

I received a free copy of the audiobook from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect the contents of my review and all opinions are my own.

I haven’t read much LitRPG, so when the opportunity came to review the audiobook Radioactive Evolution I was looking forward to it. I know how narration can make or break a book for people and I’m happy to report that the narrators did a great job with this one. I didn’t have trouble understanding what was being said and the narration fit well with the story. Radioactive Evolution feels like a video game and I loved watching the story unfold through the eyes of our main characters, Jared (human) and Scarlet (dragon).

What I enjoyed most about this book was the idea of the characters being able to level up after fighting enemies and gaining nanotechnology that allows them to divvy it up to increase strength, mental capacity, or regeneration. I also found Jared and Scarlet’s relationship quite interesting, since they have a special bond. And can I just say… for someone who’s read about dragons in books multiple times, I loved how massive Scarlet was. Imagine Godzilla and just, wow. That’s terrifying and brilliant all at once.

Some things didn’t work as well for me though. While Jared and Scarlet’s relationship was explained, I sometimes found their interactions a bit overdone. I also found a lot of things explained in general. I know this is part of the worldbuilding and sharing the knowledge with readers, but I would have loved more show than tell for parts of the book. Another thing I struggled with was the pacing. Even though things were happening one after another, I found that I just wasn’t as engaged in the story. It wasn’t bad per se, but I didn’t have the urge to keep going when a chapter ended. This is just my experience and preference of course and I can see other readers having no problem with things I mentioned.

Overall Radioactive Evolution opened my eyes to the fascinating world of LitRPG. It was fun and interesting and I think gamers will particularly love it!

Thank you so much to Richard Hummel and Kelsey at Book Publicity Services for sending me a signed copy of this book to review!

The style of this book was so different than everything I’ve ever read. It’s described as LitRPG, which I didn’t even know was a subgenre until this book! It makes total sense though when reading it. It reads very much like a video game – where you can “loot” things so to speak, upgrade your character, defeat bosses, etc. I feel like it generally melds well with a novel style, since it’s obviously basically like any character that goes on an adventure. The style was super interesting, but ultimately one of the things I struggled with. I know many people will enjoy it, but I still haven’t decided if it’s for me.

Our two main characters are Jared (a human) and Scarlet (the dragon he becomes bonded with). I found Scarlet way more compelling, and I think it was mainly because she had the knowledge of her forebears passed down, and the fact that she was alive for hundreds of years before she hatched. Which is a pretty cool concept, that she was alive and conscious within her egg. Jared is fine, but I just didn’t feel a very strong attachment to him. I liked that he was very caring and driven to help others, but other than that I felt like something was lacking.

The world setting was super interesting! That was probably my favorite thing. Things have basically gone wack on Earth’s surface, and there are strange creatures everywhere. Just plain monstrous things, and also things like giant rats and bunnies that are not at all cute and cuddly but pretty vicious. I won’t go in to detail but the scene with the lake and underground bunker/base thing had a VERY interesting “monster”. That was probably my favorite umm not like subplot but it was my favorite part of the story, definitely. There are also floating cities for the rich that float above earth, and I wish we had gotten to see more of that because it sounds cool. I’m sure that will be a thing explored in the future though.

I think the pacing was overall pretty good, but it did feel a bit draggy in some points, where Jared and Scarlet are gaining skills (aka kinda like “leveling up”).

To summarize, I think the world was super interesting, and for the most part the plot was also pretty compelling. I think my main issue was the style (LitRPG). It made it difficult for me to connect with the characters and the story. However I think that’s a very personal thing, and many people will probably enjoy it immensely!

Once again, thank you so much Richard and Kelsey for sending me a copy to review!