New Book Review: "Soul Synergy" by David North and Michael Dalton
"Soul Synergy is the first in a new series of magical fantasy novels by David North and Michael Dalton, set in North's "Aster Fall" universe in which he has set two other series of novels, the "Guardian of Aster Fall" and "Wild Era" novels.
"Soul Synergy" is set at about the same time as the events of the "Wild Era," series, late in the Chaos War, with several of the characters joining the Stars Alliance organisation which also exists in that series, but we are assured that there will be no spoilers between these two series so it doesn't matter in which order you read them.
This book and series are what's described as a "LITRPG progression fantasy" which means basically that the characters develop skills and abilities and gain levels both overall and in those skills with character sheets which work almost exactly as if they were characters in a Dungeons and Dragons-style roleplaying game, but this isn't a game, it is a series of novels. It's also an "Isekei" e.g. a story where one or more characters from Earth find themselves in a completely different world - indeed, they're not only not still on Earth or in our universe, they're not even in our group of Universes.
Callum was a navy veteran and electronics specialist working for the IT department of an office-based company when an ordinary day suddenly got very unusual indeed. He gets a ticket from a colleague called Seraphina (usually known as just Sera) in HR, reporting that "The network connection is down" and nobody in her office can get their computer to do anything.
Sure enough the entire HR department is offline, so he goes to see if there's a hardware fault in their what's wrong with their server, hoping it will just be a loose cable.
It's not a loose cable.
When he opens the door to the network room Callum, and sera who has followed him to see what the problem is, see a bright shimmering mass of energy and in moments the world around them disappears and they find themselves somewhere else.
They are in a world where both society and physics work on completely different rules. Most people can use magic and the fact that Callum and Sera have grown up without learning to do so puts then at what is initially a potentially lethal disadvantage against almost everyone they meet. However, there is not sign of any technology as advanced as a steam engine or later technology, and many areas of the world seem to be governed by force rather than law.
If they want to survive, Callum and Sera will have to adapt to this new world very fast indeed ...
If you are a reader who follows Michael Dalton's output for the, ahem, "unconventional romance" aspects of many of his other books, rather than for the LITRPG adventure, you should be aware that "Soul Synergy" does not contain any sexual scenes, let alone any "unconventional" material. What it does have is a very well written, but very slow-burn, conventional romance. The hero and heroine do not even embrace until quite a long way into the book, but when they do, it means something.
On the "Easter Egg" front "Soul Synergy" has a book-end cameo for Krystara, the "Witch Queen of Empyrea" from the "Daltonverse" which reminds me that Michael Dalton had originally planned to write a series with her as the central character. The first book, "Tomb of the Black Wizard" was supposed to come out in summer 2024 so it is, obviously, two years late and counting. Doubtless he is busy with other projects but hopefully this cameo is meant to tell us that Dalton has not forgotten about Krystara and we may get more of her story at some stage.
You can buy "Soul Synergy" from Amazon at
This is a well-written fantasy novel, and the start of what looks likely to be a good series, and I recommend it.
Mitth'raw'nuruodo
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