I dnf’d. It couldn’t hold my attention. So I skipped posting a review. Maybe another title by this author would work for me.

Solid audiobook adaption of a popular Korean web novel. In this fantasy world, a large industry is built around clearing dungeons of dangerous monsters by ranked adventurers. Jinwoo Sung is bottom ranked, but after sacrificing himself to save his party in a double dungeon, he wakes up to find the voice of the System in his head. Suddenly, he is being coached in a manner similar to grinding in a modern videogame. While he builds his skills and arsenal beyond his world's capabilities, Jinwoo struggles to keep his abilities secret while earning money in dungeons. But skills like this never remain secret for long.

Loved loved loved it.

I followed the webtoon (Manhwa) until it ended and I absolutely loved it.
I cannot wait to hear more of the following volumes.

Solo Leveling is one of my favorite manhwas ever and I was so happy when I got accepted for an audiobook. I read the light novel when it was only fan translated and I remember the happiness I felt while reading, getting deeper in the story I love so much. I felt even happier when I listened to this audiobook. The narrator was chef's kiss, they couldn't have picked a better person for the job.

For everyone who isn't familiar with Solo Leveling, it is a story about the weakest hunter in the modern world where dungeons and monsters exist. One day he gets a power that allows him to become stronger and level up and we follow him through that journey.

This is a perfect pick for the fans of Sword Art Online, Ready Player One, or Warcross. Be sure to check it out!

As much as a Sung Jin-Woo fangirl I am, unfortunately, I could not finish this audiobook. I've been following the Solo Leveling manhwa throughout this year, waiting keenly for the chapters to drop every Wednesday, and was SO DELIGHTED when Netgalley approved me for its audiobook. No offense to Ki Hong Lee; they have the perfect voice for audiobook narration. However, I just don't think SL is meant to be consumed in an audio format.

What makes SL so popular within the manhwa community is the art and the overpowered MC you just can't help feel attracted to regardless of your sexual orientation. It's totally visual. Harsh truth, but I don't think the majority of people read it for the plot (which according to Reddit users has rushed quite a lot in the latest chapters as compared to the novel). So what people actually read it for, gets taken down in this audiobook, such that all that's left to look at is the plot. Hong Lee tries his best to make the onomatopoeia come alive as well but it just doesn't work out like the manhwa.

I'm very glad that the audiobook exists so more people can know about Jin-Woo but I don't think they'll fall for him as hard as the manhwa readers will do. I may pick up the light novel very soon but I doubt even that will level the effect of the manhwa.

So, let me preface this review by saying that I read the comic first so I knew what I wanted to expect from the audibook; I knew what I loved about the comic although I knew this was the original material, there was some hope it would live up to the gloriousness that is the comic: reader, let me tell you, it did.

They couldn't have picked a better narrator, the story was fluid and fully realised in their voice.

If you're knew to this story, and like games, monsters, magic and OP characters that just keep getting stronger, this is the audiobook for you. It features a healthy amount of fights, battles and leveling up!

For all fans of anime and manga.

The story was really good but I didn't particularly enjoy the audiobook.
This is a great one to pick up if you're looking for an adventure story.

This was a really gripping and compelling light novel. It asks the question of what happens when a quest-driven MMO rule system becomes available to one person in our reality (or in our reality if random mystical dungeons popped up regularly in downtown Seoul and some humans got mystical powers to deal with them). The low-powered protagonist is cagey and uses his unique circumstances to power up and find a way to make a life for his sister without giving away his secret. The story sets up some good allies and some very interesting conflicts and antagonists, and while it was more violent and morally grey than I was expecting I really had a hard time putting it down. Lookin forward to more!

A full 5 STARS for the story!

As for the Audiobook adaptation, nothing anywhere near that.

Solo Leveling is a story that comes with an already established, devoted fan base. Including me. I've read and absolutely loved the manhwa. And when I consume the story through yet another medium, all I expect is it to not be a disappointment. Which, unfortunately this kind of turned out to be.

Keeping aside the narration for now, the writing itself, translation-wise, I'd say, is quite good. I have no idea how this reads on paper, but I'd expect it would be much more easy to follow, what with gaming stats appearing dozens of times in the story. As for the action words, I'm imagining lots of capitalised words and exclamation points. I'd have liked them to be much, much less frequent. Overall, this would get 4 out of 5 from me. Could be better, but not bad.

Now, for the narration. Where do I start? Opting a single person narration without any other background sound, for a story that's very much action-oriented, was a choice. In my opinion, a dramatised version would have been such an unforgettable experience. But, we get what we get. That's not to fault the narrator. Much. Listening to an actual Korean-American voice the story was one of the best parts of this audiobook.
But there's only so many times you can hear 'BAM!', 'CREAK', 'THWACK!', 'RUMBLE', 'SWOOSH!' and 'CLANG' as actual words, and not get frustrated out of your mind. Also, how squeaky do people think female shouts get? I still can't get those particular sounds out of my ears.

So, while I loved listening to the non-action, narrative parts of the story, the rest of it will not let me rate the Audio any higher than a 2 stars.

Overall, I'd recommend to stick to the manhwa. Can't speak for the print version of the translated novel, but I'd say audiobook experience is not worth it. Looking at the wonderful art is a much better way to consume this story.

*Thanks to Hachette Audio and NetGalley for providing me a chance to listen to this audiobook. All the thoughts and opinions here are unbiased and my own.*

As someone who loves stories that centre around anti-hero underdogs working hard to topple some rigid hierarchy, this novel was utterly riverting and one thrillingly entertaining experience. With a mix of video game, dungeons, raids, abilities, family bonding, hunters, kdrama level twists and mind boggling stats, this is a novel a diverse range of audience can enjoy in the fantasy genre and something i will certainly now be recommending at my city libraries.

5/5 stars!

When E-rank hunter Jinwoo Sung goes to the latest dungeon with his party, he didn't realize that it would change his life. Being the lowest-ranking hunter, Jinwoo had fought against adversity and the social norms that has shaped the world when dungeons had appeared and certain people had become hunters. At this particular dungeon, danger he had never known was in front of him. And at his lowest, a certain notification appeared in front of him: he has become a Player.

This phenomenal light novel series by Chugong has become a recent fave of mine. The audiobook version is narrated by Ki Hong Lee, an excellent choice for this particular novel. I enjoyed everything about this first volume, from each nuance that the narrator brought to all the characters and the effects like the notifications that pop up for Jinwoo Sung. I highly recommend this audiobook version of this series!

**Thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for the review copy. All opinions and thoughts in the review are my own.**

Solo Leveling or "I Alone Level Up" as it is titled in Korea. So when approaching Solo Leveling, the real question is WebNovel or WebComic? Which is the better experience, and does an audiobook version bring anything to the table?
Pricing-wise, published web novel and audiobook end up costing roughly the same price. However, pricing gets weird when it comes to the WebComic; while it is available by volume, it is also free to read legally through Tappy Toon—allowing it to be viewed for free(ish). So it, in reality, comes down to how you want to consume your content and understanding there are variances in the work as the WebComic is an adaptation.

I enjoyed the novel because Sung Jin Woo actually feels human and has a somewhat more human response to the situations he finds himself in. This could be because, for the novel, we exist in his head but rather than a third-party observer.

The webcomic makes him feel more like a generic Isekai protagonist, who honestly seems a lot more willing to kill than his novel counterpart. He also lacks a lot of the compassion we are shown in the novel.

What the webcomic did great instead was the story. Some points honestly spooked me while reading the webcomic that just didn't shine through the same or it at all in the book. In addition, the images and backgrounds allow for a level of worldbuilding that isn't as easy to present in written form.

If I were to narrow it down to one factor on how to pick, I'd say if you are more interested in character development, read or listen to the book. On the other hand, if you care more about the story of Jin Woo and this world, pick up the comic.

A weird note about the novel, and subsequently this audiobook, is that instead of describing something, you WILL get an onomatopoeia instead, just like if you were reading a comic. Which is odd at some points and hilarious at others; one specifically caused me to burst out laughing at work.
But this way of writing is so different that it is easy to understand that it could be more challenging to listen to this book instead of reading it.
I'd say it took me around an hour to acclimate.

Also, if you go looking for more info on this series, be careful. I felt like everywhere I turned held more spoilers for me.

Pretty early on I figured that this book was not for me. But I stuck with it, sadly, and now I feel that I've lost a great deal of time on something I didn'r enjoy. I didn't like the characters, the main character was just "meh" and had no development. I didn'tcare for anything or anyone in this book, and it all just seemed so repetitive.

Solo Leveling follows the adventure of Jinwoo who is the lowest ranked hunter ever. In this world, there are monsters and dungeons. It reminded me a lot of Ready Player One (Ernest Cline) meets Warcross (Marie Lu) where the main protagonist is put in a video game-esque type world and have to do their best to survive.

What was most fun about Solo Leveling was the action. The readers learn about Jinwoo's power ups and the System at the same time Jinwoo does, and the author does an excellent job in walking us through Jinwoo's thought proccesses. It made it easier to imerse oneself in the story.

The relationships formed throughout the first novel was also quite interesting to unwrap. In particular, Jinwoo and Jinho's partnership. Constantly wondering how much of each others backs do they actually have.

I originally knew about Solo Levelling due to it's popular webtoon counterpart. After reading the novel, I definitely want to check it out! I can only imagine it being even more immersive than it's novel. I look forward for the second novel!

thank you to netgalley and the publisher for providing me with a free audiobook in exchange for an honest review! this has not affected my review in any way, all opinions are mine.

2/5

this was honestly a disappointment to me. i'm not entirely sure how Official (TM) translations of korean webnovels usually go, and how strict a translation this was, but so many parts felt like the same line was being repeated over and over again, telling us information that had both been thought and said aloud and then again. this is only my second korean webnovel, so maybe that's just part of the style that i'm used to, but it made the book feel stagnant and repetitive.

the main character felt very stagnant as well. i didn't really care about him in a way that i SHOULD for an mc. i absolutely understand that this is volume 1, but it didn't really feel as if he had much growth or arc, and there's only maybe one character i'm interested in hearing more from. i don't think i'll be continuing with this story unfortunately

The audio on this book is fantastic. Actor Ki Hong Lee does a great job with the audio. I like that the inflections and cadences feel Korean. It fits well with the book and I'm glad that the company chose a Korean narrator.

The story itself is great. I am desperate to get my eyes or ears on volume 2. I enjoy the characters and way their story is being told. The whole time I was listening to it, I was imaging what a great Kdrama this story would make. The story has similar gory fantasy vibes to the drama Sweet Home, which was also adapted from a web story.

A quick disclaimer: While I haven’t read the Solo Leveling webnovel or manhwa, I’m a long time reader of fan-translated Asian LitRPG/Isekai/SFF webnovels. I’m familiar with the tropes and the general pitfalls of these kinds of webnovels a reader new to this genre may not have. This review will be written from that perspective. As an aside, as a long-time reader, reading an officially translated audiobook version was a very weird experience. Not bad, per se, but like the feeling of two very different, separate worlds intersecting in a way that makes you think, huh. that shouldn’t happen.

I’ve seen the cover of the Solo Leveling manhwa for years, though I’ve never picked it up. Seeing the audiobook up on NetGalley really was the final push to pique my curiosity and I’m pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed it.

Sung Jinwoo is the world’s weakest hunter and man with a frequent flyers card to the ER room, but makes up for his weakness with clever thinking and a sheer willpower to not get murdered by interdimensional monsters in a pseudo-videogame. Naturally, after he’s given the power to “level up”, quite literally, his hunting abilities, it’s quick work for Jinwoo to drastically get stronger a la video game stat points (STR, WIS, AGI, etc).

Solo Leveling takes place in an alt-universe modern-day South Korea, where magical portals leading to “dungeons” filled with malicious monsters that threaten humanity. Simultaneously, certain humans have been awakened as Hunters, people with the magical abilities to kill these monsters. Hunters come in various classes, and of various power levels that cannot be changed (cue entrance of our protag). Built around this are various international Guilds and government-funded Hunter Associations to handle these portals. All in all, think the classic RPG video game elements and you’ll have a pretty solid idea of the worldbuilding.

Book 1 of Solo Leveling focuses primarily on Sung Jinwoo’s development – how he got these leveling skills and his initial explorations to figure out what the hell is going on. Naturally, there’s a lot of focus on the System (aka the RPG UI interface) he interacts with as he learns. We don’t go too heavy on the guilds or really into other supporting characters, which might read strangely to Western readers unfamiliar with webnovels, but keep in mind the full story has 240+ chapters and we’re only getting the first 12 or so!

Having read neither the fan translation nor the original Korean, I unfortunately cannot comment on the quality of the translation. The most I can say is that thankfully, the character’s names are still formatted <Last name><First name> and not localized (a personal massive pet peeve). The narrator, Ki Hong Lee, is Korean-American so there’s also no worry about having to suffer through badly pronounced Korean.

Perhaps my only complaints with the audiobook edition are that there Chugong really really likes their onomatopoeias. There’s a lot of “shkk” and “grrrr” and ‘skrrr” and the ever present “Ding!”, that all get read aloud. Which, when narrated, I surprisingly found annoying. The other part is that every time Jinwoo opens up his stats page or levels up a stat, the entire stats page gets read to you. Which happens about once a chapter. In-text, I think most readers would simply skim over this kind of information, but over audio… Man, I really don’t need to hear what this guy’s INT stat is every single time (SINCE HE DOESN’T CHANGE IT).

Overall, I rate this book a 4/5. This first volume is pretty standard material for an Asian LitRPG webnovel, but it’s laid the groundwork for some potentially really awesome stuff to come. The audiobook was an odd but enjoyable experience I’ll definitely be checking out the manhwa while I wait for book 2.

There needed to be more world-building, since I kind of jumped into the world that seemed like ours but with hunters and gates that were not explained. A fun writing style used to explore interesting ideas that made this an enjoyable read, I will be looking for book 2.

I requested this one because it might be a 2021 title I would like to review on my Youtube Channel. However, after reading the first several chapters I have determined that this book is not my tastes. So I decided to DNF this one rather than push myself to finish it only to give it a poor review.

A wonderfully unique take on the world of gaming, made even more accessible thru a well narrated Audiobook!

Imagine you woke up one day to gates of monsters, goblins and magic!! Imagine if you became an elite hunter!!

Imagine if you were able to level up your real-time skills like in a video game!!!

Welcome to Solo Leveling.