Abigail the Grimoire

Information

Status

Hiatus

Year

2020

Author

DraconicChoir

• Not a Chapter - Status Update 2
  Jan 6, 2021
• Not a Chapter - Status Update
  Dec 1, 2020
• CH1.10 - Gem: Gearing Up
  Nov 22, 2020
• CH1.9 - How Not to Die
  Nov 18, 2020
• CH1.8 - Gem: How to Train Your Aura
  Nov 14, 2020
• CH1.7 - Gem: Welcome to the First Day of Standing Up School
  Nov 14, 2020
• CH1.6 - Interlude: Contact Rear
  Nov 13, 2020
• CH1.5 - Gem: A Veritably Voracious Visit to Valerie's
  Nov 12, 2020
• CH1.4 - Gem: Getting to Know You.
  Nov 12, 2020
• CH1.3 - Gem: The Headsman of Kilnar
  Nov 11, 2020
• CH1.2 - Gem: Running from Trouble
  Nov 10, 2020
• CH1.1 - Gem: The Return
  Nov 9, 2020
• CH0.6 - Interlude: The End Before the Beginning
  Nov 8, 2020
• CH0.5 - Prologue: Under Siege
  Nov 7, 2020
• CH0.4 - Prologue: Fire Bad, Scales Good.
  Nov 6, 2020
• CH0.3 - Prologue: Not Just Any Book Anymore
  Nov 5, 2020
• CH0.2 - Prologue: Just a Book
  Nov 4, 2020
• CH0.1 - Prologue: River of Souls EDITED!
  Nov 3, 2020

Reviews

Community Reviews(4)

• BrynathRoyal Road

  ★★★★★ 5.0

  Overall I love the story. Nonstandard reincarnation as an object done well.
  Story: Abigail's awakening as a book and her death on Earth is really well done. I do foresee some power scaling issues coming up due to the initial load out of books that she has acquired, but that could also just be a factor of her being an artifact. The world seems like it has some history to it, and there are some plots that are going on outside the main viewpoint, that could turn out interesting.
  Style: No issues noticed in the flow, and some of the scenes grab you.
  Grammar: Nothing jumps out as being wrong, tenses and punctuation seem right, word choice is great.
  Character: Abigail is interesting for a book, her backstory comes through fairly clearly, she does change a bit after Gem is introduced but I think that is more of a function of her coming into her role as a book more than anything.
  Gem is a bit unsure of herself but hopefully will grow into the power that Abigail provides.
  The side characters so far are interesting and varied, though some people might complain about there being mention of Gender Identity included.
  I'm looking forward to seeing where this one goes.
• RattedRoyal Road

  ★★★ 2.5

  The story is a neat idea that first presents itself as what might become a sort of collection of short adventures between a magical grimoire and various owners through time, though it's too early to really tell the direction this story is going. it's overall well written but the characterization is very flat. the grammar is good and the writing style is rather bland or average but with a twist of lazy writing you could find something like magical girl friendship squad, which is a tv show look it up, which causes the characters to have basically no self-awareness. the actual story itself is interesting if you ignore the conversations. it's also clear that some effort has been put into world-building which is a definitive plus, even if it is a bit stereotypical.
  the mc just kinda instantly adapts to their scenario without any actual reaction to dying and then almost burning to death as a book beside a fear of fire, they then go onto join an adventure where they effectively act as the super McGuffin and solve the problems while meeting all the bad guys and all the bad guys happen to be perverts and rapey or something like that. while as a person the mc seems to try and adopt a leadership role in an almost parental way and manages to act as less of an actual sentient being and more of a plot point designed to dispense jokes, info dumps, and virtue signaling. I have a strong hunch that the mc or at least another character is a bit of a self-insert.
  the other main side characters all act as if they are completely familiar with each other even if they only met a very small amount of time ago. Their personalities are more in line with something you would find in an LGBT+ club in a high school than what would reasonably be expected in a magical medieval society that still has major slavery and another such society shaping things. now that's fine and all but it gets distracting when they start spouting modern-day trans culture stuff like asking what your pronouns are or "that
• StillnessRoyal Road

  ★★★ 2.5

  I'd like to start by saying that I like the premise of this story. I think the story of a sentient and powerful book with many weilders through the ages has a lot of potential for intersting stories. The problem is, as always, the story doesn't deliver.
  The first thing I disliked about this story are the begining chapters. The story doesn't actually get interesting untill the main character acually becomes a grimoire. The character has no agency, there is little character development, mostly things are simply observered.
  The second thing is a bit harder to pin down, but to me it feels like the story is rushed and contrived. This may be fixed by the use of foreshadowing in some places. Others need additional world building to show why things happen the way they do. Despite feeling rushed, the story doesn't feel like its going anywhere in particular; things happen, but many don't feel like they have much purpose.
  Third, some character interactions feel unnatural. I think some of that can be solved by showing a characters motivations. One particular example of the unnaturalness is when the main character 'speaks', the dialogue sometimes turns into long blocks of text where that is the only thing that happens. These monologues might work for plays, but feel unnatural in normal conversation.
• rulerhadesRoyal Road

  ★★★ 2.5

  But the LGBT parts killed it combined with the other flaws. My issue isn't that it was in the story, it was the manner in which it was done. For the story itself, my main issues would be with the supporting cast and the use of worldbuilding/plot advancement. At times its hard to tell if the (other)main character is 5 or 15, and behavior can swing wildly between(still haven't seen a concrete number on the age). The way in which she is advancing is also an issue. She is the chosen one(not really but the term fits for the purpose without in depth explanation) and she is acknowledged as a prodigy, as well as advancing quickly in the use of combat. My problem is that its too early and too easy. It just feels like it was given to her by the gods after she meets the protagonist. Then there are the storylines that are just left in the dust for the advancement of the plot, and while they have hope of coming back later I doubt I would be anywhere near as invested in the answers and the way it plays out. Now to the stuff I said at the beginning. If you want to make a character that cross dresses or is non binary I'm fine with that. In fact, depending on the way some of the supporting characters played out it could have been very interesting. For example, if the draconid species just didn't have any sexual dimorphism, I would love to(eventually) hear about the origins and how that came to be about. Same the with the elf, if it was a tradition for the men or species in general to dress like that it would have been so much more interesting and enriching of the culture. Instead it feels like it was thrown in for the sake of having it there, and when you have the characters using the term "transphobe" while natives of a separate, fantasy world, it really breaks immersion.