Synopsis
Meet Threadbare. He is twelve inches tall, full of fluff, and really, really bad at being a hero. Magically animated and discarded by his maker as a failed experiment, he is saved by a little girl. But she’s got problems of her own, and he might not be able to help her. Fortunately for the little golem, he’s quick to find allies, learn skills, gain levels, and survive horrible predicaments. Which is good, because his creator has a whole lot of enemies… Contains profanity and violence.
Review
Threadbare is the most Adorable golem you’ve ever met. He has so many levels in the Adorable skill, you might have to pass a Willpower check to not turn to mush in his presence.
Being a newly created toy golem, Threadbare cannot read the system prompts that invade his vision. He has no mouth so he cannot talk to his girl or anyone else to ask questions. Nodding in response to questions seems to make the little girl happy. Thinking “yes” makes the text disappear. Threadbare is the most agreeable little guy.
The premise is adorable but there is a lot of swearing in Stuff and Nonsense, so don’t pick it up for young kids. It’s more appropriate for teens and adults who want something cute but cheeky.
It’s not all hugs and tea parties though. Threadbare has many adventures – on his own, with his girl, and even with the family’s very large housecat.
The audiobook is perfect, with a narrator who sounds like he should be the narrator in a Winnie the Pooh or Paddington movie. Your nice English grandpa is telling you a story! Which is, of course, even funnier when he swears.
Be cautioned this book ends on a cliffhanger. You’ll want more but thankfully this is a complete series, at six books.
LitRPG Elements
Everyone has stamina, sanity, and moxie. Stamina is hit points. Sanity functions like magic points but some attacks inflict sanity damage. When sanity runs low, it causes a bad headache. Moxie isn’t clearly defined as Threadbare doesn’t use it for any of his skills. Damage numbers float up from the entity being damaged, visible to anyone.
There are stats like strength, wisdom, etc that level up by doing different actions. The story often indicates what’s happening with stat levels. So if it says “Strength increased by one! Strength increased by one! Your Climb skill has reached level three!” the reader can piece together how much Threadbare struggled to climb somewhere before succeeding.
Everyone can gain multiple adventurer classes and profession classes, though there’s a maximum number you can have at one time. Each class levels up individually. There’s also a racial class, like Human or Bear. There are a lot of things to level up, great if you enjoy numbers becoming bigger numbers. Although Threadbare’s status screen is not given until the epilogue.
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