This is a great example that you can use common tropes to great effect without appearing unoriginal or boring.
Technically this book is not much different from the hundreds of other UF/PnR books out there, but to me, it has a unique charm that gives it character and distinguishes it from the crowd.

My biggest issue with this was the writing itself. For the most part, I enjoyed the writing style but it has the tendency to become unintentionally rambly and repetitive. Especially in the first half, thoughts get repeated multiple times but worded differently.
This issue makes sections drag unnecessarily and hurts the pacing.

Another common problem is scene consistency. There are numerous examples of things happening without the reader having been told. People just warp through rooms, change positions, stand up or sit down etc. Other stuff is affected by these kinds of issues as well.
Scene setting is largely missing and sometimes even contradictory in places.

Scenes appear unnatural and stilted because everything seems to happen in sequence. Even simple things like walking and talking frequently don't appear to happen at the same time even though it seems natural for the characters to do so.

I think a thorough editing pass by an experienced editor could've massively improved the quality.
To me, those issues were far less noticeable towards the end but I am not sure if this was because I got so invested or because it's actually less of an issue.
Without those basic writing issues, this would've been a 4-star rating.

If you are sensitive to amateurish writing issues like that you will probably hate this but otherwise, I would recommend giving it a try because the ideas are great.
I will for sure listen to the second book in the series as soon as it becomes available as an audiobook.
The narration of the first one was great. ( )