Series Guide
The Beginning After the End
Every audiobook in TurtleMe's The Beginning After the End, in order, with the publisher-pack buying trick, the 12-books-versus-13-audiobooks explanation, and the verdict on the series I avoided over the baby thing and was wrong about.
Start here
Book 1, Early Years, knowing one thing going in: this is structurally the slowest origin in the genre, an adult mind reincarnated as an infant, and TurtleMe barely time-skips. You get Arthur as a baby, then a child, then an adolescent, and you don't really get him as a man until around book seven. I avoided the series for exactly that reason, and I was wrong. The origin is the point, and it's excellent.
Verdict on the series
S-mid — Worth Starting.
S-mid, earned across every category: writing quality, cast depth, pacing discipline, and a premise executed far better than it had any right to be. Across thirteen audiobooks I can't name a filler entry, which is a sentence I can write about almost nothing else this long. What keeps it out of the higher S bands is the absence of a single transcendent, scene-stealing element, no Malefic Viper, no Eithan; what it delivers instead is the most sustained, even quality of almost any long series I've covered. The full review has the complete argument.
What it does best. Stakes that stay real: wars with costs, factions that take losses that took me aback, and villains whose evil runs on specific, comprehensible motivation. It also contains the only character-regression arc in the genre I'd point to as done right, resolved in chapters instead of wasting a book. And it goes darker than the cover art suggests; this is the stakes pick next to Cradle's craft pick.
Where it sags. The origin's pace is the toll of entry, and the early releases run short for a full credit each, which is why the publisher packs below matter. Neither is a flaw so much as a warning label.
Books in order
| # | Title | Published | Runtime |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Early Years | October 1, 2024 | 6 hrs 8 min |
| 2 | New Heights | October 1, 2024 | 6 hrs 17 min |
| 3 | Beckoning Fates | October 1, 2024 | 6 hrs 44 min |
| 4 | Horizon's Edge | October 1, 2024 | 6 hrs 12 min |
| 5 | Convergence | May 26, 2020 | 9 hrs 42 min |
| 6 | Transcendence | August 11, 2020 | 15 hrs 11 min |
| 7 | Divergence | November 10, 2020 | 15 hrs 8 min |
| 8 | Ascension | June 15, 2021 | 24 hrs 18 min |
| 8.5 | Amongst the Fallen | June 14, 2022 | 4 hrs 43 min |
| 9 | Reckoning | August 30, 2022 | 22 hrs 45 min |
| 10 | Retribution | November 16, 2023 | 23 hrs 7 min |
| 11 | Providence | January 14, 2025 | 27 hrs 38 min |
| 12 | Apotheosis | May 19, 2026 | 22 hrs 58 min |
Book data above is pulled from our full review — updated automatically as new entries publish.
Next audiobook: none coming. The series is complete at 13 audiobooks.
The count explained: twelve story volumes, thirteen audio releases. Podium split the early volumes into the four short 2024 releases and slotted the Amongst the Fallen novella at 8.5. Buy the early books through the two-per-credit publisher packs on Audible; individually they're poor credit value.
Timeline
The series runs one continuous life, so the arcs below are scope only, no major beats spoiled.
- The origin (Books 1-4). Arthur's childhood: a grown man's mind learning a new world's magic from scratch, surrounded by a family and his father's old adventuring crew who feel like people rather than props. Slowest stretch, and the foundation everything else stands on.
- Coming of age (Books 5-7). Adolescence, training, and the world's politics sharpening around him. Somewhere in here the series quietly stops being a comfort read.
- The war (Book 8 and the 8.5 novella). Large-scale conflict arrives with real casualties. Amongst the Fallen follows the supporting cast through occupied Dicathen and is optional, but it rewards anyone invested in the wider ensemble.
- The reckoning (Book 9). The core-loss arc, and the genre's rare example of a regression handled without a wasted book.
- Endgame (Books 10-12). The cosmic layer takes center stage and the series drives to an actual finish, closing in Apotheosis.
Who's who
- Arthur Leywin — the protagonist, formerly King Grey of a dueling-settled future Earth, reborn with his adult mind intact. The dual-life tension is the series' engine.
- Sylvie — Arthur's bond, entrusted to him young, snarky and fiercely protective. The heart of the series' found-family core.
- Tessia Eralith — elven princess and Arthur's childhood friend, whose family shelters him for years. The relationship the fanbase argues about most.
- The Leywins — Arthur's parents and little sister. Unusually for the genre, the family stays present and load-bearing instead of vanishing after the origin.
- Agrona Vritra — the primary antagonist, whose machinations set the whole story in motion. Evil with a comprehensible plan, which is exactly the kind this site keeps asking for.
- Kezess Indrath — ruler of the dragon clan at the top of the world's power structure, and proof that the villain's opposition isn't automatically your friend.
Is the series complete?
Yes. Apotheosis closed the twelve-volume arc in May 2026. That puts TBATE in rare company: a long-run progression epic that actually finished, joining Cradle on the very short list of completed commitments in this genre.
Where to go next
If you finished TBATE and want more of what it does:
- Cradle (Will Wight) — the most direct structural cousin: core-based cultivation, no menus, complete, and the natural next read.
- Immortal Great Souls (Phil Tucker) — the other core-based progression pick on this site, with a brutal-comeback structure TBATE fans tend to take to.
- Beware of Chicken (Casualfarmer) — same xianxia roots, opposite register: warmth and comedy instead of war. The palate cleanser.
Full verdicts on all three live on the reviews page.