Dungeon Crawler Carl by Matt Dinniman – Review

Published: August 27, 2024

Publisher: Ace

Series: Dungeon Crawler Carl #1

Genre: Fantasy, LitRPG

Pages: 464 (Hardcover)

My Rating: 4 Stars

A copy of this book was provided by the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

Synopsis:
The apocalypse will be televised! Welcome to the first book in the wildly popular and addictive Dungeon Crawler Carl series by Matt Dinniman—now with bonus material exclusive to this print edition.

You know what’s worse than breaking up with your girlfriend? Being stuck with her prize-winning show cat. And you know what’s worse than that? An alien invasion, the destruction of all man-made structures on Earth, and the systematic exploitation of all the survivors for a sadistic intergalactic game show. That’s what.

Join Coast Guard vet Carl and his ex-girlfriend’s cat, Princess Donut, as they try to survive the end of the world—or just get to the next level—in a video game–like, trap-filled fantasy dungeon. A dungeon that’s actually the set of a reality television show with countless viewers across the galaxy. Exploding goblins. Magical potions. Deadly, drug-dealing llamas. This ain’t your ordinary game show.

Welcome, Crawler. Welcome to the Dungeon. Survival is optional. Keeping the viewers entertained is not.

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I’ll be perfectly honest, I don’t really love LitRPG but the hype for Dungeon Crawler Carl got to me. All those glowing reviews can’t be wrong! So when the publisher reached out with a NetGalley link, I hit download like I was the fastest book nerd in the west. 

The story begins with the titular Carl trying to wrangle his ex-girlfriend’s show cat back inside on a cold winter night whilst clad in only boxers and a leather jacket. Right as Carl is securing the lauded and very fluffy Princess Donut, every structure of any kind (buildings, cars, probably even tree forts) slams flat into the ground and the remaining people receive a message straight to their brains: Earth is now under the possession of some alien conglomerate and the humans get to compete in an eighteen level dungeon crawl, that’s being televised to billions of beings around the universe. Carl and Donut head to the nearest dungeon entrance, if for no other reason than to not get frostbite and become Crawlers.

What follows is an absurdly hilarious and ridiculously violent traipse through the first two floors of the World Dungeon. Donut is awarded a pet biscuit upon entry that allows her to become truly sentient and very, very vocal and she’s now a Crawler in truth rather than just Carl’s pet. The duo face down goblins, slimes, grotesque low level bosses, and even other Crawlers and all the while they are becoming more and more popular with the viewers who are tracking their every move. While the dungeon is a game of survival, it’s also a popularity contest because the more followers a Crawler gets, the more likely they are to get a sponsor and a sponsor means valuable items that will allow them to survive. If Carl and Donut can reach the end and complete the eighteenth floor, they can theoretically get Earth out of the alien’s clutches. Not that there’ll be much left.

LitRPG reads very much like a transcript of a player’s actions in an open world video game. There are checkpoints, rest areas, bosses, leveling up, and even loot boxes and even ways to sort of ‘break the game’ that get patched out. I haven’t read much in this subgenre, but I really enjoyed Dungeon Crawler Carl. It had a breakneck pace that made it a completely addictive read, purely because I could never begin to guess what the next chapter would hold. It was a novelty to me. Because of this, I’m planning to check out the second installment when it’s available. This series was self published originally, but was picked up by Ace with the traditional publication beginning in August 2024.