Summary: Aliens destroy the Earth and put millions of people who managed to survive into a live action role playing game where they have to survive lots of monsters (and some people) trying to kill them.
I have known about Dungeon Crawler Carl for about a year. It started showing up in recommendations for great audiobooks and what to read if you like Project Hail Mary or the Murderbot series. I have been reading a lot of fiction lately, in part because my paying job has been so busy that I have not had the brain power for other types of books. I finally decided to pick them up when a good friend and his wife said they were listening to them as an audiobook on a long drive.
Dungeon Crawler Carl knows it is not great and important literature. It is funny, crass, way too violent, but engaging. At this point I am in the middle of the third book in a bit over a week. The kindle books are in the Kindle unlimited library so I have borrowed them and then had the kindle discount to get the audiobook for under $5 each.
This is a book describing a live action role playing game. It is inspired by first person shooters and Dungeons and Dragons and the wide variety of other games. In some ways I think this is like a more adult oriented version of Ready Player One, except Ready Player One was an immersive video game who was on a quest to solve problems using cultural history. Dungeon Crawler Carl is supposed to be more D&D inspired fantasy where the “real” person dies and there is (from my perspective) entirely too much description of blood and guts from the fights.
The writing style is self consciously insider jokey that understands the ridiculousness of the premise. I think that is similar to the Ready Player One style of writing without the love of 80s and 90s culture. There was a lot of complaints about the constant references of music, movies and video games from the 80s and 90s in Ready Player One, but that isn’t here. There is references to mythology and D&D and alien movies, but it is much more moderate and not oriented toward the nerd level knowledge.
I think a lot of people will like the series but there is genuine content warning. The audiobooks are very well done, but the writing style of the book has lots of examples of the characters texting back in forth because the live action role playing game is a galaxy wide TV shows with trillions of people watching. So lots of communication says one thing out loud and another thing is texted. That is signified using audio distortions in the audiobook, but it is easier to follow that in text. Generally, I don’t love sound effect or music in audiobooks, but here it is important to give context to what is going on. But I also am not listening to this if anyone else is in the room without using headphones. The swearing isn’t too extreme, but it is consistent. The descriptions of the violence and gore is mostly what is what I don’t love. There is sexual innuendo, but as of the middle of the third book right now, there hasn’t ben any actual sex. There is A LOT of death. Much of it is abstract. Billions of people on earth die in the opening pages of the book. The game starts with about 10 million characters and by the end of the first book, about 90% of those have died. But they are not all abstract. Characters that are known die.
I also think there are conceptual problems. Carl wakes up in the middle of the night and goes outside because his girlfriend’s cat escapes out of the house. It is about 2:30 AM and everyone who is inside a building is killed instantly. So if it is 2:30 AM in the US, then it will be the middle of the day in much of Russia or the UAE or India. So many more people should be alive from Asia but that isn’t reflected in the book. This is a book, but it is a real conceptual problem created by the author not thinking through his set up.
The 8th book in the series was released in March 2026. And according to an interview earlier this year, the author plans to conclude the series with the 9th book. This was originally self published, but Ace picket up the rights in 2024. The series has been optioned by Peacock for a tv seres. The audiobooks are an audible exclusive and the main narrator has given unique voices to over 200 characters, it is an impressive range of voices and accents that do not sound like a single person and it is part of why so many have embraced the series. According to the series wikipedia page, the audiobook sales have surpassed the print or ebook sales, which is unusual.
At this point i don’t know if I will do a post on every book or not. My problem with writing about series fiction is that inevitably spoilers have to be discussed.
Dungeon Crawler Carl by Matt Dinniman Purchase Links: Paperback, Kindle Edition, Audible.com Audiobook