Dungeon Crawler Carl cover art

Dungeon Crawler Carl

A LitRPG/Gamelit Adventure

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Dungeon Crawler Carl

By: Matt Dinniman
Narrated by: Jeff Hays
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About this listen

The apocalypse will be televised!

A man. His ex-girlfriend's cat. A sadistic game show unlike anything in the universe: a dungeon crawl where survival depends on killing your prey in the most entertaining way possible.

In a flash, every human-erected construction on Earth - from Buckingham Palace to the tiniest of sheds - collapses in a heap, sinking into the ground.

The buildings and all the people inside have all been atomized and transformed into the dungeon: an 18-level labyrinth filled with traps, monsters, and loot. A dungeon so enormous, it circles the entire globe.

Only a few dare venture inside. But once you're in, you can't get out. And what's worse, each level has a time limit. You have but days to find a staircase to the next level down, or it's game over. In this game, it's not about your strength or your dexterity. It's about your followers, your views. Your clout. It's about building an audience and killing those goblins with style.

You can't just survive here. You gotta survive big.

You gotta fight with vigor, with excitement. You gotta make them stand up and cheer. And if you do have that "it" factor, you may just find yourself with a following. That's the only way to truly survive in this game - with the help of the loot boxes dropped upon you by the generous benefactors watching from across the galaxy.

They call it Dungeon Crawler World. But for Carl, it's anything but a game.

©2020 Matt Dinniman (P)2021 Matt Dinniman Fantasy Genre Fiction Movie, TV & Video Game Tie-Ins Suspense Thriller & Suspense Witty Litrpg System
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honestly I picked this up as it kept coming up in my recommendations I was hesitant as it seemed quite strange but once I started I couldn't stop listening to it at every opportunity it's one of the best novels I have listened too and I found myself laughing more than once

a wild ride from start to finish

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Dungeon Crawler Carl is written by Matt Dinniman. The book was something of a hit with audiences, and it isn’t had to see why. It’s a fantastic book and the squeals only add to the lore and the main characters.
Since I don’t have much time to read, I picked this book up on audio first using a credit and have to say, if this ever gets turned into an animated Netflix series, I want Jeff Hays to play the main character and the dungeon’s AI. The narrator does a fantastic job and he’s got a lot of range.

Plot:
The book sets itself on Earth during a extra cold winter. Most everyone with a brain is inside and is trying to stay warm. The book’s main character is, as you have guessed from the main title, is called Carl.
During one of the coldest nights, Carl’s ex-girlfriend’s cat, Princess Donut jumps out of a window. This, causes Carl, to step outside and attempt to fetch her. The dumbass did this while forgetting to put on pants.
Already I could imagine doing this myself. Going out in the freezing cold, hoping the police don’t pick me up for being underdressed, all to save a crying cat that won’t shut up.
It turns out that this was perfect timing, because a galactic mining and entertainment organisation decided at this very moment to conquer the planet.
Within the blink of an eye, nearly every living being on Earth is killed in an instant. Those who were outside at the time, then have to rush towards the entrances of the alien’s game show.
Cold, having no pants, and holding his pet cat, Carl finds himself inside the dungeon and is forced to play the alien’s sick game.

Characters:
Throughout most of the book the perspective is 1st person. We see through the eyes of Carl as he tries everything he can to survive the dungeon’s first floor.
Carl reminds me as your everyday kind of person. The first book does touch on his past, and you get glimpses of the toxic relationship he had with his ex-girlfriend. Overall, Carl has a problem with authority, is physically fit, but isn’t afraid to throw a punch when the situation calls for it.
He is the kind of person who doesn’t have many friends, but he is loyal to the ones he does have.

The character who really steals the show, however, is the MC’s cat, Princess Donut.
A show cat, Princess Donut, is something of a wild card. It’s hard to go into the character as I don’t want to spoil the book for any potential readers or listeners. She is one of the fan favourites.

The next character is an unknown variable. Mordecai is the dungeon guide. Every team who goes into the dungeon has one, and it is their job to provide just enough information to the dungeon crawlers to make sure they are entertaining to their alien masters. Once a dungeon crawler himself in a previous game, Mordecai has a solid century of experience on how the game and the organisations running the place works.
All Mordecai wants to do, is finish his indentured service to the dungeon and leave to forge his own destiny among the stars.

What I like:
The moment I finished this book I bought the entire series. That should tell you something. This book has a good balance of fighting, game mechanics, and story building. Most authors who write LitRPGs have this notion that character levels equals character development, or they want to fill in the book with stupid grinding. But everything in this book, including the enemies have a purpose.

Criticism:
This is the author’s first book so I’m sure that some people will find a few beginner mistakes, but it was enjoyable.
The real issue might be the whole alien thing and them using dungeons to wipe out alien species just to steal their resources and make entertainment, but you can imagine humans doing it in the future.

Overall:
A fantastic book. I want Netflix to pick this up. Not a live action. You need an animation series Netflix. With entire season based around a single book. You’d make bank.

5 stars all the way

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Hilarious from beginning to end. Perfect Narration. The nature of cats perfectly captured. Everything about this is great.

Hurry up and get this litrpg right now

Goddamnit Donut!

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first 15 minutes succeed but after that. it was so good. haven't laughed out loud like that in years. it's a fun, exciting book. I highly recommend it

first 15 minutes SUCKED! but after that.

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This performance by Jeff Hays is superb. The book is macabre and brilliant. I can't count how many times I nearly lost my stomach whilst listening to this during meals......Don't eat and listen. Friendly warning. Just listen.

Ahmuhzing

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If you love video games or RPG this is a great book. Jeff does an amazing job as always with his narration draws me in.

Great book

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All non-gaming parents of ‘gamer children’ need to read these books.

As book one in a series of chortles, sniggers, ewww’s and laugh out loud humour.
Carl and Donut must combat artificial intelligence, creepy crawlers, creatures, critters, observers, rivals and shapeshifters for survival to reach level 18 of a dungeon, that has the best restaurants in the universe.
An addictive fascinating insightful look into the skills required for ‘gaming’.
Recognition of understanding the vicarious pleasure a parent obtains observing their child destroy the destroyers.

This book ticks all the boxes for me (as a player unable to achieve all the crystals required in any Crash Bandicoot game :-) ).

Excellent book, thanks Matt :-)

Loved it, a totally enjoyable jaunt in the wild side :-)

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Hilarious with some very poignant moments. The voices brought the characters to life. My favorite is the cat.

Highly recommend

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Very good narrator. Goes the extra mile for the voices. I believe he uses a voice changer sometimes, for example to make the voice of the AI sound more robotic.

Cat

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Such an interesting premise for the apocalypse, taking from Arthur C Clarkes premise that any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic, and condensing this to make a cross over between fantasy, sci fi, cyberpunk and comedy, I have binged this and every other Dungeon Crawler Carl book in rapid and repeated succession.

The narration of Jeff Hays is incredible, I checked out the cold reads for Soundbooth Theater on YouTube and saw him in action and was surprised at how he created all the different characters and effects. Hopefully one day they’ll do the full drama series on soundbooth theater . com!

Creative chaos cataclysm

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