“Dungeon Crawler Carl” by Matt Dinniman

I came into this as a skeptic. My only prior experience with litrpg had been the progression fantasy (which isn’t quite the same thing as litrpg? I think?) Sufficiently Advanced Magic by Andrew Rowe - I liked it OK, not great, and my least favorite parts were all the stats and gear talk. So I was definitely prepared to dislike DCC, but I’ve heard enough about it I decided to give the audiobook a shot.

My initial reaction was that it was OK: decently entertaining but nothing special. I thought the jokes of the talking Persian cat with laser eyes, Carl’s lack of pants and shoes, and the self-aware-cringe-but-still-cringe humor of the dungeon in general were fun, but not enough to hold my attention for a full novel, let alone a long series.

I was eventually forced to admit that the book actually had a lot of heart, great character growth from both Carl and Princess Donut, and a lot of side characters that are actually very endearing. It helps that Carl finds the “humor” of the dungeon as annoying as I do; if it was presented straight it would be unbearable - one friend compared it to Borderlands, and that’s actually a really solid comparison. Great in small doses, but it quickly gets old.

Luckily Matt Dinniman, at least in this book, seems to understand that. I still have concerns this won’t be a series for me, but for the moment I’m a convert.