Dungeon Crawler Carl
by Matt Dinniman
Dungeon Crawler Carl by Matt Dinniman seemed to come up often on the facebook LitRPG Books group as a highly recommended series. I added it to my to read list some time back but only got to reading it just recently. Sadly, it is an incomplete series, and at this point, it is up to book 5.
Before I let you read my comments, let me first say, I did enjoy these five books. But there are definitely things in it that may be unpalatable to some readers.
If you don’t like bad language in books, be alert to the fact that these books include expletives. One of them, (book 3 maybe?), uses the “C” word two or three times. I don’t mind moderate swearing, since I swear liberally myself, but the “C” word, does not sit well with me. i find it jarring enough to pull me out of my fantasy world that I become one with when I read.
Book one starts with a world assimilation, as you would expect for this genre of book, but it is slightly different as the dungeon is everything in the assimilation, and we almost never see anything happening on earth itself, or the other planets involved in triggering the dungeon. A planet-wide dungeon forms below ground and about 13 million people go into it voluntarily, and this is where the bulk of the action is set. But, there are generous glimpses of other worlds, their social norms, their politics, and their violence and barbarism. The reflection of alien races from the interactions we see are not encouraging, to be sure!
The dungeon is a bit like Hunger Games on steroids, as we soon discover it is a televised entertainment for aliens, and people die hard and fast. This dungeon is a horrific parody of things we know stereotypically from earth, thrown into a blender with fantasy and horror elements, creating loathsome abominations and uncomfortable bosses. Carl, our main character, enters this world with his ex-girlfriend’s cat, Donut, and they quickly become key players in the sadistic and murderous game show dungeon crawl.
Book 3, with the Iron Tangle, was a tough one for me. I felt that I could not suspend my disbelief enough to fully immerse in it, and I think this was the book with what I felt to be excessive expletives in it. I almost stopped reading the series during book 3, but the story is really good and I continued on. Book 4 picked back up, not quite where I wanted it to be, but an improvement on 3. Book 5 brought me back to full immersion, back to what I feel were the excellent levels in books 1 and two.
There are a few things in these books, which make me think of other types of dungeons i.e. harnesses which sound like shibari, a minor goddess living as the head of a sex doll, and an unpalatable gore-foot fetish as examples. Matt doesn’t shy away from using sexually transmitted infections as weapons in book 5 either. Although sex is a thing, and dino-pets get some, there are brothels, there is some weird mantis incest thing and we know a couple of dungeon crawlers are “active” shall we say by the end of book 5, there are not actually any proper sex scenes. (I hope it stays that way).
This series has some seriously twisted ideas. Stomping gerbils to death with bare feet to titillate a perverted AI with a foot fetish as a prostitution style survival tactic as just one of many examples. If you want something a little more standard, this series won’t be for you. I do advise, if you don’t like the books, don’t give a one star rating or a negative review. Matt Dinniman is not shy to put down his nay-sayers in his books! Hah!
After saying all that, this really is a great series. Matt Dinniman is fearless in his writing, and is clearly highly intelligent and very open-minded. He dives in feet first and stomps his way through, regardless of how his readers may feel or react. It is bold and raw and brilliant!