| Title | : | The Dungeon Anarchists Cookbook (Dungeon Crawler Carl, #3) |
| Author | : | |
| Rating | : | |
| ISBN | : | - |
| Language | : | English |
| Format Type | : | Kindle Edition |
| Number of Pages | : | 534 |
| Publication | : | Published April 2, 2021 |
The top ten list is populated. The sponsorship program is open. The difficulty is ramping up. The first three floors were nothing compared to what Carl and Donut now face.
The Iron Tangle. An impossibly-complicated subway system built out of the world's subterranean railway systems, all combined and then tied together into a knot. Up is down. Down is up. Close is far. The cars are filled with monsters, the railway stations are less than safe, and the exit is always just a few stops away.
But there is hope. For the first time, the crawlers are all working together. The loot is better than ever. And the secret to unraveling it all may be hidden in the pages of a seemingly-useless book. Welcome, crawlers. Welcome to the fourth floor of the dungeon.
The Dungeon Anarchists Cookbook (Dungeon Crawler Carl, #3) Reviews
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Still very well written and I like the characters, but this one didn't really work for me. The book gave me the feeling of running on a treadmill and never really getting anywhere. I understand the intent, but I found it tedious to read about all of the trains, lines, stations which detracted from my enjoyment.
The author goes so far as to say that you don't need to understand the floor, trains, etc. but if so, why bother to put so much effort into them? Hopefully the next one will work better as a reading experience. -
Monsters – many kinds, many threats, many outcomes:
"In fact, I realized as I watched the constant stream of creatures, it was probably a good thing for everybody if they did survive the fall into the pit. These were living, non-undead creatures, which meant every time one of them died, a ghoul was generated at a nearby ghoul generator."
Tension:
There is now a bounty on Carl….and on Donut!
Intergalactic Humor:
"New achievement! Martha Stewart! You used a workbench to craft for the first time. The next thing you know you’ll be fashioning bottlecap earrings, drinking oat milk, and selling your ugly crap on Etsy while you wax poetic on Instagram about your “journey.”"
Dangerous Decisions:
"“You’re going to get us killed one way or the other, Carl. It might as well be for a good cause,” Donut said.
I grunted. “Well they do say I’m crazy.”"
The Galaxy is Watching:
"The last thing I wanted was to be a pawn in some intergalactic pissing match. I had enough to worry about already."
Same characters; same humor (which tickles me frequently) but the plot thickens. -
4.5/5
Funny, Heartwhelming and EXPLOSIVE
Another solid entry in the DGC series with some intersting new characters, plenty of LOL moments and good ol' powerups.
The only thing that bothered me in this book was some plot threads felt like way too convenient for story progression. Otherwise I had a blast reading this one.
Book 4, Here I come... -
Brilliant, hilarious, and gripping!!! Did I mention funny as hell this series is something special and takes a mad genius to write it.
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Continuación directa de la historia de Carl, Donut y demás gente en la mazmorra y como viene siendo costumbre, un disfrute de lectura.
Descarado, divertido, con mucha acción, más subidas de nivel y cajas de recompensa llenas cosas chulas.
Me está gustando mucho esta saga! -
The best book so far! Carl, Princess Donut and her sidekick Mongo face the toughest floor yet. The Iron Tangle. The world's subway and train systems have all been jumbled up and linked together into a dungeon of massive and utterly confusing proportions. Navigating the way to the stairs down to the next level in only 8 days will be nearly impossible. Doing so in boxers, with a scrappy sentient cat and her dinosaur pet is just downright epic!
Once again, I grabbed up the audio for this book and enjoyed Jeff Hays' performance. Fun and entertaining story! Complex traps, a complicated dungeon and unexpected events carry this story through to floor collapse. Enjoyed it!!
On to the next book!! -
This is third. Read in order.
Like the second, you know what you're getting, but there's more, too. This one has a pivot towards the serious. And frankly, I'm still not sure if that's a good thing or not. Dinniman pulls it off gently-enough, I think, but it wasn't an enhancement for my experience.
Or maybe I just didn't click with the plot? This dungeon floor is wild and twisty and you don't really have to care about the details (which is good because I didn't). But the problem isn't the complexity, it's that much of the scene and scenario are all the same. You have trains. And you have stations. And even though there's surface variety (with different critters or puzzles) it still felt largely the same.
If you're detecting a bit of a come-down from previous books in the series, you're right. I was entertained, but not as highly as before. So despite some surprises () it was . . . less.
I'm going to call this four stars. I really, really liked Katia's arc (new team member, she shows up early, so not a spoiler) so it's still solidly entertaining and I'm not that disappointed.
A note about Chaste: Despite having a woman join the team, there's not any hint of romance. Or even tingles. So it's still very chaste. -
Another great entry. However, this book was the most complicated out of the three with all the train stations, routes etc.
Had my doubts about Katiya at the start but I have come to love her.
Katiya mowing mobs at the forefront of the train was a joy to see, and that scene with Heckla was the highlight of the book.
Carl’s class became more interesting this book for reasons… waiting to see the implications that will have on the series moving on
Mordecai is awesome! -
Dungeon Crawler Carl is a fantastic series and shows Dinniman at the height of his game. It's engaging, fast-paced, and manages to sucker-punch you with unexpected empathy for the characters at key moments. Dinniman also managed to inject a lot of humor into this series that helps balance the more serious and darker aspects of his usual style. I can't recommend this series enough and am eagerly awaiting the next installment.
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Full of sarcasm and humour, this is a unique and refreshing series that is unlike no other I've read. Fully entertaining from end to end. High quality prose, taut plot and brilliant pacing... I loved this series so much that I made a full blog post.
Highly recommended!
https://fanfiaddict.com/2021/07/07/se... -
Okay, I've a problem now. It's not july, so that I can read the next part. Outragous!
So in short: I love this book and its characters! Go Donut! -
DUNGEON CRAWLER CARL is a series hits that sweet spot of being absolutely ridiculous but also surprisingly moving. It is a series with an absurd and insane premise but it is treated serious enough that you care about the characters involved. The Earth is no more, most of humanity's survivors are going to be killed, and our last remaining chance to spit in the face of our destroyers is a guy with a talking cat as well as no pants.
Here, I was a bit iffy on the Iron Tangle and felt the sponsorship plotline of Carl was much more interesting. I think the work is at its best when its satirizing the zaniness of reality television as well as the ridiculousness of celebrity culture--even though I love all of the Dungeons and Dragons nonsense. -
These books just keep getting better. there is strangely a bunch of depth to them at the same time as just being ridiculous.
It is funny trying to explain them to kamile because sometimes it s0unds so weird.
And this ones intro was perfect "dont worry about the train colours... its not important until the end" was a perfect thing to say. :D
cant wait for the next. -
Epic rock music starts blasting and the crowd goes wild. Fog machines work on overdrive, giving the whole studio an ominous look. The music rises to a crescendo as the lights flair up, showing the host enter, stirring up the fog as they move towards a large mahogany desk. The music fades out together with the applause.
JG: Welcome, welcome, welcome! This is our show Last Level Tonight, thank you for joining us. I am your host, Jack Gulliver! Our main guest tonight is the lovely Miss Slagathor again. This floor was a lot different from the 3rd one, so how was your experience following Carl and Donut around?
Slagathor’s ghost avatar sighs dramatically and shakes her head.
S: Well Jack, although I appreciate all the work, effort and money that Borant Corporation put into this train level, I feel like they became overenthusiastic and simply overcomplicated things. Even though they mentioned before the start of the level that we don’t need to remember all the trains and numbers, since it only matters in the endgame and we’ll get a map… By that point I honestly had no idea what’s going on anymore, train-wise.
JG: If it wasn��t important for you to follow all the trains and station numbers, why bother having them at all?
S: Right?! I mean, it’s not like I was totally lost, but I only had a vague idea of how things are set up, so all the big revelations kinda fell flat, since I couldn’t really follow the train of thought, if you will, of Carl or Katia so well.
JG: I see. And what about the story?
S: As exciting as the previous levels were, here the pacing felt a bit odd from time to time and sometimes the story was a bit of a slog. As much fun as it was spending time with other crawlers, the main reason we are following the show is Carl and Donut, not… well, everyone else. There was a bit too much interpersonal drama for my liking is all I’m saying and not enough excitement. Nonetheless I am happy to see the growth of some individuals, especially Donut and Carl.
JG: And will you continue your following of our two protagonists?
S: Oh, hell yea! Don’t get me wrong, Jack, even if I felt that this level was a bit of a flop, this series is awesome! It is dark, it is fun, it is gritty and it is surprisingly deep. I’ll have some other things planned, but I’ll continue following my favorite heroes for sure!
JG: I’m glad to hear that! Unfortunately that's all the time we have for today. Thank you, Slagathor for joining our show and see you all next week!
Epic rock music starts blasting again while the crowd erupts in applause. The camera slowly fades to black as the noise fades out. -
This is my kind of series. Fun characters, stupid plots. Crazy shit going down 24/7.
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Alert
First, my review, then it’s time for a new copypasta:
“This was a fun book. I am glad that I read it. You should try it too.”
I am not a bot even though my reviews are identical. Of course, that is what a bot would say trying to pass itself off as human. But I would argue that trying to pass as human is enough to at least qualify as a reviewer.
I enjoyed this book, so my goal is to promote it and help the author. I am not going to share my reasoning, thoughts on the book, or any opinions that would influence your decision to read it. It is my opinion that Art needs to be experienced at an individual level. You are the only one that can determine what you like and don’t like. Don’t let others make that decision for you. You should definitely read the book and completely ignore all of the reviews. Or not if you don’t think this book is for you. That choice is all yours and the beauty of art appreciation. You are a much better judge of what you will like than anyone here.
As always, I am open to debates and arguments, but also vain enough to seek acknowledgement, so feel free to roast me or applaud my efforts. Either is acceptable, because if you are paying attention to me then you are at least considering the book. And THAT my friends is exactly why you see my comments here.
Cheers -
Godd@mm!t, Donut
The author is a very disturbed...being, who has done an excellent job sharing various scenes of quite graphic violence and a level of gore that is epic.
Almost no stats, but item and creature descriptions more than make up for it.
Liked this quite a bit more than the previous novel. The MCs seemed to have a bit more agency and were less controlled by quests.
I will preorder the next novel as soon as it is listed. -
This might have been the funniest one so far. I guess what impressed me most about this book is how the author managed to introduce a boring character, acknowledge that she is boring and work her boringness in to the story in an exciting way. The fake commercial at the end of this one was hilarious! I'm diving straight in to Book 4.
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Princess Donut supremacy! She and Carl are just the perfect duo and things only get better with the addition of Katya. Hopefully there's more Mordecai in the next one!
This series continues to have the most engaging audio performance I've ever heard. Jeff Hays is a master. -
This was leagues better then the 2nd book and I'm so glad i kept going with this series.
The complaints I had with book 2 just didn't exist in this book. This returns to form with the inclusion of side characters again that are both interesting and meaningful. I really enjoyed seeing the expansion of side characters and more involvement of the community as a whole with this world. You can experience a better variety of personalities and care more about what was going on.
The characters were all very well written too. I really cared about these people and what happened to them. A few times I really leveled with the trauma of their experience and them really feeling like their doing their best to navigate a really awful situation. I also felt like there was a lot of tension and risk going on too, there are some shady characters and very wild situations that made me a bit tense and even sometimes uncomfortable wondering what was going to happen. I really found the writing super good with getting that feeling of unease on occasion.
Its also very funny at times. Once again it's not back to back jokes and it paces it out nicely from the action scenes, serious stuff, character building moments and humor. There was actually a few scenes that made me laugh out loud, have to pause it and then laugh myself to tears until I got it out of my system. Some of the absurdist humor and the relationships built up with these characters, some funny scenes are just snuck in there in surprising ways that just works so nicely with the setting.
The plot also was a roller coaster. There are a LOT of moving parts here and even some grey areas occurring with other characters that makes it not entirely clear where things are going. The plot also is constantly moving and in clever ways that builds tension and keeps things moving along. I really love the levels it takes and some of the character focused moments.
The world building is sorta same-same. The world building was super focused in the first book, expanded on in the 2nd book and just drip fed here. The world feels super established at this point. The floor change still doesn't feel wildly different other then a new mechanic of trains and train tracks being where stuff is happening and less of a feeling if there being rooms. Changes how the plot is delivered but doesn't feel too much of a change to get too confusing. I liked it. Kept things different.
Overall though this book was fantastic, I really enjoyed my time with it. The build up with what's going in the background plot I find super intriguing and I just hope the eventual delivery works out. Luckily each individual book has its own conflict and new centered plot line so the risk of the background plot not delivering isn't too high thanks the the conflict for each book holding up on its own nicely.
Starting the next book in this series right away. -
Three Books - Three Days
I’ve hammered through Crawler Carl in just a few days and have been hooked the entire time. The social commentary, parody of game design, reality television, and the two-fisted action of the series makes great reading.
I went in expecting a popcorn story and have found the whole thing infinitely more compelling than anticipated. -
Another great one, although it slogged at one part pretty badly but it pulled through. Really enjoying the progression in each book. Slowly getting a larger picture of the puppet master and the universe.
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Round and round it goes, where it stops nobody knows. This dungeon level is many different trains, going in every possible direction.
Carl and Donut apparently are now part of a trio, facing all sorts of creatures, bureaucracy, treachery and fun. -
Endless exposition dump!
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Wildly fantastic read
I feel like this book is the perfect blend of litrpg and comedic gold that you rarely find. The character development is amazing and leaves me wanting more. Every book gets better and more coherent. DO NOT SKIP THIS SERIES IT IS SO GOOD YOU WILL LOVE IT AND NEVER WANT TO PUT IT DOWN
