Let’s Read For Fun: Dungeon Crawler Carl, by Matt Dinniman

Wow Funners, here it is at last: OurAugust read for fun is NYTimes best-seller Dungeon Crawler Carl, by local author Matt Dinniman! Before we go into what it is about, some trigger warnings: the end of the world and humanity talk shows, reality tv goblin babies drug-dealing llamas a horny AI with a distinct foot fetish The basic premise is that on a snowy January night in Seattle, the world ends. Carl is barely dressed and chasing his ex-girlfriend's trophy winning cat (Princess Donut) outside, when space aliens arrive and all buildings and structures on earth are flattened with most of humanity inside of them. So the cat kinda saves his life. Tunnels open up for the surviving humans, so they can enter the very first level of a reality TV show broadcast across the universe. The survivors are forced to go to deeper levels before the previous level is flattened after a fixed amount of time; each level requires that they become stronger, more talented, And / or more devious. So Carl and Princess Donut (who now can speak or at least Carl can understand her) are paired up as a team of fighters and must use their innate talents to survive as they accrue weapons and experience. This is Carl and Donut's adventure, and it is bonkers good fun. You don’t have to know about role-playing games (or video games for that matter), the adventure becomes sort of self-explainatory; and the horny AI is often there to explain everything and make a pass at our heroes. Dungeon Crawler Carl is a hugely popular book and might be difficult to check out from the library, so put a hold on it NOW. It is a fast read, however. As always, you don’t have to finish the book to come to the meet-up, but there will be spoilers (there always are), so please forgive us. Oh, memorize this exclamation: “Dammit, Donut!”