New Achievement!
You have written a book review about Dungeon Crawler Carl. Reward: The sense of satisfaction when you click Publish. That's it. Were you expecting something else? Maybe a shiny bauble or a theme tune?
My seventeenth book of 2026! I picked up this one after reading a Reddit thread about it that cropped up on my feed. On the subreddit I noticed it was being adapted into a TV series and I had read a bit about the series on Goodreads. To say it piqued my interest is an understatement!
The Book and Author
Dungeon Crawler Carl by Matt Dinniman
Matt Dinniman is an NYT bestselling author from Gig Harbor, Washington, best known for the Dungeon Crawler Carl series.
The Premise
Carl and his ex-girlfriend's cat, Princess Donut1 find themselves in an RPG after Earth is taken over, collapsed and has its resources harvested by the Borant Corporation, purely by the "luck" of being outside at the time.2
Essentially, it is like a video game - Carl and Princess Donut3 can level up, get achievements, build their skillset and get loot boxes for doing certain things in the dungeon. There are some funny snippets from the AI who runs the dungeon scattered throughout the book, mainly relating to achievements.
We follow Carl and Princess Donut through the dungeon as they fight mobs, access safe rooms, interact with other crawlers, level up, fight bosses and gain new items for their inventories.
What I Liked
It's an RPG in book form! Very reminiscent of video games I've played, the amusing snippets from the AI produced several belly laughs and the story was really good. (So much so that I insta-bought the second one and am currently reading that).
I also liked how easy it was to pick up and get hooked into a chapter, as well as the chapter length - with currently juggling a toddler and a baby, I don't want super long chapters that feel like a slog. Short chapters where I feel I can easily reach the end before switching the light off for the (early) night are much better. This was definitely the case in Dungeon Crawler Carl, and on numerous occasions I even read the next chapter to find out what happened next.
What I Didn't Like
Not much, in all honesty. There was maybe a little bit of repetition in the story in terms of approaches to bosses, the achievements/AI snippets. But that is minor and didn't detract much from my experience of reading it at all.
If you aren't into game mechanics or dark comedy, this one probably isn't for you. But for me? Perfect!
Conclusion
Overall, 9/10 for me. I really enjoyed it, and am looking forward to getting stuck into the full series. Will I binge-read all eight books back-to-back? Only time will tell!4 With a TV adaptation in the works, now's a great time to get started on the series.
Footnotes
-
Her full title is actually Grand Champion, Breed Winner Regional, National Winner Princess Donut the Queen Anne Chonk. ↩
-
Everyone who was inside during the collapse was killed instantly. ↩
-
GC, BWR, NW Princess Donut the Queen Anne Chonk - this will be the last time I make the correction... ↩
-
Current indications are probably yes. ↩