Book Review 149
"Carl's Doomsday Scenario" by Matt Dinniman
Book 2 in the "Dungeon Crawler Carl" series. Book 1 was reviewed in Review 140.
So our Dungeon adventure continues. While book 1 covers levels 1 and 2, the second one is about level 3 (out of 18, and it is said that for the many thousands years dungeon exists, nobody ever descended below level 13).
Our protagonist Carl is experiencing a lot of mishaps and adventures together with his companion - a sentient cat named Princess Donut. In general, this book follows the general template of the previous one: there are several plans here. On one, we have a typical DnD scenario, with elves and goblins, quests, level up and so on. With each new part it is becoming more and more complex. On the second level, we can't forget that this is just a made up scenario created to amuse godlike evil (or, rather, just cruel) aliens. And, of course, there are moral temptations of its characters, where different angles of this plot are convoluted.
While not adding anything new in principal, the third book is adding a lot of details and some character development to remain as captivating as the first one. However, since the complexity of this world grows, it is more difficult to read it casually.
I still can recommend this book, if your requests are controversial: it is tragic, yet funny; absolutely unrealistic, yet logical. Even full of magic and melee, yet wrapped into an ultimate space opera setup.