I listened to the first four books twice before approaching this review. I did it because they were just so darn enjoyable.
A man. A cat. The end of the world as we know it. It sounds like a recipe for rehashing overused tropes, but in Matt Dinniman’s skillful hands we get a fun adventure with just enough laughs to keep smiling, but a serious enough subject that a second read is just as meaningful as the first.
This is the story of people given the chance to win-back-the-Earth from our just-revealed alien overlords. Al they have to do is make it through an 18-level dungeon that has been created using the material taken from Earth’s surface. Seems like magic? Any technology sufficiently advanced can seem like magic to the natives, and the advanced technology does manifest like magic in a system reminiscent of a modern video game.
As I said, this sounds like another one of the many litRPGs popping out like locusts; but it a breed-apart. Imaging Terry’ Pratchetts humor and irreverence, but with Lenny Bruce’s frank approach to issues.. In addition to a top-level litRPG story, we get subplots involving massive galactic conflicts among aliens, humans who band together to try to save some vestige of the human race, and a cat who is altered by alien technology to be smarter than any human (sounds great – but imagine the cat trying to grapple with the sudden surge of intelligence against everything it had perceived before).
Matt Dinniman chose to build a “world” that permits him a great deal of variety. He has used it in the later books. So there is little worry about the world (or the story) getting stale in later books. This s not one fo the series where you have to worry about the later books failing to measure up to the first (at least the first five books are astoundingly good)
Jeff Hays does a great job narrating. He captures the main characters perfectly but he also does an amazing array of other voices. Another reviewed compared him to Patrick Warburton. For the voice he uses for the main character, the comparison is apt, but I cannot imagine that Patrick Warburton has the vocal talent of Jeff Hays, who offers a truly incredible range of voices for the characters.