Caverns and Creatures: Volume I (Books 1-4)

By: Robert Bevan

Narrated by: Jonathan Sleep

Length: 32 hrs and 43 mins

Publisher's Summary

Swords.

Sorcery.

Dick Jokes.

Truly do the gods smile upon you, dear listener, for the first four books in the hilarious Caverns and Creatures series are now available in one audiobook set. Join Tim, Dave, Julian, and Cooper as they are thrown into a hostile fantasy world filled with magic and monsters, and ruled over by a cruel and sadistic game master who taunts and harasses them while he sits back and eats their fried chicken.

Having taken on the bodies of their fantasy characters, Tim and the others are forced to discover the answers to two questions that every underachieving lowlife who's ever rolled a d20 has asked themselves at least once.

What if you and your friends got to live the game for real? What if you and your friends were assholes?

Would you have what it takes to survive? The strength? The wisdom? The...charisma?

Do you have the dice in your sack?

It's like Lord of the Rings meets your mom in a truck stop bathroom, but even cheaper.

This set includes:

1. Critical Failures
2. Critical Failures II: Fail Harder
3. Critical Failures III: A Storm of S-Words
4. Critical Failures IV: The Phantom Pinas

©2016 Robert Bevan (P)2019 Robert Bevan

A great listen, but don't listen while in public!

No really, laughing like the Joker in the grocery aisle makes people weird out

As a Canadian comedian Rick Blue puts it: "The trick is being able to speak the unspeakable and somehow get away with it." Mister Bevan is a master of this skill and if you have any appreciation for well-crafted lowbrow humor, then this book is for you.

All I can say is, "WOW!"

Ok, maybe a little bit more than, "WOW!"

As a player of Dungeons and Dragons for 38 years, I knew I was going to enjoy this book series, and it did not disappoint.

What I didn't know is that the narrator would blow my mind.

I never heard a single book on audible with this kind of voice range. I thought there were multiple people narrating the book.

I will definitely be looking for more books read by this man.

Amaze balls of a listen

If you like game night with friends and they happen to be crude and childish and make d;(k jokes that are funny and make you pee your pants a little this book is for you! Be careful about listening in public or around other people. Funny and a great value! Spend your monthly credit on this now! Why are you still reading? Just click it and enjoy.

what a ride!

This series is OutFuckingStanding! I flew through books 1-4, and can’t wait for 5-7.

Critical failures is great

A very funny twist on the sent to "a game world" trope. anyone who likes dnd or pathfinder and crude humor will love it

Don't listen to this if you are sensitve

This was a spoofy book in the light of Tosh 2.0, Monty Python's flying circus, and a super rude version of Blazing Saddles. The author poked at every raw nerve from child molesting, in the closet gay, racist, redneck police to super insecure white people who wondered if they were racist because they described someone as black. There is a LOT of F-bomb dropping. However, there is a story hidden in there that books 1-3 in this omnibus. This left me with hope that the author would make something of this book that was entertaining even if stupid like Sharknado or Ghost Busters. There is TONS of poop and fart humor. Some of it was LOL, but the author was leaning on this and many of the other weak elements so heavily by book four, that it became hard to listen to. If I find book 5 on sale, I'd probably buy it just to see if the author pulls this one out of the pooper. (You see what I did there? :) Anyway, I give books 1-3 three-stars, but book four two-stars. If you don't like 4th grade humor by college aged people or stupid-spoofy stories, stay away from this book. Oh, and I thought the narrator did a great job especially considering some of the stuff he had to read.

friend said I'd like it

I like the lvl of wrongness this series had to offer.. will be moving to the next adventure of set.

Lots of yikes

Facebook advertised the audiobook for Critical Failures/Caverns & Creatures 1-4 for me on Audible. I've had floating credits so I picked it up because it had high reviews for the basic "players enter the game" "but they curse and talk like me" thing.

I'm less than an hour in and so far 'Jew' and 'gay' have been used disparagingly, and 'f--' used casually, along with this gem:

Female character: "What's the difference between a halfling and a gnome?"
Male character: "An inch or two; your vagina will be the same size no matter which one you choose."
(this was three minutes in)

I cuss like a sailor, fuck is one of my favorite words, and I am not shy on vulgarity. This book tries to make backward language seem casual though. Fuck that.

Also the whole 'being put into the game for real' thing is because they (D&D players) are only put into the game as a punishment because they mercilessly bully the DM that they "put an ad out in the paper" for.

I'm also pretty sure there is some casual racism about one D&D race or another being inherently black but I had already started zoning out on the book that I didn't catch it.

This seems like weird fantasy-adjacent bro fulfillment. I'm not far in, but have seen so many instances of gross that 'giving it a chance' seems just really awful.

These are observations from just the first 40 minutes of a 32-hour listen. If it gets better, that would be surprising. I returned my copy.

Whole lot of nope

Only 15 minutes in and I cant do it. Whether it's the narrator's annoying voice or just the poor writing.... I know, I havent even given it a chance, but I can already tell I wont like it. I am all for quality potty humor... but this is straight hot garbage. No thanks

Boys will be boys?

The gross and relaxed attitude the author has on middle schoolers being murdering rapist as boys will be boys is distracting and disgusting. He also tries to normalize rape as a means of reproduction. I mean, is this normal behavior or mentality male D and D players have? I play mtg and deal with that already, easily threatened male nerds live in these kind of delusions

Not worth the time or money.

Whilst the author does show the ability to put together a cohesive story line, he unapologetically fails at designing individual characters. Each and every character in the book is designed to be a prepubescent, homophobic half-wit. None of them have an individual personality, and each acts the same way in every situation, fart jokes, poo jokes and penis jokes. Honestly, for an author that makes homophobic comments at such a disturbing rate, I expected a lot less gratuitous homoerotic content.

I gave it my best shot with this book and tried to get through it. But by the point that it gets to someone using a grease spell to help insert a wooden dildo into a 'shit covered asshole' I was done.

If you have a very limited understanding of humour, or an obsession with penises and shit, give the book a go. if you want any element of variety in a story, steer clear, and pretend you never saw this.

Good story, some funny twists

Good story, some funny twists, I do feel like it grew suddenly in the 3rd book and became a bit harder to follow but not by a lot

Never giggled so much

This has been an absolute hilarious listen

Snort laughed out loud so many times, so be warned if listening outside as you will get funny looks from people!

This series is a gem! Will be listening to this again and again!

I have not laughed out loud so much on a long time

gutter in appropriate humour that has tickled me from.start to finish. bear with it, there is some golden moments in this.

Laugh out loud funny

well worth the listen. I was sad when it finished. book 5 here I come

Well worth it!!

This was an advert at first but after reading the plot i thought what the hell I've a spare token... So glad i did. I have laughed all the way through.

decent value for money

it's an interesting concept with some light humour. Lacks intelligent humour but it's got a fair few well delivered comical moments. Would like to see some positive character development and some consistency with characters. Tim can switch from creative thinker to moron within sentences. The narration is superb.

Not for me

I’ve been looking for writers to help me with my discworld withdrawal, and really wanted to like this one, but I just couldn’t get through it. The premise is a good one, and I’d like to read a series based on it, but the sexism and homophobia in this book was confusing. I kept listening, trying to figure out what the author was trying to say with it (is it their opinions or their characters opinions? Is it trying to be social commentary? Does it get addressed? Are characters who react against these opinions in the book intentionally written as whiny and clueless?) But in the end, I think that either the writer isn’t skilled enough to write bigoted characters who are effectively dealt with, or they hold those believes themselves. I guess I’m not the target market. The hunt continues

started well

The concept & idea behind it was interesting, The 1st book started well & captured my imagination. But then it slowly sank into repeating toilet humour, characters whose personalities just switched & plot lines that just jumped around rather than building to a climax. by the 4th book it just felt like a different set of main characters, things happening just for the hell of it & a continues barage of low brow toilet humour which I'm not sure was there to shock or make you laugh, it did neither.
Not an author I will seek out or willingly listen to in the future. The performance of the narrator was the hilight of most of book 3 & 4.

Needs 90%+ less toilet humour

I really enjoyed this as some light hearted wind-down reading/listening. The one major observation I have is that it genuinely needs 90%+ less references to genitals & toilet humour. It's not even limited to a personality quirk of one character but is incessant throughout and sounds like adolescent humour of a much lower age than I thought the characters were supposed to be, so it's jarring. It's to the point where I'd be too embarrassed to have this playing on anything other than private earphones, definitely not out loud. It seems to get progressively worse as the books progress. With that in mind, I have found a place for this in my low-effort listens library because I enjoy the story, core concepts and world overall, even if the language makes me cringe with unrealistically adolescent hammy bravado that perhaps should have been funnier than it was. I don't think they even count as 'dick jokes' as they're not actually setup to be funny a lot of the time, the references just dominate the otherwise good flow of the story.