Dungeon Lord

The Wraith's Haunt: A LitRPG Series, Book 1

By: Hugo Huesca

Narrated by: Jeff Hays, Annie Ellicott

Length: 9 hrs and 37 mins

Publisher's summary

Dark forces have extended Edward Wright an offer of incredible power at a terrible cost...and Edward has chosen to make them regret it.

When Edward is swept into the world of Ivalis as a Dungeon Lord, the Dark's most powerful servant, he has no servitude in mind. He'll oppose the evil plans of the Dark god, Murmur, whatever it takes.

Through only his wits and his guts to help him survive a weakened arrival, Edward must rise to power if he is to earn the right to live another day. But in the battle between Dark and Light, what can Edward choose if both sides are cruel, uncaring monsters? Cold gods laugh in the distant world of Ivalis. Heroes chase after power and experience, while Kings send their armies to their deaths in the name of the Dark and the Light.

But no one expects the rise of the Dungeon Lord.... And in the world of Ivalis, maybe a single man can forge his own path.

With the One Man Theater himself at the helm, joined by the sensational Annie Ellicott as two of the most disturbing monsters ever produced by Soundbooth Theater, we hope you never forget this horrifying LitRPG experience.

The Soundbooth Theater team for this production:

• Jeff Hays - Narration, Characters, Production Supervision
• Annie Ellicott - Amphiris the Spider Queen, Ilene the Mindbrood
• Dalton Lynne - Proofing, Editing
• Alex Tate - Production, Editing, Mastering

©2017 Hugo Huesca (P)2018 Soundbooth Theater

The negative review about gore (spoiler) seems too

I may be cold hearted (I'm not) but the main negative review which references a child's death seems over stated.
I actually didn't buy the book for MONTHS because I took that review seriously. I didn't want depressing. However, I love Jeff Hays and soundbooth so I eventually gave in.
Maybe it's because I fully expected it and the author does signpost the death for the reader in ahead of time so I was REALLY expecting it, but it didn't seem worse than edgy horror or monster movies. For that matter, it's not nearly as bad as classics like The Shining.

Point is, a child dies. The author does NOT give excuricating detail about the pain or suffering beyond noting it. There is NO glorification of child torture.
It's NOT gorn. It's a medieval story and bad things happen. It's a sad plot point.

These are great books!

(I do not wish to imply the other reviewer lied. That's not it. That review is over stated in my opinion.)

Average attitude in a fantasy world.

Was so happy the main character wasn't stereotypically whiny, and actually had some for thought without being a super genius.

A Good Book Carried by a GREAT Performance

Where does Dungeon Lord rank among all the audiobooks you’ve listened to so far?

Based on performance and production quality, this is one of the best audiobooks I've listened to. No steady monotone reading here; the narration is dynamic and the voices used to differentiate the characters really bring them to life. The story itself starts out with a very entertaining scene of players interacting in a raid environment - stupid DPS pulling early made me genuinely laugh in a "been there" sort of way - but then moves on to a really forced, WTF scene where the main character assaults his boss (who was the stupid DPS in question) when the boss punishes the MC and another character over the in-game events. Now, maybe having the MC smash his boss's face was intended to set him up with a dark side and make him "dungeon lord" material. Maybe it was wish fulfillment because the author had a boss he wished he could punch. I don't know; the upshot was that it made me think the MC was an idiot with anger management issues, and I very nearly dropped the book right there.

Fortunately, the assault and subsequent arrest is a very short sequence, and the book quickly moved on to the fantasy aspects of the world. Which were interesting, but good god that was a huge info dump that could have been handled better (and which was saved by the narration, which was excellent even during the boring parts). And while the story is a good-not-great portal fantasy, some of the actual gaming elements that make it LitRPG felt pasted on. The author could have written much the same book without the game trappings. Making the mechanics more central to the story would have made it a better LitRPG book; dropping them entirely would have made it a better fantasy book. As it is, the story seems a bit unfocused and doesn't really pay off, but the entertainment value of the narration kept me listening to the end.

This is one story you need to listen to.

The best part, was the voice effects. Incredibly creepy and truly a great voice effect.

Great Adventure Awaits

Thoroughly enjoyed the adventure. Great sense of humor and pretty good action throughout. Highly recommend.

The narration is the best I've ever heard!

For me the highlight of this book was the incredible narration! Honestly, other than saying that the narration was perfect, I have no clue how to describe it.

The story itself is good. Personally I didn't like how slow the characters are at growing, but it's not badly paced, just slower than I was hoping.

so much fun

I was surprised how sucked into this book I got. loved the concept and the voice acting was incredible. The main character wasn't the deepest but that's okay because the world and your introduction to it was fascinating.

Good start

A good start to the series. Looking forward to reading more of this intresting world.

Purely enjoyable

Loved the narration, especially the monsters! Can't wait to sink my teeth into the second one.

Excellent Dungeon Core but...

This book had excellent crunch and an entertaining storyline, but the MC is a little too virtuous for me. I dont mind a good character, but in a world as cruel as the one the MC finds himself in, it's unrealistic he would survive let alone thrive. In order to accommodate this, the author has to weave the story in a way that makes it hard to suspend disbelief. I found myself scoffing incredulously at events, which in-turn made it difficult to remain immersed in the story. With that stated, I do believe the author did an excellent job navigating the story to minimize the impossibility of the main character's success due to his absurd ethics. If you love dungeon core and virtuous MCs then I highly recommend this book to you.