The Dungeon Slayer

The Dungeon Slayer, Book 1

By: Konrad Ryan

Narrated by: Austin Rising

Length: 11 hrs and 41 mins

Publisher's summary

Mankind has been under attack for 50 years by the awesome power of bosses and monsters who are the denizens of dungeons.

Monsters started these attacks when a mystical beast named Raekast appeared and threatened the world, eradicating human life from several continents. Raekast threatened all human life until a mysterious ceremony called "Rebirth" unlocked the hidden potential of humans strong enough to repel and defeat her. Raekast’s final, desperate act caused dungeons to spawn across the globe. The greatest of these dungeons is known as Titan. Dungeons are a threat to humanity and nature alike. Powerful reborn humans known as "Slayers" enter their dangerous depths to kill the monsters and bosses that live within and retrieve treasure, items and more.

Tad Harrington, a video-game-loving 16-year-old high school student, was bullied relentlessly throughout his life. Tad’s Rebirth date has come. His last hope is to be reborn a slayer strong enough to enter the toughest dungeons where a life of power and luxury could await him.

When things don’t go according to plan, Tad finds out he has a special Rebirth, one that can level up and grow stronger by defeating monsters. Starting from level one, how high can Tad climb? Can he overcome the challenges and become the ultimate dungeon slayer?

©2020 Konrad Ryan (P)2021 Podium Audio

Great book based on Solo Leveling

The world of this series is based on Solo Leveling, where dungeons need destroying and no one levels (though improves through gear and better utilization of skill). As such, I think this story is quite an improvement over the initial concept in the overarching plot and character interactions. it isn't really an overpowered, perfect main character hiding his strength, but more like someone given the opportunity to grow through hardship and sort of feeling their way around making mistakes along the way.

One of the best parts of this series is actually one of the most annoying in the beginning. The MC starts out horribly unlikeable even in his narration in his own head, and how well the author evolved this aspect of the story and the conclusion of what was going on is truly unique to this story and ended up being my favorite part of this first book.

Great start to a disappointing series

So first of all, addressing some of the other complaints about this book, yes, MC is not very bright. But unlike many other books where it is a failure of the writer, in this case, the character is meant to be a little stupid at first. He is very young with extremely little social interaction with others, and what socialization he did have was largely abusive. So yeah. I can get behind that he is oblivious and makes poor decisions. This does not cover everything, as there are things that he absolutely should know and understand about the way his world and society functions, but that is very forgiveable. Also, I do feel like he grows in intelligence as the book progresses.

My biggest problem is virtually everything that came after this book. I loved this book so much that I immediatey bought the rest of the series. The second book wasn't as good, but it wasn't terrible and I was still riding the high of the first book, so I ignored a lot of the problems that really bother me now. For example, he makes a weapon out of monster parts that a store offers to buy from him for $4,000,000 due to it being an superior weapon than most other dungeon generated weapons, but then he never makes another one again and just buys dungeon generated items. Another is the extremely frustrating lack of explination as to how magic works. Tad is unique in that he has access to his stats and can see how much mana he has, so he has a hard time describing to his team mates what certain weapons can do. That is fine. but then how do THEY think magic and damage works? This is never explained. Also, how do people learn spells? it is only vaguely implied that you know the ones you know and that's all you get. but that is contradicted a few times without explination. Also, there are a few times when other characters use terms that they shouldn't know, which only makes it more confusing. And when the author does establish rules and explain them in great detail, he ends up ignoring them later on.

Highlight of the second book was Fat Jack. Best character ever, 10/10. All problems can be forgiven if we get more Fat Jack.

Third book was awful. Not going to get into any spoilers, But starting with the second book and getting worse with the third, The Conflict keeps getting bigger and bigger and more and more complicated when the author really should have kept things simple. Fight scenes also kept getting longer and longer. I think the final fight is around 4 chapters. I ended up skipping through it I was just so bored of the action never ending. Hated how the third book ended and I ended up just returning the 4th before even starting it.

I do reccommend reading this book, but I wouldn't bother with the rest of the series.

Really enjoyed the story.

Been a pretty good story. Reminds me of Solo Leveling. The narrator isn't the greatest at a broad spectrum of voices but I would say it's average compared to others.

Enjoyable with some great dungeon monsters

Great monsters Cool idea of a world and the character needs to be a bit darker

Fun idea!

I’m really enjoying lit rpg books. This series is off to a great start! Really enjoyed the first one, can’t wait to listen to the last few. Had a few chuckles, for sure, and some near to tears moments too! But not too close to tears, it’s definitely more of a fun action fantasy, than an emotional tear jerker. And of course, Austin Rising is an amazing narrator. I’d listen to him watch paint dry. Haha. The main character isn’t unlikeable in my opinion, he just has room to grow- but that’s how all heros start! That’s why it’s so fun to follow their journey to greatness.

great book

I love it. I can't wait for book to come out. once I started I couldn't stopped.

good

i liked it it kinda reminded me of solo leveling. im not sure if you got the idea from that manga or Ln but it was good, but i kinda hated the way he forgot things and didn't use his powers to his potential, and i also hated the way he was so unrealistic, he reached soldier in days .

Great story concept

Great story concept, worth giving a try. Definitely going to get the next story in the series. There are a few concerns that I hope are addressed later on in the series.

the only crybabies are the 1 star reviewers.

this book is amazing. written well, read well, and consumed well. All those one star reviewers are audio posers.

Zero to hero

Or road to zero? interesting stat building litrpg looking forward to book 2 hope Tad gets a little more common sense though