Two star reviews are reserved for books that were so bad I did not finish, but had something enjoyable about them. This gets 2.5 because I finished it.

So I want to start by saying this is not a good book, and I would never recommend someone else read it. That being said, the good things about this book are that the action is fun, the characters are sometimes tolerable, and the author does a great job at two things: setting up seemingly impossible problems that the characters solve in interesting ways, and really getting a reader curious about what's going to happen next. This last one is somewhat clumsy and heavy handed, but it is very effective, so credit where credit is due.

This book is also incredibly racist and misogynistic. I'm pretty sure the author thinks most people in South America do not live or sleep in houses, either that or he thinks the continent is on the other side of the planet from North America. The book is full of gross sexist jokes, oftentimes in places and situations where they make no sense. The main character is practically sexless in the ways he responds to conversations about sex or sexuality, but the world around him is disturbingly horny, with the narrative pausing occasionally to breathlessly describe the details of an alien woman's gigantic boobs.

Also I'm pretty sure the author thinks the MC is a good person, but he chose to rob a group of people (racialized and otherized) who just helped him, then kill their leader. He accidently kills all their kids when he does this. How does this make him feel? Just kinda bad! Like a bit of a jerk! And how dare they make him feel bad about it (his words not mine.)

I use this detail to illustrate how incredibly bad at character writing the author is, at least in this first book. He really wants to have his cake and eat it too. He wants to write a fun and fast paced sleazy trashy adventure book, which he's pretty good at doing! But he also wants his characters to be complex and deep, he wants them to make hard and complicated choices and deal with the consequences both internally and externally, he wants to satirize our world and say something deep and meaningful about it, and at all these things he is an absolute failure. Also his worldbuilding is terrible. What a waste of an intergalactic society.

All in all I will not ever recommend this book, and will actively discourage others from reading it.

A fun read, I really enjoyed the litRPG genre. I have to admit that the dudebro teen humor was a bit hit-or-miss—while entertaining initially, it became tiresome as the story progressed (I found myself frequently eye-rolling). As someone who has been playing RPGs/TTRPGs for over 15 years, I felt the narration fell short at times. I also never became invested in Carl as a character, not even at the end of the book, when I felt the story as a whole became more interesting - I even found him tiresome at points.

Nonetheless, I LOVED Princess Donut and take it from someone who struggles to concentrate while listening to audiobooks: this audiobook is a must-listen; Jeff Hays' hilarious narration saved me from DNFing it a couple of times.

Overall, it was a fun read, and, while the humor may not always land, I plan to continue with the series as a light break from my other readings.