-
Dungeon Crawler Carl and the gleeful fun of LitRPG fiction
“You’re the main character of your story,” works well as a general lesson of self empowerment and a foundational aspect to role playing games (RPGs) such as Dungeons and Dragons. Literary RPGs take the other components of RPGs–combat and magic systems, creatures and quests–and weaves an adventure in narrative form.
Matt Dinniman’s Dungeon Crawler Carl series might be the best example of the genre, now on its seventh book. Carl and his ex-girlfriend’s cat, Donut, survive an alien invasion only to be thrust into a galactic survival game show with a sprawling cast of alien species and mythical monsters. As Carl and Donut progress through the dungeon, they level up with gear and magical items. What Dinniman brings to the genre is well executed humor, drama, and pathos.
Those well versed in pop culture will be rewarded as monsters and gear are referenced as the series progresses, sometimes with twists or subversive elements. There’s a reason for this, too, revealed in one of the books.
As the books progress, Carl encounters a different game being played in each level of the dungeon. Most of the time these plot devices work, but book 3, The Dungeon Anarchist’s Cookbook, involves a convoluted maze of trains, inordinate exposition is required to finish the story thus weakening the book. And that book pulls in numerous plot threads that come together in later books.
And with each level, the cast expands, a broader story of political intrigue grows, and existential themes of life, love, justice, compassion, and economic systems are brought to life in uncanny ways. A mentor acts as a guide but is an indentured servant to a brutal corporation. A Jurassic Park like dinosaur and the responsibility of fatherhood. A foul mouth head of a sex doll that exemplifies toxic relationships. A teenage girl that can command dogs but not her own trauma. And Carl, for all his John McClain gravitas, struggles to keep his humanity.
Are you getting Pulitzer Prize writing? No. But are you getting an escapist read that’ll distract you from real life?
Yes.
- Book 1: Dungeon Crawler Carl
- Book 2: Carl’s Doomsday Scenario
- Book 3: The Dungeon Anarchist’s Cookbook
- Book 4: The Gate of the Feral Gods
- Book 5: The Butcher’s Masquerade
- Book 6: The Eye of the Bedlam Bride
- Book 7: This Inevitable Ruin
-
Eames Institute Curious 100
Absolutely love this list of talented and creative folks, the Eames Institute Curious 100. Some I’m familiar with and others who are new.
-
The Opposite of Fascism
I’d quote the whole article, but go read what Anand Giridharadas writes regarding the opposite of fascism.
The best revenge against these grifters and bigots and billionaires and bullies is to live well, richly, together.
The best revenge is to refuse their values. To embody the kind of living — free, colorful, open — they want to snuff out.
-
Bed Rotting is a thing
‘When you’re bed rotting, you’re not sleeping, just lying there, scrolling on your phone, watching TV, or doing nothing in particular,’ Monroe continues. ‘It’s often framed as a way to “check out” from the demands of life, work, or stress. The term can conjure images of decay or stagnation, which can feel relatable to people who are overwhelmed or burned out.’
-
Richard Scarry and the art of children’s literature
Chris Ware delves into the history and magic of Richard Scarry’s Busy Town world.
Scarry followed What Do People Do All Day? with a series of books all set within the same society, including (among others) Great Big Schoolhouse, Cars and Trucks and Things That Go, and Busiest People Ever! The Busytown books, as they came to be known—with their dictionary-like visual presentation paired with lightly slapstick situations and the presence of recurring, memorable characters like Huckle Cat, the Pig family, and my favorite, Lowly Worm—grew into a real-feeling big world that Scarry seemed to be letting little ones into. (Lowly was perhaps the first children’s book animal character with a real nod to the ADA and the myth of “dis”-ability, and cheerfully makes his linear form work in all sorts of inspiring and disarmingly moving ways.)
Those Busy Town books could occupy my entire afternoon as a kid. Pair those books with generic Lego blocks, and 5 year old me would attempt to recreate the scenes. There never was a mini-fig worm with a hat, though.
-
FAFOnomics
Kyla Scanlon coins an apt term for our current economic state–FAFOnomics. Fuck Around, Find Out.
Yes, America needs change. But change without wisdom isn’t reform, it’s recklessness.
And of course, there is an important point to all of this, which is that it is all noise. It’s what Tyler Cowen and Ezra Klein have both pointed out as strategic chaos: overwhelming the public’s already limited capacity for attention until exhaustion sets in. It’s the attention singularity that I wrote about last week in action, where power, narrative, and wealth merge into a self-reinforcing system of perpetual disruption.
Welcome to FAFAnomics – F*ck Around and Find Out Economics, something that feels like the policy equivalent of a TikTok influencer doing increasingly dangerous stunts off the side of a building for views. The goal isn’t good governance; it’s capturing attention at any cost. And it’s working! While we debate whether each new crisis is legal, ethical, or even real1(as we should) the broader transformation of American fiscal policy continues.
-
Libertarians feed bears
A New Hampshire town was taken over by bears because freedom means being able to feed bears so long as the bears aren’t “my problem.” It’s more complicated than that, because when you don’t believe government services have value, then problems that need government intervention don’t get addressed.
What was the deal with Grafton’s bears? Hongoltz-Hetling investigates the question at length, probing numerous hypotheses for why the creatures have become so uncharacteristically aggressive, indifferent, intelligent, and unafraid. Is it the lack of zoning, the resulting incursion into bear habitats, and the reluctance of Graftonites to pay for, let alone mandate, bear-proof garbage bins? Might the bears be deranged somehow, perhaps even disinhibited and emboldened by toxoplasmosis infections, picked up from eating trash and pet waste from said unsecured bins? There can be no definitive answer to these questions, but one thing is clear: The libertarian social experiment underway in Grafton was uniquely incapable of dealing with the problem. “Free Towners were finding that the situations that had been so easy to problem-solve in the abstract medium of message boards were difficult to resolve in person.”
More evidence that libertarianism is anarchy for rich people.
-
Cover roundup: Fields of Athenry
Fields of Athenry, a traditional Irish folk song from 1979 by Pete St. John, serves as an unofficial national anthem for Ireland.
Perhaps the most recognized version is by the Dublinners, sticking to the songs folk origins.
The Drop Kick Murphys channel fury into the lyrics and guitars.
The Ohio St. marching band gave a good rendition
The vocal harmony of Sina Theil & Caitríona O’Sullivan brings a resonance to the lyrics.
With the Ireland national team about to be eliminated from the 2012 Euro soccer tournament, the Irish fans began singing.
-
Kevin Kelly’s travel tips
Kevin Kelly has listed 50 travel tips. Here are a few interesting ones:
If you hire a driver, or use a taxi, offer to pay the driver to take you to visit their mother. They will ordinarily jump at the chance. They fulfill their filial duty and you will get easy entry into a local’s home, and a very high chance to taste some home cooking. Mother, driver, and you leave happy. This trick rarely fails.
The rate you go is not determined by how fast you walk, bike or drive, but by how long your breaks are. Slow down. Take lots of breaks. The most memorable moments—conversations with amazing strangers, an invite inside, a hidden artwork—will usually happen when you are not moving.
Even if you never go to McDonalds at home, visit the McDonalds on your travels. Surprisingly, their menus are very localized and reflect different cuisines in a fun and easy way, with unexpected versions of familiar things. Very illuminating!
