I Went on an Adventure and All I Got Was This Barbarian Orc: Crack Fantasy Adventure Chapters 1-5

Crack Fantasy Adventure #1-5

by Jennifer Cody

Berklak:

The life of an adventuring orc like me is at the very least interesting, even if I’m only half-orc. (The other half is elvish and that just means that my father let himself be seduced by a pretty face, and my mother gave in to the tenacity of an orc in love.) When I find multiple sites of mass killings on my way to the capital of Fasgard, interesting becomes curious, confusing, and downright dangerous.

After a meeting with the general of the king’s army, I find myself in the company of a beautiful necromancer, a feral old friend, a clumsy bard with serious kitchen skills, a paladin who can see invisible enemies, and a pair of halflings who look like twins (they’re not even remotely related) and act like lovers. Together we investigate the murders, descend into the depths of the Underthyr, and discover the origin of a mysterious miasma plaguing all of Fasgard.

And all that is just the sidequest to falling in love with the most amazing man in all of thyr.

Lawton:

Life in the palace has never been pleasant for me. Born a necromancer in a kingdom where my magic is illegal, I’ve struggled from birth to earn my place in the palace. As the high sorcerer of Fasgard, it’s my duty to protect the kingdom from the magical attacks, so when the sweetest of my father’s concubines kills his most valuable pets, I task myself with the investigation.

Discovering a miasma of darkness covering the kingdom I’ve sworn to protect, I hire the most lovely half-orc to exist to accompany me to investigate. It takes every ounce of illegal magic in me to get from the palace to the dungeon, but every battle, puzzle, and tiny bit of loot is worth it because along the way, I find acceptance from a new kind of family that loves me more than I ever thought I could be.

Our quest might be to save the world, but saving me seems to be just as important.

I Went on an Adventure and All I Got Was This Barbarian Orc is a five chapter serial fantasy adventure with a light-hearted, fun TTRPG vibe. Expect big magic, lots of cuddles, plenty of steam, and a team of characters that might not get a natural 20 on every roll, but they make up for it with creative solutions to both magical and mundane problems.

Genres: Fantasy, M M Romance, Romance, LGBT, Cozy, Paranormal, Magic

513 pages, Kindle Edition

Published February 20, 2024

About the author

Jennifer Cody lives in Small Midwestern Town, USA, aka the sticks of Kansas. She has three kids and a Beardo she loves. Her sleep schedule is weird, so messages sent at midnight usually get answered relatively promptly. She reads all kinds of mm romance and urban fantasy, but her favorites are gay-for-you, small-town romances and over the top urban fantasy romances. Her own writing doesn’t always reflect her reading preferences, but mostly it does. She writes what she wants to read and reads extensively because she’s an addict. To books, obviously. And caffeine because sleep is for other people.

Reviews

[Jessie The Book Addict · Rating 1 out of 5]

DNF partway through book 2
This has a lot of situations of questionable consent passed off as fully consensual in the plot. What we're being told about the world conflicts with what we're being shown of the world and not in a cool future reveal way, but in a not cool, just because you said they could've said no, doesn't mean your not coercing them, kind of way.
It also does the playboy and virgin trope for the romance and that's not my cup of tea. especially when the book spends so much time explaining in great detail all the people the orc is fucking. And his partners being disturbingly young compared to him make it feel actually gross instead of just not for me.
This is meant to be a light read with a fun plot, but it has all sorts of fucked up situations that are very disturbing for those concerned with consent, and they are entirely unnecessary to the plot.
This book made me feel disturbed, not happy.



My first issue is with Berklak's (the orc, a main love interest) sexual relationship with Oliver (young human, not a main love interest). Oliver starts out afraid of Berklak and a little racist towards him, and is told by an older guard he works with that if he wants any chance of having a decent life out of his tiny town he should accompany the orc and provide sexual services for him in exchange for being taken to college. We do not know if Oliver has any previous sexual experience or is even into men. Berklak thinks to himself that he wouldn't have sex with Oliver if he wasn't really into it, but that's vague as hell, and as we don't see what happens leading up to their sex we never find out if Oliver is told that. What we see implies Oliver thinks that putting out is necessary to travel with Berklak. Which is super coercive, and makes any consent he gives questionable. This situation is made worse by Berklak being like 90 (middle aged for an orc) with a lot of life experience and accomplishments and Oliver being a human in his 20's with no experiences and he's called boy and thought of as "boy" by Berklak.

Oliver is not the only college student that Berklak fucks, and it's implied that all orcs have the habit of accompanying young future bards to school and fucking them on the way then helping them pay for school. A pretty fucked up situation. If some middle aged dude was offering desperate young adults, who have not chosen to go into sex work, a chance at college in exchange for sex, I think we'd all think he was gross and creepy and coercive. I feel that way about the Berklak.

The next issue is the "you think I'm your friend charm". A stable boy is rude to a party member, gets "charmed" and immediately does a 180 and starts propositioning the party member. The party member implies that he will take him up on the offer later. This is basically magical roofies. The charms makes him interested but with out it he was definitely not. If you have to magically coerce someone to get consent, it is not consent.

The last issue I came across made me rage quit the book, though I almost did at each of the previous scenes too. Apparently Orcs have a social tradition of grooming and that's supposed to just be a fun fact about their culture. When asked how Orcs get the skills to back up their reputations as good lovers, we find out that when they reach the cusp of adulthood, their fathers set them up with a friend of their fathers, who teaches them all about sex by doing it together, then brings in a partner for them both to have sex with. They are apparently allowed to opt out of this tradition but Berklak only knows one orc who ever has because they want to stay a virgin so they can become a paladin. The amount of social pressure to take part in this tradition seems like it would be a lot. And can you imagine having your first sexual experience with your dad's friend? Yuck. Even worse is imagining the idea of watching someone grow up and then fucking them as soon as they qualify as an adult. That's straight up grooming. It's just so fucked up, but everyone in the book acts like this is just a cultural difference.

On a less extreme note I have some issues with conflicts between how the author tells us things are and how they show us things are. Though in fairness I did a lot of skimming before I gave up on the book, so I could be missing things. For example, do orcs ever do monogamy? I can't quite figure that out. We're told they don't do marriage, but still have serious relationships, just it's normal for orcs in those relationships to have a bunch of sex with their friends kid to teach them about sex (yuck). which all implies none of them do monogamy. But then Berklak goes on about how possessive of their sexual partners they are, and how they have trouble giving them up with out a time limit set at the beginning, and how being a good lover is making sure that Lawton knows he's only fucking him at the time. This kind of implies monogamy, at least serial monogamy. Or is it a one sided possessiveness, where the orcs fuck around but don't let their partners fuck around? All this confusion prevented me from enjoying the Lawton/Berklak romance after the plot finally got to it because I didn't know if Berklak would continue to fuck around. I'm okay with poly romance, and have even done it in real life, but this was giving more completely open-relationship vibes but where only one partner is actually interested/able to have relations outside the couple. The whole set up feels very unequal, especially because Lawton is not chaste by choice, but because everyone is afraid of him and he's not allowed to have kids. Contrasted by everyone apparently wanting to fuck Berklak despite also being afraid of him. I'd have found this a lot less bothersome if Lawton was able to be more promiscuous, which I actually think would have fit better with his character as a prince in a world where most royalty has a partner and a bunch of concubines. Then at least they would be on equal footing, and I wouldn't care if their relationship was monogamous or open, because they could both fuck around.

Another confusion I have is all Orcs being described as pansexual, but then being culturally shamed if they have sex with a woman (all orcs are male but the one trans-woman mentioned). Is your whole race really pan-sexual if they almost never sleep with women? I guess sexual-attraction and who someone has sex with can be two very different things, so it's not technically wrong. But it also doesn't seem accurate to call an entire race pansexual, when they are only allowed to actually have sex with men. Like I know a lot of self-described lesbians who feel some attraction to men, but are not interested in having sex or a relationship with them, so they use the term lesbian. It kinda seems like the orcs are more that type of gay. Also the whole shaming for sleeping with women bit feels pretty fucking sexist.

I'm also a little confused by sexuality in general in this book. Is everyone bi? All the men we encounter seem down to fuck a male orc, without sexuality coming into question at all. Is there no straight people? Are all the guys just down to go gay for orc cock? Are the college kids actually straight but going gay for pay? If not, how does the orc never end up propositioning a straight dude? I like it when books create worlds without homophobia, but I feel that completely ignoring the possibility of incompatible sexualities is unrealistic.


I think the author would benefit from learning more about consent and so that they notice when they write coercion into the plot at every turn.

[Kirstine Hansen · Rating 4 out of 5]

I've never played a single RPG, so there's probably a ton of references that went over my head, but this is still so sweet and fun and enjoyable. And exciting, whee! The world building is wonderful, too.

When we first meet the orc (sorry, half-orc) Berklak, he is carrying around his trusty magical war hammer, and looking for a replacement for his just as trusty barrel of mead.

At the same time, Prince Lawton putters around in his father's palace, taking care of his job as high sorcerer of Fasgard. He is lonely because the court fears and despises him for being a necromancer. Dicks, all of them.

However, within a few days he is going adventuring with Berklak instead, looking to solve a magical mystery that is disrupting the whole kingdom, and finding true friends and love for the first time in his life.

Oh yeah, and since this is a horny romance story: Orcs are such prolific and prized lovers that you can go to the apothecary to get a sort of starter pack of lube and healing ointment before going on a trip with one of them. Our heroes get one of those (or was it two?) and along the way Berklak has a lot of fun showing Lawton everything he's been missing for the first forty years of his life. The prince has been looking forward to alll the coitus since before leaving the palace, and he is not disappointed.

I’m just a barbarian half-orc in a deeply committed relationship with my mead, but Lawton might be slipping into the space I reserve right next to my mead for people just as important. I’m not saying I’d leave my mead for him, but I am saying I would save him if it was a choice between him and my mead.

[Dana · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm very split about this one.

On one hand, the characters are written like that one internet writer that's way too into their OCs but never actually tells their readers why they're worth reading about. The relationship stakes are non-existent and the background characters (ie, adventuring party) could be replaced by a Mage Hand spell, and a pair of golden retrievers.

On the other, the overarching plot is fascinating and had me glued. I was so invested. And it was a beautiful high fantasy concept with a satisfying conclusion (albeit, I'd have wanted an epilogue about it, but it was good as it was nonetheless). The whole mystery was so well executed from start to finish and kept me wide eyed and keen to hear more.

So you can see why I'm torn.

The writing isn't bad, the characters and their complete lack of chemistry are.

So I'm leaving 3 stars. Right in the middle. Because I both loved and severely disliked this with the same intensity in my heart.

[Kassandra Knight · Rating 5 out of 5]

I Went on an Adventure and All I Got Was This Barbarian Orc (Crack Fantasy Adventure Chapters 1-5)

I absofreakinglutely LOVED it!

Like, y’all are gonna love this, especially if you love her other books.

I love how the story progressed and would love to see this as an animated movie (except for the things that shall not be named, *shudders* my ass would be noping the hell out of that field and right back to Fasgard. I feel like Indy, except instead of snakes it’s the things that shall not be named. *shudders again*)

I love that Jennifer put the character art from the individual book covers in front of their respective “chapter”. They were really too cute not to include them.

Highly recommend.

This was my first time reading through the “boxset” as I had previously ARC read the individual books when they came out. They definitely need to be binge-read in order and I will definitely re-read this one.

[~TheBlasian~ · Rating 3 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this story!!!

I’m rating it a 3 because I wouldn’t necessarily re-read it again, but I Definitely enjoyed the adventure the first time!

I appreciate that this story offered plenty of intrigue without spiraling into unnecessary plot devices and drama. Each obstacle the group encountered was dealt with almost immediately, while also contributing to the overarching plot.

I know people like drama to drive a storyline, but i appreciate a great story that is cut-and-dry without the drawn out resolutions and conspiracies.

Humor and adventure were the key principles, with elaborate world building and focus on the group’s dynamics in forming a friendship.

Im a bit disappointed that it ends with the completion of their quest. I hope there will be more since there’s so much potential and opportunity now that the gang is together!!!!!!!

[Chetana · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5-3.75⭐️

I went in not knowing anything about this series. I had never even heard of the genre- Crack Fantasy, which apparently is fantasy with more ridiculous or funny elements. This one was more along the lines of a D&D quest (as the author states) and was a fun adventure story.

I quite enjoyed the adventure that the Beefcake Brigade had, finding the cause of the miasma. For a ridiculous fantasy it sure did have heart in some parts of the book. I enjoyed the world the author built and am hoping she expands on it with Law and Berklak or even the other characters in the adventure gang.

[☆ Todd · Rating 3 out of 5]

For this story to have been a reported 513 pages, it somehow still left me wanting... more. 🙁

The story itself was fine, but I think that a *lot* more action scenes would've helped keep my level of excitement up.

So yeah, pretty decent, but nothing exceptional.

3 stars.

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[Ian Tomlin · Rating 2 out of 5]

The first chapter got me hooked, and the overall plot was pretty enjoyable . The journey however was pretty bumpy. Most of the characters didn’t really get time to grow or shine at all—probably a symptom of chapter 2 introducing five new party members. This introduction also signaled a shift toward this really just being a fantasy RPG adventure with occasional romance and light spice thrown in. The romances in the story didn’t feel particularly earned either, but overall the overarching story and the individual settings and scenarios were interesting enough to keep me reading (though I almost put it down partway through chapter 4, admittedly).

[She Who Shall Remain Nameless · Rating 5 out of 5]

epic crack fantasy adventure

This is such a fun series featuring a half orc, a necromancer, and the rest of their adventuring crew. The first episode, or chapter, is a bit slow moving, but that’s to be expected what with world building and character introductions and the like. Overall, this was an exceptionally entertaining series which I highly recommend.

[BookLover886 · Rating 5 out of 5]

loved it!

Another great story from Jennifer Cody! This was such a fun story. Fun of action, humor, adventure, and love. I wish it didn’t end. I definitely recommend joining this fun group on their adventures to save the kingdom!

[Liz Prosser · Rating 5 out of 5]

adventure and magic

An absolutely amazing and amusing adventure from start to finish! One of the absolute best books of the year and I truly hope the author has more adventures for this world!

[Deb · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great

What a great story. So many adventures, friendships, enemies, weird things, and Lawson who has the most fantastic personality. Enjoy.

[CB · Rating 5 out of 5]

So entertaining! Humorous, cute and very, very engaging. I am not a D&D player but many in my family are and this gave me just a taste of that world.

[Ｂａｙｌａｎ · Rating 1 out of 5]

DNF @ 3%

[Lauren]

It was fun and fine until my interest drifted as it felt samey with no tension to make me want to continue

[Emilie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Was I at least a little confused about what was going on half the time? Yes. Did I enjoy the book(s)? Also yes.

[Reader · Rating 3 out of 5]

2.8/5

[Sniege · Rating 5 out of 5]

The title of this book is very appropriate 😊 It's fun and funny, and all that you can hope for, l am just sad that never had the opportunity to play games from which such fantasy originates

[Susan · Rating 2 out of 5]

I like a good crack fiction but this was a little much, and so many parts just didn't make sense. I kept thinking I was missing pieces.

[Zoe · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was cute, cozy, adventure packed and just so much fun. I can not begin to explain the rabbit holes I went down to find this book but let me just say it was totally worth it. I have been searching for a book with RPG vibes ever since finishing two of them earlier this year and this book definitely had all the right elements. One of the best things in this book was the found family and the way all of them were misfits in their own right and all found each other. The immediate acceptance and protectiveness of one another was perfection. I am the biggest fan of cozy fantasies where there is adventure and problems to solve but all the characters remain happily in one piece because they are the best there is and this book has it in spades. Their little group is both silly and very smart and powerful, taking on every challenge. I also adore the immediate bond between Berklak and Lawton. Lawton finally found someone who wasn’t afraid of him and his abilites but instead wanted to protect him and Berklak found a cute little necromancer who is even more important than mead. The entire story is just light, cozy, and fun. If you want a good time and an interesting plot this is 100% the right story.

[MyDoRyS · Rating 5 out of 5]

This series was so much fun! There is a bit of everything and then some. Not a DARK book, it is cute, sweet, and kickass! I really enjoyed all of them and did not hate any character....other than the royal family :) Maybe it is just because I do not enjoy or believe in royalty, so it's a me thing. I love the balance between adventure, mystery, action, and romance. I fell in love with the MCs and their team. PLEASE MAKE IT AUDIO!!!!!!!!! That way, I can take it with me while driving. I have read it 3 times already and will be back for more. Also, can we get more stories? Pretty please with a cherry on top!?!?!? It is a positive read, heartwarming, silly, over-the-top, and sassy! Perfect if you want a good laugh, because it is so ridiculously funny that it will make you crack up! On to my next adventure, Happy Readings!!!