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Delvers LLC #1
Welcome to Ludus
Henry and Jason led normal lives in Seattle before they were abducted to another world. Their kidnapper, the vain, self-styled god Dolos refuses to send them back unless they can accomplish an impossible task. Oddly, Dolos doesn’t seem to care if they succeed or not.
Luckily, Henry and Jason studied Historical European Martial Arts (HEMA) on Earth. Unfortunately, a Japanese American EMT and a geeky IT programmer don’t have many other useful skills on a sword and sorcery world like Ludus.
Stranded in the middle of nowhere on an alien world, the friends have no real direction and only a few possessions including magic-granting orbs from an apathetic god. Undaunted, the two begin their insane adventure to return home, but basic survival and eventually paying rent will have to take priority.
Luckily, Henry and Jason studied Historical European Martial Arts (HEMA) on Earth. Unfortunately, a Japanese American EMT and a geeky IT programmer don’t have many other useful skills on a sword and sorcery world like Ludus.
Stranded in the middle of nowhere on an alien world, the friends have no real direction and only a few possessions including magic-granting orbs from an apathetic god. Undaunted, the two begin their insane adventure to return home, but basic survival and eventually paying rent will have to take priority.
379 pages, Kindle Edition
First published September 19, 2016
1003 people are currently reading
1095 people want to read
About the author
Blaise Corvin
30 books635 followersBlaise Corvin served in the US Army in several roles. He has seen the best and the worst that humanity has to offer. He is a sucker for any hobby involving weapons, art, or improv.
He currently lives in Texas, in a house full of enough geeky memorabilia to start a museum.
He likes talking about himself in 3rd person and posting pictures of himself holding tarantulas. Sometimes, he pretends he is not an idiot with a terrible sense of humor.
It's all very eccentric.
Blaise currently writes mostly in the GameLit genre and LitRPG subgenre, exciting new classifications of fiction where characters either play a game (usually VR), or live in a world with game-like elements.
Delvers LLC is GameLit, lightly LitRPG, mostly a Fantasy/SciFi Adventure. Secret of the Old Ones is hard LitRPG, complete with XP and leveling...plus has Lovecraftian and steampunk elements (because why not?).
He currently lives in Texas, in a house full of enough geeky memorabilia to start a museum.
He likes talking about himself in 3rd person and posting pictures of himself holding tarantulas. Sometimes, he pretends he is not an idiot with a terrible sense of humor.
It's all very eccentric.
Blaise currently writes mostly in the GameLit genre and LitRPG subgenre, exciting new classifications of fiction where characters either play a game (usually VR), or live in a world with game-like elements.
Delvers LLC is GameLit, lightly LitRPG, mostly a Fantasy/SciFi Adventure. Secret of the Old Ones is hard LitRPG, complete with XP and leveling...plus has Lovecraftian and steampunk elements (because why not?).
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 296 reviews
July 16, 2017
Two friends get abducted by a deity as an experiment and are abandoned in a world of unknown magic and mystery. Sounds like the making of a good book. Unfortunately, I had to put it down all most as soon as started it.
We meet two 30 year olds who are described as the smart one and the retired war vet that now functions as a civilian EMT and "gets all the girls". A testament to the smart one's intelligence is the fact that "he played chess in high school". He's nerdy, and likes video games, and deduces that the whole world is just like DnD game and that their captor is basically one of the many Star Trek deities that force the players to fight for his personal reasons. He plans to use his intellect to learn more about the world. Okay, the plot's a bit worn out, but I'll try it out.
He asks the first person they meet, and the only one that speaks the same language, and his suspensions are confirmed in great detail by the stranger reading them his journal of "world races," "how magic works," and "the specifics of EVERYTHING on the planet."
So, the two are going to get some magic powers/abilities. Okay. It's influenced by their personalities/knowledge/self, right? No, they get to pick. No problem, you mean they pick an element and gain powers based off... Nope, they each get a dream and get to spend points to rank up abilities they want, and the next three pages go on to explain what rank they've decided to level each skill AND they are explicitly told that more XP will be reward at a later time. The characters have a discussion about ranking up "heightened sense to rank 2" and earthwielding to rank 3, and similar abilities. I almost slammed the book closed at this point.
Characters should grow more powerful. That's great, show me. Give them new spells. Let one start hearing things that are whispered or seeing in the dark. Maybe one can run distances without getting winded or lift more than he could earlier. Do NOT give me a readout of XP points and ability ranks.
So, now we have two cardboard cutout characters with literal spreadsheet attributes stapled on. Oh, I forgot: they cannot have a complete thought without profanity. This was presumably done to give them some personality, but it seemed really forced.
Then they meet the second character, save her from goblin rapists really, and she falls head over heels in love with one of the spreadsheets, but wants the other to explain it to his friend, but he won't because it's too weird discussing feelings with his best friend who he "knows like a brother". And then were immediately introduced to the third character, the girl's stalker who has full on womanshaming, "if you aren't having sex with me right now, you're a whore" personality. He actually leaves the story a page after being introduced, but every other character that was introduced was that archetype, quest giver, or person to swear at and take advantage of.
At this point there were too many boring cliches and not one character I cared about. I stopped reading and won't really look back.
We meet two 30 year olds who are described as the smart one and the retired war vet that now functions as a civilian EMT and "gets all the girls". A testament to the smart one's intelligence is the fact that "he played chess in high school". He's nerdy, and likes video games, and deduces that the whole world is just like DnD game and that their captor is basically one of the many Star Trek deities that force the players to fight for his personal reasons. He plans to use his intellect to learn more about the world. Okay, the plot's a bit worn out, but I'll try it out.
He asks the first person they meet, and the only one that speaks the same language, and his suspensions are confirmed in great detail by the stranger reading them his journal of "world races," "how magic works," and "the specifics of EVERYTHING on the planet."
So, the two are going to get some magic powers/abilities. Okay. It's influenced by their personalities/knowledge/self, right? No, they get to pick. No problem, you mean they pick an element and gain powers based off... Nope, they each get a dream and get to spend points to rank up abilities they want, and the next three pages go on to explain what rank they've decided to level each skill AND they are explicitly told that more XP will be reward at a later time. The characters have a discussion about ranking up "heightened sense to rank 2" and earthwielding to rank 3, and similar abilities. I almost slammed the book closed at this point.
Characters should grow more powerful. That's great, show me. Give them new spells. Let one start hearing things that are whispered or seeing in the dark. Maybe one can run distances without getting winded or lift more than he could earlier. Do NOT give me a readout of XP points and ability ranks.
So, now we have two cardboard cutout characters with literal spreadsheet attributes stapled on. Oh, I forgot: they cannot have a complete thought without profanity. This was presumably done to give them some personality, but it seemed really forced.
Then they meet the second character, save her from goblin rapists really, and she falls head over heels in love with one of the spreadsheets, but wants the other to explain it to his friend, but he won't because it's too weird discussing feelings with his best friend who he "knows like a brother". And then were immediately introduced to the third character, the girl's stalker who has full on womanshaming, "if you aren't having sex with me right now, you're a whore" personality. He actually leaves the story a page after being introduced, but every other character that was introduced was that archetype, quest giver, or person to swear at and take advantage of.
At this point there were too many boring cliches and not one character I cared about. I stopped reading and won't really look back.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
December 14, 2018
These two 'amazing badass dudes' had so little common sense and such a massive lack of situational awareness it made me visibly upset. My wife can attest to my ranting about these two morons. Like, the fact that they survived living in Seattle, much less an alien planet boggles my mind. On top of all that, they're arrogant dicks who think they're smarter than everyone else, and are condescending to basically everyone. But it's ok, because they're soooo amazing...
Technically speaking, the writing is fine. It's just really hard to convince me these guys are awesome, when the text tells me how awesome they are, and then their actions say completely the opposite.
I even tried sleeping on it and picking it up another day. Didn't even make it another chapter before they did something so stupid I had to put it down and call it quits.
It's only saving grace was a single scene in which the female lead/romantic interest goes on a gloriously specific rant about how stupid these two idiots are. Best thing in the book. If I had to rate just on that scene, 5 1/2 stars.
Technically speaking, the writing is fine. It's just really hard to convince me these guys are awesome, when the text tells me how awesome they are, and then their actions say completely the opposite.
I even tried sleeping on it and picking it up another day. Didn't even make it another chapter before they did something so stupid I had to put it down and call it quits.
It's only saving grace was a single scene in which the female lead/romantic interest goes on a gloriously specific rant about how stupid these two idiots are. Best thing in the book. If I had to rate just on that scene, 5 1/2 stars.
September 16, 2017
This is the kind of monster you create when you heap attention and money upon hack frauds like Brandon Sanderson. I don't know what I expected but Jesus Christ. Just because you're writing meme-fantasy doesn't mean it's okay to commit crimes against literature in the process.
>> Jason chuckled grimly. 'We've know each other a long time man. Don't you remember how I had to take my mom to the women's shelter when I was 15? I grew up with an abusive alcoholic step-father.' << ACTUAL EXCERPT OF MAIN CHARACTER DIALOGUE IN CHAPTER ONE, and one third of the way in it's all been like this. He can't be allowed to get away with this.
>> Jason chuckled grimly. 'We've know each other a long time man. Don't you remember how I had to take my mom to the women's shelter when I was 15? I grew up with an abusive alcoholic step-father.' << ACTUAL EXCERPT OF MAIN CHARACTER DIALOGUE IN CHAPTER ONE, and one third of the way in it's all been like this. He can't be allowed to get away with this.
September 17, 2017
Like so many others I've read lately (and most have been fun and enjoyable if not inspired) this another in the fairly new genre of LITRPG. That is a book or story set in what is a fantasy RPG (Role Playing Game) world.
The big plot switch of late has been to come up with an over riding reason for the person to be "trapped" in said world. Most of the time the story starts out with the premise that the main character can not exit the game. Early on the players might have been quadriplegic and finding a new life in the game or someone else may have played with a program and trapped them there. Now more involved reasons seem to becoming popular.
This one is a doozy ("doosy" "duzy"??? Oh well). Our "heroes" are trapped in a world that is set up as a game by the deity who set the game world up.
See he wants something accomplished and he won't relent on their captivity until they accomplish it...
Nice guy.
The book is fun the character a bit predictable and Dolos (the aforementioned deity) also a little cliched. I enjoyed it, followed it up with the second book and will probably stay with the series if it stays as good as it is. I like the LITRPG books I've read as a whole I am generally looking for new ones.
The big plot switch of late has been to come up with an over riding reason for the person to be "trapped" in said world. Most of the time the story starts out with the premise that the main character can not exit the game. Early on the players might have been quadriplegic and finding a new life in the game or someone else may have played with a program and trapped them there. Now more involved reasons seem to becoming popular.
This one is a doozy ("doosy" "duzy"??? Oh well). Our "heroes" are trapped in a world that is set up as a game by the deity who set the game world up.
See he wants something accomplished and he won't relent on their captivity until they accomplish it...
Nice guy.
The book is fun the character a bit predictable and Dolos (the aforementioned deity) also a little cliched. I enjoyed it, followed it up with the second book and will probably stay with the series if it stays as good as it is. I like the LITRPG books I've read as a whole I am generally looking for new ones.
September 2, 2025
I've liked other work by the author and thought I'd try this, his first series. It's pretty obvious it's a first. It's rocky and makes a lot of mistakes the author avoids in later work.
Henry and Jason are friends who end up isekai'd into a new world by a demented jerk. Demented jerk gives them a task but doesn't seem like he cares about it one way or another. This becomes deus ex jerkwad and is applied like a spur to the story and it's every bit as subtle as actual spurs.
And it doesn't help that the world is ridiculous on its face, include a gender split in the population where women outnumber men by a wide margin. Hello harem excuse! Each guy gets a girl in this one but it's obvious more are on the way.
I enjoyed this more than I'm letting on. The worldbuilding is capricious and the plot suffers a bit from coincidence, but the pace was good and I liked the heroes. All told, I'd have ended up with rounding up to four stars, but the cliffhanger ending move it back down to three. I am, however, completely uninterested in continuing the series.
A note about Steamy: There's not much explicit here, so it's very low on my steam tolerance. It's enough for the tag, but only barely. The predatory wannabe rapist made this very icky, though.
Henry and Jason are friends who end up isekai'd into a new world by a demented jerk. Demented jerk gives them a task but doesn't seem like he cares about it one way or another. This becomes deus ex jerkwad and is applied like a spur to the story and it's every bit as subtle as actual spurs.
And it doesn't help that the world is ridiculous on its face, include a gender split in the population where women outnumber men by a wide margin. Hello harem excuse! Each guy gets a girl in this one but it's obvious more are on the way.
I enjoyed this more than I'm letting on. The worldbuilding is capricious and the plot suffers a bit from coincidence, but the pace was good and I liked the heroes. All told, I'd have ended up with rounding up to four stars, but the cliffhanger ending move it back down to three. I am, however, completely uninterested in continuing the series.
A note about Steamy: There's not much explicit here, so it's very low on my steam tolerance. It's enough for the tag, but only barely. The predatory wannabe rapist made this very icky, though.
June 29, 2024
Since Mark Twain did A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court, there's always been a desire by some people to be the guy who goes to a fantasy world in order to make use of their knowledge to take over. Err, I mean be a big hero. My favorite of this subgenre is probably Army of Darkness followed by Eric Flint's Ring of Fire series. Still, Blaise Corvin's Delvers LLC has probably supplanted the latter as my second favorite of all time. The only reason it's not at the top is because, well, Bruce Campbell.
The premise is Jason and Henry are a pair of martial arts enthusiasts who get kidnapped by the Great God Dolos (bolded for emphasis). Dolos is effectively a being akin to Q from Star Trek: The Next Generation only obsessed with Dungeons and Dragons or World of Warcraft (depending on what decade you grew up in). He's omnipotent or close to it and has populated a planet with elves, humans, goblins, beast people, and orks.
Even more so, he's created a bunch of dungeons spread across the planet full of treasure as well as magical items designed to simulate leveling up. Dolos outfits the pair with a couple of orbs and tells them to go onward, Christian soldier, and kill some monsters for loot. The rest of the book follows them in their confused attempt to deal with the fact they're now trapped in a Gygaxian death world.
As the writer of the Supervillainy Saga series, I'm aware of a rule which Blaise Corvin seems to be, which is that any premise can be sold to the reader as long as its implication are well thought out as well as presented sincerely. The idea of a god playing hack and slash rpging with real people is absolutely insane but it works wonderfully because the characters take it seriously. They discuss things ranging from: "is it right to kill people", "are the monsters we're killing actual people", "how do we survive in a world based on violence", and "can we get home?"
If I have any real complaint about the book, it's that Jason and Henry are a little too well-adjusted to the insanity around them. I'd have thrown in a bit more, "Is that a frigging elf? That is a frigging elf!" Then again, Jason has the ambition of nailing a cat girl before he discovers they're not the anime kind so I can't complain too much. Jason and Henry may be both straight men but they each have specialties with the former being a trained soldier while the latter having a science-fiction/fantasy background.
Really, I'm pleased to say the supporting cast from Ludus is even more interesting than the protagonists. Mareen and Uluula are more than mere love interests for the character with the former being a fairly well developed fantasy archetype (farm girl turned adventuress) while the latter is a Space Elf stuck on a planet full of primitive screwheads. I'm also pleased Corvin tackled the issues of romance, courtship, and sexual taboos are different on Ludus than Earth. It may sound a bit peculiar but I'm actually interested in seeing if Corvin will tackle polyamory in the setting. The rest of their adventuring company is also entertaining with their own arcs and story beats.
Dolos, himself, is a great character and a fine fantasy villain that comes close to being Handsome Jack levels of hateable. For example, one thing I loved is how he misleads the various races into killing one another while making it seem it's all in good vs. evil fun. That's some dark and disgusting stuff from a man who is just doing this as a giant experiment. The cover of my copy really captures what a smug jackass he is, complete with little crown.
A fair warning for more sensitive souls, part of how the book sells its premise is the fact violence is unsanitized. People die horribly in the setting and Ludus is kind of a hellhole where the strong prey on the weak. There's allusions to rape and sexual slavery as well as one scene where a female character has to fight off a sexual predator. The dissonance with the colorful premise gives the book a distinct flavor, though.
In conclusion, I recommend Delvers LLC quite strongly. It's entertaining and has an original premise with characters I actually care about. The women are arguably more interesting than the men but I wanted them to hook up with their love interests--which is rarely something I care about in books. I also like the set up for a full-length series as a lot of seeds are planted for the eventual fall of Dolos (or not).
9/10
The premise is Jason and Henry are a pair of martial arts enthusiasts who get kidnapped by the Great God Dolos (bolded for emphasis). Dolos is effectively a being akin to Q from Star Trek: The Next Generation only obsessed with Dungeons and Dragons or World of Warcraft (depending on what decade you grew up in). He's omnipotent or close to it and has populated a planet with elves, humans, goblins, beast people, and orks.
Even more so, he's created a bunch of dungeons spread across the planet full of treasure as well as magical items designed to simulate leveling up. Dolos outfits the pair with a couple of orbs and tells them to go onward, Christian soldier, and kill some monsters for loot. The rest of the book follows them in their confused attempt to deal with the fact they're now trapped in a Gygaxian death world.
As the writer of the Supervillainy Saga series, I'm aware of a rule which Blaise Corvin seems to be, which is that any premise can be sold to the reader as long as its implication are well thought out as well as presented sincerely. The idea of a god playing hack and slash rpging with real people is absolutely insane but it works wonderfully because the characters take it seriously. They discuss things ranging from: "is it right to kill people", "are the monsters we're killing actual people", "how do we survive in a world based on violence", and "can we get home?"
If I have any real complaint about the book, it's that Jason and Henry are a little too well-adjusted to the insanity around them. I'd have thrown in a bit more, "Is that a frigging elf? That is a frigging elf!" Then again, Jason has the ambition of nailing a cat girl before he discovers they're not the anime kind so I can't complain too much. Jason and Henry may be both straight men but they each have specialties with the former being a trained soldier while the latter having a science-fiction/fantasy background.
Really, I'm pleased to say the supporting cast from Ludus is even more interesting than the protagonists. Mareen and Uluula are more than mere love interests for the character with the former being a fairly well developed fantasy archetype (farm girl turned adventuress) while the latter is a Space Elf stuck on a planet full of primitive screwheads. I'm also pleased Corvin tackled the issues of romance, courtship, and sexual taboos are different on Ludus than Earth. It may sound a bit peculiar but I'm actually interested in seeing if Corvin will tackle polyamory in the setting. The rest of their adventuring company is also entertaining with their own arcs and story beats.
Dolos, himself, is a great character and a fine fantasy villain that comes close to being Handsome Jack levels of hateable. For example, one thing I loved is how he misleads the various races into killing one another while making it seem it's all in good vs. evil fun. That's some dark and disgusting stuff from a man who is just doing this as a giant experiment. The cover of my copy really captures what a smug jackass he is, complete with little crown.
A fair warning for more sensitive souls, part of how the book sells its premise is the fact violence is unsanitized. People die horribly in the setting and Ludus is kind of a hellhole where the strong prey on the weak. There's allusions to rape and sexual slavery as well as one scene where a female character has to fight off a sexual predator. The dissonance with the colorful premise gives the book a distinct flavor, though.
In conclusion, I recommend Delvers LLC quite strongly. It's entertaining and has an original premise with characters I actually care about. The women are arguably more interesting than the men but I wanted them to hook up with their love interests--which is rarely something I care about in books. I also like the set up for a full-length series as a lot of seeds are planted for the eventual fall of Dolos (or not).
9/10
December 29, 2016
I won't finish this. When a character does something completely out of whack with their training for no reason other than to forward the plot, I won't waste my time reading it past that point.
SPOILER COMING
If a person has been in a war zone, and their buddy, whom they have said they trust, hesitates to follow a child down a dark alley, there is no chance that the military member is going down that path and going to be surprised. But that is what one of these guys did. I stopped reading at that point.
SPOILER COMING
If a person has been in a war zone, and their buddy, whom they have said they trust, hesitates to follow a child down a dark alley, there is no chance that the military member is going down that path and going to be surprised. But that is what one of these guys did. I stopped reading at that point.
May 1, 2017
Jason a budding psychopath and Henry the Sociopath are abducted by a "God" and put into a world said "God" has been using as experiments. This is your standared harem story.. With a couple twists. Light on the sex (no real descriptions.. So rest easy) While i found the book somewhat interesting..The author failed to get me to care about any of the characters. I will not be reading Book 2
February 4, 2020
I personally had a very difficult time ignoring the quality of writing with this story since it was a few notches lower than what I'm used to. There are also a lot of tropes that bothered me right off the bat.
I gave this book 176 pages of my time which accounts for 30% progress according to my kindle. I feel like if the author is still somehow holding onto something that will blow my hair back, then that's just another of the many writing mistakes he has made. It was painful for me to follow the two generic characters as they were pulled along by plot strings, rather than any real motives, into overwhelming odds in battle only to be the best spear throwers ever for no good reason and just decimate a whole cave of enemies in the first minutes of the story.
The dialogue was painfully bad at times. In an attempt to convey some information about the characters, the author has the two friends of many years say ridiculous facts that they should already know about each other just for the reader's benefit. "Hey, don't you remember the time I had to take my mom to the women's shelter? I grew up with an abusive stepfather." Paraquoting rather than verbatim, but you get the point.
The author then forgoes that shoddy dialogue route and just straight up dumps exposition backstory on you for page after page for the female character that's introduced. Not sure why, cause the only important thing she's doing is falling head over heels for one of the main characters and then, rather than just Hey guys mind if I join your adventuring group, she decides to make herself an indentured servant...ok.
Then there's the whole Imma jus' add aposraphes errywhar and mistype words to simlate a dilect. Please, God...just please no. Change the speech patterns, word usage, and maybe throw in a few idioms. Don't make me sift through that garbage. It really breaks my immersion when I'm already struggling to stay involved with things.
Well, back to the overall look at the story...here comes a couple main characters that are handed unique powers on a platter so they can become game-breaking and overpowered extremely early. Basically, this book seems to be a wish-fulfillment story in the making. Not that there's anything wrong with that inherently, but on the heels of reading books like Dragon's Trail and Dungeon Born, I thought this one extremely clumsy by comparison and the characters didn't have to work for anything.
I didn't enjoy this story in the slightest and couldn't be bothered to give it more than the 30% that I did. I would recommend pretty much any other litrpg over this book.
I gave this book 176 pages of my time which accounts for 30% progress according to my kindle. I feel like if the author is still somehow holding onto something that will blow my hair back, then that's just another of the many writing mistakes he has made. It was painful for me to follow the two generic characters as they were pulled along by plot strings, rather than any real motives, into overwhelming odds in battle only to be the best spear throwers ever for no good reason and just decimate a whole cave of enemies in the first minutes of the story.
The dialogue was painfully bad at times. In an attempt to convey some information about the characters, the author has the two friends of many years say ridiculous facts that they should already know about each other just for the reader's benefit. "Hey, don't you remember the time I had to take my mom to the women's shelter? I grew up with an abusive stepfather." Paraquoting rather than verbatim, but you get the point.
The author then forgoes that shoddy dialogue route and just straight up dumps exposition backstory on you for page after page for the female character that's introduced. Not sure why, cause the only important thing she's doing is falling head over heels for one of the main characters and then, rather than just Hey guys mind if I join your adventuring group, she decides to make herself an indentured servant...ok.
Then there's the whole Imma jus' add aposraphes errywhar and mistype words to simlate a dilect. Please, God...just please no. Change the speech patterns, word usage, and maybe throw in a few idioms. Don't make me sift through that garbage. It really breaks my immersion when I'm already struggling to stay involved with things.
Well, back to the overall look at the story...here comes a couple main characters that are handed unique powers on a platter so they can become game-breaking and overpowered extremely early. Basically, this book seems to be a wish-fulfillment story in the making. Not that there's anything wrong with that inherently, but on the heels of reading books like Dragon's Trail and Dungeon Born, I thought this one extremely clumsy by comparison and the characters didn't have to work for anything.
I didn't enjoy this story in the slightest and couldn't be bothered to give it more than the 30% that I did. I would recommend pretty much any other litrpg over this book.
March 26, 2017
More a straight up fantasy title, where the protagonists are transported from our world to science fiction/fantasy world. The heroes are heroic, self sacrificing men, the women hot and there are even cat girls. While one of the heroes complains about anime tropes, the novel certainly contains them. The great god Dolos was my favorite character, both funny and evil and a great way to drive the story.
April 4, 2017
My original Welcome to Ludus audiobook review and many others can be found at Audiobook Reviewer.
Henry and Jason suddenly find themselves on Ludus, a strange and violent planet run by the homicidal god, Dolos. They are given a bag of goodies and instructions to either save the world, have a chance to return to Earth, or more likely die in the effort.
The story is an unapologetic fictional creation of a roll playing video game (RPG). Henry and Jason can gain points, improve their magic skills and get better weapons and knowledge with their efforts and successes. Ludus is full of Orcs, Goblins, Hell Hounds and other demons who simply want to kill everything and everyone. Ludus is mostly inhabited by transplanted humans, but also a host of other humanoid aliens, some friendly, some not. Ultimately, Henry and Jason must kill or be killed.
There is a sense of unreality throughout the story, like the main characters could simply wake up from a bad dream. They are perhaps a little too lucky at everything they face. And like a video game, the challenges get harder with their greater skills and weapons. Though Dolos says he doesn’t expect them to live, he has given them extreme advantages.
Delvers LLC starts off slowly and takes some sustained effort to get into. But with the effort comes a very entertaining listen. There is plenty of action and clumsy love interests to keep the listener involved. To the author's credit, it doesn't take itself too seriously and is pretty funny. The story is cartoonish and somewhat unbelievable – like a game; but that is the point and is true to itself.
The story is performed by Jeff Hays, who does a very good job. The characters are clearly differentiated and sound true to their personalities. He generally stays out of the way, just giving enough interpretation to allow the listener’s imagination to fill in the rest.
Delvers LLC is like watching over the shoulder of someone playing a video game. It is very entertaining and full of action and video violence. The characters are defined early, but evolve into something resembling real people. Though you really don’t expect them to fail, the action is engaging. If you enjoy roll playing games, or the recent genre of bringing these games to fiction, you should definitely put this novel at the top of your list. A good dose of humor throughout the novel keeps it fun too. Delvers LLC is not listed as a series, but is clearly written as one. It neither ends, nor wraps up the story. If you like it, you will want to continue on to book 2 when it is released. Recommended for the intended audience.
Note: Appropriate for the right young-adult audience. Keep in mind there is graphic violence, sex and adult language. The equivalent of an R rated movie.
Audiobook was provided for review by the narrator.
Henry and Jason suddenly find themselves on Ludus, a strange and violent planet run by the homicidal god, Dolos. They are given a bag of goodies and instructions to either save the world, have a chance to return to Earth, or more likely die in the effort.
The story is an unapologetic fictional creation of a roll playing video game (RPG). Henry and Jason can gain points, improve their magic skills and get better weapons and knowledge with their efforts and successes. Ludus is full of Orcs, Goblins, Hell Hounds and other demons who simply want to kill everything and everyone. Ludus is mostly inhabited by transplanted humans, but also a host of other humanoid aliens, some friendly, some not. Ultimately, Henry and Jason must kill or be killed.
There is a sense of unreality throughout the story, like the main characters could simply wake up from a bad dream. They are perhaps a little too lucky at everything they face. And like a video game, the challenges get harder with their greater skills and weapons. Though Dolos says he doesn’t expect them to live, he has given them extreme advantages.
Delvers LLC starts off slowly and takes some sustained effort to get into. But with the effort comes a very entertaining listen. There is plenty of action and clumsy love interests to keep the listener involved. To the author's credit, it doesn't take itself too seriously and is pretty funny. The story is cartoonish and somewhat unbelievable – like a game; but that is the point and is true to itself.
The story is performed by Jeff Hays, who does a very good job. The characters are clearly differentiated and sound true to their personalities. He generally stays out of the way, just giving enough interpretation to allow the listener’s imagination to fill in the rest.
Delvers LLC is like watching over the shoulder of someone playing a video game. It is very entertaining and full of action and video violence. The characters are defined early, but evolve into something resembling real people. Though you really don’t expect them to fail, the action is engaging. If you enjoy roll playing games, or the recent genre of bringing these games to fiction, you should definitely put this novel at the top of your list. A good dose of humor throughout the novel keeps it fun too. Delvers LLC is not listed as a series, but is clearly written as one. It neither ends, nor wraps up the story. If you like it, you will want to continue on to book 2 when it is released. Recommended for the intended audience.
Note: Appropriate for the right young-adult audience. Keep in mind there is graphic violence, sex and adult language. The equivalent of an R rated movie.
Audiobook was provided for review by the narrator.
December 9, 2017
I couldn't stand the romance or the perspective constantly switching between characters. Great potential but I got too annoyed to finish.
October 2, 2021
- progression, very light litrpg elements
- building up to harem probably
- meddling gods
This is one of those books that the less you think about it, the better it is. It's the pure definition of popcorn entertainment.
Despite that, I really liked some of these elements. I liked the friendship the two guys had sparked. I liked how highly they thought of each-other while both suffering from their own insecurities.
I especially liked the.. cougargard? tiger? I don't recall. The feline species and their culture. I also really liked that the two main characters was just plain stupid, and despite the girls falling in love with them, they still thought their guys was stupid to a certain degree. And while I might disagree with how it sometimes was written, that felt horribly realistic at times.
- building up to harem probably
- meddling gods
This is one of those books that the less you think about it, the better it is. It's the pure definition of popcorn entertainment.
Despite that, I really liked some of these elements. I liked the friendship the two guys had sparked. I liked how highly they thought of each-other while both suffering from their own insecurities.
I especially liked the.. cougargard? tiger? I don't recall. The feline species and their culture. I also really liked that the two main characters was just plain stupid, and despite the girls falling in love with them, they still thought their guys was stupid to a certain degree. And while I might disagree with how it sometimes was written, that felt horribly realistic at times.
December 19, 2018
Rating 2.5
I am really not having much luck with my reading selection lately. I go into these books with high hopes and they end up disappointing. This books wasn't terrible but it wasn't very good either. The premise was a little different from other LitRPG books. Most of the time it is a person who wants to escape his life so he ends up playing a virtual reality game and then gets stuck in the game. Even though the character doesn't plan on getting stuck in the game, that character did initiate the process. In this book, 2 friends end up on a new planet. They were transported there by a God Delos who is using this planet and the people he brings to this world for some sort of experiment. So, at the beginning I was a little bit encouraged because it was something new, and I continued to have hope for this story for the first 1/4 of the book. At that point I started to realize this story was not going anywhere. I didn't believe the friendship between the two main characters: Henry was the combat veteran who worked as an EMT. He is recently divorced and his wife took him to the cleaners. Jason is a computer programmer. They are part of a HEMA group which is some sort of martial arts program. Henry was abrasive and rude. If I were Jason, I would have punched him in the face for some of the things he said. I know military personal can be quite crude, but that is with each other. All the characters, including Jason and Henry, had some deep seeded personal issues, but they all ended up being about the same: I don't want to let my friends down and I refuse to be useless. Every single member of the group had that issue.
Jason and Henry seemed to wander from one situation to another without much of any plan. They said they had a plan to become stronger and in order to do that they needed to go into dungeons to get loot. The 1 dungeon they went to was actually anticlimactic. The power up process for both characters was also confusing. They went into a lot of detail into how Henry came up with new ideas on how to use his powers and create new weapons. They didn't explain how Jason Powered up at all though. He just meditated for a while and then he came up with an idea and then it just worked. It was disappointing as this is one topic that really interests me.
All the relationships were terrible. I didn't think they were realistic at all. Maureen felt her "heart song" for Henry even though he was rude, but instead of doing anything about it she started talking to Jason because she was too shy to approach Henry. Then she got pissed off and said every man was stupid because they thought she liked Jason (because of course why would anyone think the person you talk to all the time is the one you actually like). Jason was 27 years old and Henry was 29, yet they acted like they had no experience with women. It would have been more believable if they were teenagers.
Overall, not a very good story. There are much better stories out there in this genre to read. Not going to read the next book.
I am really not having much luck with my reading selection lately. I go into these books with high hopes and they end up disappointing. This books wasn't terrible but it wasn't very good either. The premise was a little different from other LitRPG books. Most of the time it is a person who wants to escape his life so he ends up playing a virtual reality game and then gets stuck in the game. Even though the character doesn't plan on getting stuck in the game, that character did initiate the process. In this book, 2 friends end up on a new planet. They were transported there by a God Delos who is using this planet and the people he brings to this world for some sort of experiment. So, at the beginning I was a little bit encouraged because it was something new, and I continued to have hope for this story for the first 1/4 of the book. At that point I started to realize this story was not going anywhere. I didn't believe the friendship between the two main characters: Henry was the combat veteran who worked as an EMT. He is recently divorced and his wife took him to the cleaners. Jason is a computer programmer. They are part of a HEMA group which is some sort of martial arts program. Henry was abrasive and rude. If I were Jason, I would have punched him in the face for some of the things he said. I know military personal can be quite crude, but that is with each other. All the characters, including Jason and Henry, had some deep seeded personal issues, but they all ended up being about the same: I don't want to let my friends down and I refuse to be useless. Every single member of the group had that issue.
Jason and Henry seemed to wander from one situation to another without much of any plan. They said they had a plan to become stronger and in order to do that they needed to go into dungeons to get loot. The 1 dungeon they went to was actually anticlimactic. The power up process for both characters was also confusing. They went into a lot of detail into how Henry came up with new ideas on how to use his powers and create new weapons. They didn't explain how Jason Powered up at all though. He just meditated for a while and then he came up with an idea and then it just worked. It was disappointing as this is one topic that really interests me.
All the relationships were terrible. I didn't think they were realistic at all. Maureen felt her "heart song" for Henry even though he was rude, but instead of doing anything about it she started talking to Jason because she was too shy to approach Henry. Then she got pissed off and said every man was stupid because they thought she liked Jason (because of course why would anyone think the person you talk to all the time is the one you actually like). Jason was 27 years old and Henry was 29, yet they acted like they had no experience with women. It would have been more believable if they were teenagers.
Overall, not a very good story. There are much better stories out there in this genre to read. Not going to read the next book.
July 16, 2017
This book reads like someone's fan-fiction.... a someone that grew up in a very specific time frame.
Delvers LLC Recipe
-Take "Q" from Star trek the next generation and make him the trickster god Dolos
-Mix in Bella from disney's beauty and the beast and make her go through with her love of adventuring (like what she sings about but ends up only reading)
- Add a pinch of space elf (because a Nyan-chan girl spot was taken)
- And a thunder cat, because thunder cats, WE ALL APPROVE OF THUNDER CATS!!!!!!!!!!!!! (my fav. character and I don't care what anyone thinks, they were awesome and go well in everything!)
- oh, and I forget. Our two MCs and in your typical 90's tv troop one is the jock and the other a nerd, feel free to make there personalities the reversal of the stereotype as that is the current stereotype.
- So take this mix and throw it into an RPG world with your typical D & D layout for 10 years or until when well done.
Ok I have to admit something, I got the audiobook for this over a month back, 20 minutes in I felt like I was listening to a fanfic and was like NOPE!
So while looking at my lib today, I noticed it and gave it another shot, yeah it's still a Fanfic but you know what, if you give it a chance it'll get better and you will enjoy the silliness.
I do recommend NOT getting the audio book, the reader's performance is... distracting... just get the actual book/e-book with this one.
Delvers LLC Recipe
-Take "Q" from Star trek the next generation and make him the trickster god Dolos
-Mix in Bella from disney's beauty and the beast and make her go through with her love of adventuring (like what she sings about but ends up only reading)
- Add a pinch of space elf (because a Nyan-chan girl spot was taken)
- And a thunder cat, because thunder cats, WE ALL APPROVE OF THUNDER CATS!!!!!!!!!!!!! (my fav. character and I don't care what anyone thinks, they were awesome and go well in everything!)
- oh, and I forget. Our two MCs and in your typical 90's tv troop one is the jock and the other a nerd, feel free to make there personalities the reversal of the stereotype as that is the current stereotype.
- So take this mix and throw it into an RPG world with your typical D & D layout for 10 years or until when well done.
Ok I have to admit something, I got the audiobook for this over a month back, 20 minutes in I felt like I was listening to a fanfic and was like NOPE!
So while looking at my lib today, I noticed it and gave it another shot, yeah it's still a Fanfic but you know what, if you give it a chance it'll get better and you will enjoy the silliness.
I do recommend NOT getting the audio book, the reader's performance is... distracting... just get the actual book/e-book with this one.
June 8, 2018
Starting with the good:
The narration was great. The GameLit parts were sparse, but I liked what was there. The adventure elements of the story were a lot of fun.
However, on the negative side, the romance was particularly, painfully adolescent. But the thing that was truly off-putting was that the morality was sometimes... disturbing. If there's another brutal rapist character in the next book, I won't be reading it.
The narration was great. The GameLit parts were sparse, but I liked what was there. The adventure elements of the story were a lot of fun.
However, on the negative side, the romance was particularly, painfully adolescent. But the thing that was truly off-putting was that the morality was sometimes... disturbing. If there's another brutal rapist character in the next book, I won't be reading it.
April 9, 2022
This book would deserve something like a 3 star review except for one thing. The MCs get a mission from a god but the book ends with zero resolution. All that happens is the MCs make a start. So, this book fails in the simple task of actually telling a story.
Other than the lack of resolution the author does a fairly good job. He even makes an attempt to alleviate the lack of resolution by ending on the high note of the gang successfully clearing a dungeon, although that is immediately followed up by more unresolved conflict just in case you missed the part where the MCs have only made the barest of starts on their mission.
While generally the writing is decent there are notable exceptions. The first being the opening "fight in the cave" where the goblins essentially stand around waiting to be killed. The author does a good job with all later fight scenes so I can only assume he was attempting to convey the vast surprise felt by the goblins, but, if that was the case, the author failed to communicate it clearly.
The second exception is the shear amount of convenience encountered by the MCs. At one point the MCs, upon entering a city, stupidly allow themselves to be captured. The MCs' stupidity in the given situation was appropriate to the characters and well explained by the author so that's not a problem. However, this captivity led to improvements in the MC's combat capabilities, garnered the MCs two very important additions to their gang and even provided them with a starting point for their own experiments with gun powder.
Similarly, when sent out to confront a band of thieves, the thieves conveniently learn of their coming (by this point in time one of the MCs can readily teleport short distances and so I thought it was odd he didn't even try to catch the thief running to warn the rest of his band). This leads to the thieves killing all their captives so the MCs conveniently have absolute and immediate justification for killing the thieves wholesale and aren't held up after the fact by the need to care for a bunch of horrifically damaged people. The justification for this action was that the thieves wanted to prevent the MCs from enlisting the captives' aid in their attack. This rationalization falls short however since the leader of the thieves was absolutely confident of winning the fight and the captives were so horrifically treated that they would have been more of a burden than a help to the attack.
Bottom line: good workman writing that is completely undermined by the lack of any kind of a resolution to the story. Also over utilizes convenience to advance the story, often stupidly.
Other than the lack of resolution the author does a fairly good job. He even makes an attempt to alleviate the lack of resolution by ending on the high note of the gang successfully clearing a dungeon, although that is immediately followed up by more unresolved conflict just in case you missed the part where the MCs have only made the barest of starts on their mission.
While generally the writing is decent there are notable exceptions. The first being the opening "fight in the cave" where the goblins essentially stand around waiting to be killed. The author does a good job with all later fight scenes so I can only assume he was attempting to convey the vast surprise felt by the goblins, but, if that was the case, the author failed to communicate it clearly.
The second exception is the shear amount of convenience encountered by the MCs. At one point the MCs, upon entering a city, stupidly allow themselves to be captured. The MCs' stupidity in the given situation was appropriate to the characters and well explained by the author so that's not a problem. However, this captivity led to improvements in the MC's combat capabilities, garnered the MCs two very important additions to their gang and even provided them with a starting point for their own experiments with gun powder.
Similarly, when sent out to confront a band of thieves, the thieves conveniently learn of their coming (by this point in time one of the MCs can readily teleport short distances and so I thought it was odd he didn't even try to catch the thief running to warn the rest of his band). This leads to the thieves killing all their captives so the MCs conveniently have absolute and immediate justification for killing the thieves wholesale and aren't held up after the fact by the need to care for a bunch of horrifically damaged people. The justification for this action was that the thieves wanted to prevent the MCs from enlisting the captives' aid in their attack. This rationalization falls short however since the leader of the thieves was absolutely confident of winning the fight and the captives were so horrifically treated that they would have been more of a burden than a help to the attack.
Bottom line: good workman writing that is completely undermined by the lack of any kind of a resolution to the story. Also over utilizes convenience to advance the story, often stupidly.
January 7, 2020
Child abuse, rape, and torture.
Posting a review in case someone else might appreciate advanced warning. I just couldn't get past the repetitive scenarios and graphic descriptions of abuse, rape, and torture of prisoners, women, and especially children. The scenarios in the first book are just a hint of what you'll find in the following books. It escalates. A lot. IMO it goes way beyond anything that is needed to support, or add to, the storyline and ruins the series.
Other people might be okay reading that stuff. Yeah, the author is making a point: human beings are the real monsters. But if I'd known that psychotic serial killers, torture, sadistic pedophilia, etcetera were repetitive, embellished, ongoing themes, I would have passed on the series. I stayed with the series longer than I should have. But I hit my limit at the pre-sacrifice adolescent mutilations and sicko sex abuse recommendation.
But hey, I could be an outlier. I have to admit that I really haven't seen many (or any) other reviewers taking issue with this.
Posting a review in case someone else might appreciate advanced warning. I just couldn't get past the repetitive scenarios and graphic descriptions of abuse, rape, and torture of prisoners, women, and especially children. The scenarios in the first book are just a hint of what you'll find in the following books. It escalates. A lot. IMO it goes way beyond anything that is needed to support, or add to, the storyline and ruins the series.
Other people might be okay reading that stuff. Yeah, the author is making a point: human beings are the real monsters. But if I'd known that psychotic serial killers, torture, sadistic pedophilia, etcetera were repetitive, embellished, ongoing themes, I would have passed on the series. I stayed with the series longer than I should have. But I hit my limit at the pre-sacrifice adolescent mutilations and sicko sex abuse recommendation.
But hey, I could be an outlier. I have to admit that I really haven't seen many (or any) other reviewers taking issue with this.
July 16, 2019
I flip flop from kinda liking to straight disliking this book. The world and ideas are interesting. The characters have interesting powers. However, the personality of the leads aren't fleshed out like real people and they do things that contrast with how they're described a lot.
Another thing that bothers me is the maturity level of these 'adults'. They seem a lot more like teenagers in thoughts and sometimes actions than someone in the 20 to 30 range.
Technically speaking the author's storytelling ranges from passable to decent. It's never a good sign when I stop after a sentence and wonder about a better way to convey what I just read. There was also more than a few moments when I wondered if the author knew how to use pronouns instead of constantly repeating a characters name. This book could have benefited greatly from a professional editor.
Another thing that bothers me is the maturity level of these 'adults'. They seem a lot more like teenagers in thoughts and sometimes actions than someone in the 20 to 30 range.
Technically speaking the author's storytelling ranges from passable to decent. It's never a good sign when I stop after a sentence and wonder about a better way to convey what I just read. There was also more than a few moments when I wondered if the author knew how to use pronouns instead of constantly repeating a characters name. This book could have benefited greatly from a professional editor.
July 20, 2019
Could have been good
Great example of good idea buried in a ton of poor writing.
Unfortunately the author can’t write a dialogues and 99.99% is third person description of what happened. There is almost no interaction between characters and those few rare conversations are poorly written and completely not matching what we are constantly told about MCs.
If half of the nonsense was cut out, the descriptions of conversations replaced with actual dialogues and background info of MCs changed from programmer/medic to kids going through puberty to match their actions, then it would be solid 2.5 stars. Maybe 3.
For those who want good litRPG in similar settings go read Ten Realms series and stay away from this. Even for free through Kindle unlimited it’s not worth the time.
Great example of good idea buried in a ton of poor writing.
Unfortunately the author can’t write a dialogues and 99.99% is third person description of what happened. There is almost no interaction between characters and those few rare conversations are poorly written and completely not matching what we are constantly told about MCs.
If half of the nonsense was cut out, the descriptions of conversations replaced with actual dialogues and background info of MCs changed from programmer/medic to kids going through puberty to match their actions, then it would be solid 2.5 stars. Maybe 3.
For those who want good litRPG in similar settings go read Ten Realms series and stay away from this. Even for free through Kindle unlimited it’s not worth the time.
July 31, 2021
3.5 Stars for Story & Narration by Jeff Hays
Mini-Review:
Jeff Hays is a talented voice actor and does a great job with the character voices but the way he narrates the rest of the story is rather robotic. That's the reason why it took a while for me to get into this story and finish it.
The world Corvin created comes off like a odd mix of D&D and RPG games. I like the snarky humor that underlines the story and the various characters that make up Delvers group. There's a smattering of LitRPG feel due to the "leveling" up vibe of the orbs and spirit stones but it's a light influence. Overall, it's a tale about two friends that get landed in a strange world and told to be good for the "experiment". The first book makes a nice base. I'm curious to see how the rest will pan out.
Mini-Review:
Jeff Hays is a talented voice actor and does a great job with the character voices but the way he narrates the rest of the story is rather robotic. That's the reason why it took a while for me to get into this story and finish it.
The world Corvin created comes off like a odd mix of D&D and RPG games. I like the snarky humor that underlines the story and the various characters that make up Delvers group. There's a smattering of LitRPG feel due to the "leveling" up vibe of the orbs and spirit stones but it's a light influence. Overall, it's a tale about two friends that get landed in a strange world and told to be good for the "experiment". The first book makes a nice base. I'm curious to see how the rest will pan out.
October 23, 2017
I feel like this book was written by two different people. There was the cool, analytical writer who writes about game mechanics and detailed battles and then there's the teen aged hormonal boy writing about sex with girls. It was disarming and took away from the book feeling that there were two voices. Not sure if I will read more in this series.
February 22, 2019
Not for me.
I hated these characters and the writing gave me hives.
I hated these characters and the writing gave me hives.
January 26, 2018
Henry and Jason are engaging characters. They have a little knowledge about weapons, armor, and fighting and these are definitely put to the test right away on Ludus. Dolos, the omnipotent god of Ludus, is a jerk but Henry and Jason strike a bargain with him and are determined to win. I am skeptical that Dolos will hold up his end of the bargain. Still, I hope Henry and Jason best him by the end of the series.
The first big hurdle for the guys is to take out some orc-like creatures that have taken some human-like captives. Enter Mareen, the first maiden that needs saving. Now she’s not all helpless. She puts up a fight and is quick to recover enough to get out of there with the guys and back to safety where she can fall apart in private. So, she held potential from the beginning…. if only the author had used that potential.
The quests and magic continue from there. Henry is more the reactive, leader type while Jason is much more the thinker. The inhabitants of Ludus know how Henry and Jason got here because either they themselves were brought here for Dolos’s entertainment or their ancestors were. So they offer what knowledge they have to Jason and Henry.
There’s caves and dungeons to explore to gain treasure and the chance to level up your magical skills. It really felt like these characters were immersed in an epic fantasy computer game. Mostly I enjoyed the world building, though there were a few times where explaining the rules dragged things down a bit.
For some reason, Mareen remains our only female character for some time. Also, her destiny is to fall in love. Yep… sigh…. really? Eventually, we get Uulula who is basically an elf. She’s a bit more interesting than Mareen when we first meet her. Both ladies do get some skills but their main focus is to serve as love interests for Henry and Jason. Since there are so few ladies in a large cast, I really needed them to shine and they didn’t. While they had a little depth by the end of the book, they were pretty much cookie cutter, interchangeable characters which was greatly disappointing. Keeja is the one female character that holds my interest but she comes in near the very end of Book 1. I’m really hoping that the author keeps her around for the rest of the series.
All told, it’s a fun, breezy take on the epic fantasy genre even with it’s flaws. I hope Book 2 holds my interest more than Book 1. 3.5/5 stars.
The Narration: Jeff Hayes was the star of this book. It’s his performance that kept me going. All his character voices are distinct and his female voices are very believable. Hayes sounded engaged for the entire book and appears to have enjoyed giving voice to this story. I loved his serious, grumpy voice for Henry and his flippant voice for Keeja. 5/5 stars.
I received a free copy of this book. My opinions are solely my own.
The first big hurdle for the guys is to take out some orc-like creatures that have taken some human-like captives. Enter Mareen, the first maiden that needs saving. Now she’s not all helpless. She puts up a fight and is quick to recover enough to get out of there with the guys and back to safety where she can fall apart in private. So, she held potential from the beginning…. if only the author had used that potential.
The quests and magic continue from there. Henry is more the reactive, leader type while Jason is much more the thinker. The inhabitants of Ludus know how Henry and Jason got here because either they themselves were brought here for Dolos’s entertainment or their ancestors were. So they offer what knowledge they have to Jason and Henry.
There’s caves and dungeons to explore to gain treasure and the chance to level up your magical skills. It really felt like these characters were immersed in an epic fantasy computer game. Mostly I enjoyed the world building, though there were a few times where explaining the rules dragged things down a bit.
For some reason, Mareen remains our only female character for some time. Also, her destiny is to fall in love. Yep… sigh…. really? Eventually, we get Uulula who is basically an elf. She’s a bit more interesting than Mareen when we first meet her. Both ladies do get some skills but their main focus is to serve as love interests for Henry and Jason. Since there are so few ladies in a large cast, I really needed them to shine and they didn’t. While they had a little depth by the end of the book, they were pretty much cookie cutter, interchangeable characters which was greatly disappointing. Keeja is the one female character that holds my interest but she comes in near the very end of Book 1. I’m really hoping that the author keeps her around for the rest of the series.
All told, it’s a fun, breezy take on the epic fantasy genre even with it’s flaws. I hope Book 2 holds my interest more than Book 1. 3.5/5 stars.
The Narration: Jeff Hayes was the star of this book. It’s his performance that kept me going. All his character voices are distinct and his female voices are very believable. Hayes sounded engaged for the entire book and appears to have enjoyed giving voice to this story. I loved his serious, grumpy voice for Henry and his flippant voice for Keeja. 5/5 stars.
I received a free copy of this book. My opinions are solely my own.
February 16, 2024
Delvers LLC - Welcome to Ludus by Blaise Corvin is definitely for fans of the LitRPG genre.
There's not many stats, but it's very much the typical "humans have been placed into a world that works like a game" story with most of the tropes that come along with it.
It is as fast and entertaining enough for me to finish, but it's decidedly not one of my favourites in the genre.
The two main characters are supposedly almost 30, a retired military man and one working in IT. They feel like horny, full of themselves, teenagers though. Obviously there's a hot woman for each of them! The way they talked / thought about them had me roll my eyes a *lot*.
Then they are obviously THE BEST™ at everything. I mean the mains in this sort of story are often a bit overpowered, but here it was a bit annoying.
The banter between them also was not nearly as organic and well written as I'd have liked. I really found the sheer arrogance and "I don't care" attitude tiring at times.
I did like the world and the action, so I don't really regret having read it, but I'll definitely not pick up any more books in the series.
There's not many stats, but it's very much the typical "humans have been placed into a world that works like a game" story with most of the tropes that come along with it.
It is as fast and entertaining enough for me to finish, but it's decidedly not one of my favourites in the genre.
The two main characters are supposedly almost 30, a retired military man and one working in IT. They feel like horny, full of themselves, teenagers though. Obviously there's a hot woman for each of them! The way they talked / thought about them had me roll my eyes a *lot*.
Then they are obviously THE BEST™ at everything. I mean the mains in this sort of story are often a bit overpowered, but here it was a bit annoying.
The banter between them also was not nearly as organic and well written as I'd have liked. I really found the sheer arrogance and "I don't care" attitude tiring at times.
I did like the world and the action, so I don't really regret having read it, but I'll definitely not pick up any more books in the series.
September 12, 2025
Not as amazing as I remember it
I read this way back when and I remember being favorably impressed when compared to Logan Jacobs and Dante King. This was so much better.
Now it's many years later, and after Re-reading this one I'm less in love with it.
Oh, it's good. for it's time, and compared to what else was out there this one was a gem. But an MC who delights in being a douche to his 'Best friend', and oh so, SO many references to rape, (so much rape) I'm not sure this stands the test of time.
...I'm still gonna reread the whole series, but I'd rather see a new Apocalypse Cultivation at this point.
I read this way back when and I remember being favorably impressed when compared to Logan Jacobs and Dante King. This was so much better.
Now it's many years later, and after Re-reading this one I'm less in love with it.
Oh, it's good. for it's time, and compared to what else was out there this one was a gem. But an MC who delights in being a douche to his 'Best friend', and oh so, SO many references to rape, (so much rape) I'm not sure this stands the test of time.
...I'm still gonna reread the whole series, but I'd rather see a new Apocalypse Cultivation at this point.
September 16, 2024
Introduction:
Alright folks, buckle up, because we’re diving into *Delvers LLC: Welcome to Ludus* by Blaise Corvin. Published in September 2016, this 379-page GameLit/Fantasy/Sci-Fi mashup kicks off the *Delvers LLC* series with a premise that feels like a blend of *Guardians of the Flame* meets *Jumanji*. Henry and Jason—two regular dudes from Seattle—get sucked into a sword-and-sorcery world, complete with magic, monsters, and a god who’s basically just using them for entertainment. Corvin’s world of Ludus is brutal, strange, and filled with more WTF moments than you can shake a sword at. This is a wild, unapologetic ride through a realm where leveling up isn’t just a game mechanic, it’s survival of the fittest. So grab your enchanted gear, we’re about to enter Ludus.
Plot Summary:
Our story kicks off when Henry, a former military guy turned EMT, and Jason, a snarky IT geek, are snatched up by Dolos—a deity with a twisted sense of humor—and dropped onto Ludus, an alien planet that plays out like an RPG nightmare. With no way back to Earth unless they complete a vague, seemingly impossible task, the duo is forced to adapt quickly, learning the rules of the world and gaining magical abilities via orbs gifted to them by their apathetic kidnapper. Their new reality is one filled with orcs, goblins, and deadly beasts, but the real challenge lies in surviving long enough to figure out what the hell they’re supposed to do.
Along the way, they pick up a motley crew of companions—most notably Mareen, a local with her own tragic backstory, and Uluula, an alien elf-like warrior who joins their party. As they navigate the political and social intricacies of Ludus, Jason and Henry find themselves embroiled in fights, betrayals, and all sorts of high-stakes action. The world-building is rich, blending medieval fantasy elements with modern-day snark, and Corvin never lets you forget that Ludus is unforgiving. No one’s coming to save them, so they better figure out how to save themselves.
The Author:
Blaise Corvin is one of those authors who knows how to mix humor with grit in a way that feels fresh, especially in the GameLit and LitRPG genres. A veteran of the US Army, Corvin brings a sense of authenticity to his action scenes, while also keeping things light with quick-witted banter and a no-BS approach to character development. His writing isn’t overly concerned with spoon-feeding you every detail; instead, he’s all about dropping you into the middle of the action and letting you figure things out alongside the characters. Corvin’s ability to balance intricate world-building with fast-paced narrative makes *Welcome to Ludus* a standout in the LitRPG genre, especially since it doesn’t lean too heavily on game mechanics like some other series. It’s more about survival and adaptation, with a dash of “let’s see how these nerds handle a real-life RPG.”
Characters:
Henry and Jason are the heart of the story, and their dynamic is what makes *Welcome to Ludus* such a fun read. Henry is the pragmatic, battle-hardened guy who’s used to thinking on his feet. He’s got a cool head in a crisis, but he’s also dealing with the emotional baggage of his past—specifically his time in the military. Then there’s Jason, who’s all snark and sarcasm, but with a sharp mind that proves to be just as valuable as Henry’s combat experience. Together, they form a duo that plays off each other perfectly, with Jason’s tech-geek knowledge blending surprisingly well with Henry’s physical prowess.
Mareen, their first ally, brings a level of emotional depth to the story. She’s not just a damsel in distress, even though they rescue her from a pretty grim situation. Mareen quickly becomes integral to the group, and her personal growth is one of the highlights of the book. Then there’s Uluula, an alien warrior with her own agenda, who adds some badassery to the mix. She’s not your typical love interest, which is refreshing—her motivations are complex, and she has her own reasons for sticking around.
The real wildcard is Dolos, the god who brought Henry and Jason to Ludus. Dolos is an enigmatic, almost trickster-like figure who doesn’t seem to care whether they succeed or fail. He’s there to stir the pot, and while his appearances are brief, they’re impactful. Dolos embodies the chaotic nature of Ludus, and his nonchalance about the fate of the people he toys with gives the story an extra layer of tension.
Structure:
Corvin keeps the pacing tight, moving the story along without getting bogged down in unnecessary details. The book is divided into a series of events and battles that gradually increase in intensity, reflecting the characters’ growing understanding of Ludus and its dangers. One of the unique narrative techniques used is the “dream” sequence where the characters spend points on abilities. It’s like a mini character creation screen from a video game, but Corvin makes it feel organic to the story. The shifts in perspective, while primarily focused on Henry and Jason, occasionally dip into the viewpoints of other characters, adding depth to the world and giving us insight into the minds of their companions and enemies.
The pacing, while generally fast, does slow down during certain world-building moments, but these pauses never feel out of place. Instead, they serve to give the reader a breather between the high-stakes action scenes. It’s a clever balance that keeps you hooked without feeling overwhelmed.
Themes & Analysis:
At its core, *Welcome to Ludus* is a survival story. It’s about two regular guys trying to adapt to an extraordinary situation—one where the rules of their old world don’t apply. But beyond the survival aspect, the book delves into themes of personal growth, loyalty, and the question of morality in a world where killing is not just accepted, but necessary. Henry and Jason both struggle with their new reality, and Corvin doesn’t shy away from exploring the psychological toll it takes on them.
There’s also a running theme of choice versus fate. Dolos, in all his god-like glory, gives them just enough freedom to think they have a say in their destiny, but the looming question is: do they really? The choices they make—whether it’s to help a village or slay a band of goblins—are all dictated by the cruel game that Dolos has set up. It’s a commentary on agency, and whether or not the characters can truly forge their own path in a world designed to manipulate them.
Scenes:
While there’s no explicit romance in the book, there are hints of budding relationships, particularly between Jason and Mareen. Corvin keeps it subtle, focusing more on the camaraderie and growing trust between the group than on any overt romantic developments. That being said, there’s a definite chemistry between the characters, and it’ll be interesting to see how these relationships evolve in later books.
The action scenes are where *Welcome to Ludus* really shines. Corvin knows how to write a battle, and the fights are brutal, visceral, and often unpredictable. Whether it’s fending off goblins in a cave or taking down a band of marauders, the stakes always feel high. Corvin doesn’t pull any punches when it comes to the violence, but it never feels gratuitous. Each fight serves a purpose, either to advance the plot or to force the characters to confront their own limitations.
World-Building:
Ludus is a world where magic and science blend in ways that shouldn’t work but totally do. Corvin’s world-building is meticulous, from the way magic functions to the social hierarchy of the different races inhabiting the planet. One of the most interesting aspects is the matriarchal society of the Orukthians, which adds an extra layer of complexity to the political landscape of Ludus. The gods are another fascinating element—Dolos isn’t the only deity, and there’s a sense that Ludus is just one experiment in a larger cosmic game.
What sets Ludus apart from other fantasy worlds is the game-like mechanics. Henry and Jason’s abilities are tied to the magical orbs they receive, which allow them to level up and gain new skills. It’s a clever way of incorporating RPG elements into the story without making it feel too much like a straight-up game. The world feels lived-in, with its own history, cultures, and conflicts that make Ludus feel more than just a backdrop for the action.
Praise & Critique:
Corvin’s greatest strength is his ability to blend humor with action. Henry and Jason’s banter feels natural, and it adds a lightness to what could otherwise be a very grim story. The world-building is top-notch, and the pacing is solid, with enough twists and turns to keep you invested. The action scenes are exciting, and the characters—while occasionally falling into familiar tropes—are likable and well-developed.
On the flip side, the dialogue can sometimes feel a bit forced, especially when it comes to Jason’s “geek speak.” While it’s fun to see a character nerd out over RPG mechanics, it occasionally pulls you out of the story. Some of the side characters could also use a bit more depth—Mareen, in particular, feels a little underdeveloped, though she has potential for growth in future books.
Comparison:
*Welcome to Ludus* stands out in the GameLit genre for its balance of humor and grit. It’s not as stat-heavy as some LitRPGs, which makes it more accessible to readers who aren’t as familiar with the genre. Compared to Corvin’s other works, like *Secret of the Old Ones*, this book leans more heavily into the fantasy and adventure side, with less focus on the game mechanics. It’s also less dark, though there are definitely some heavy moments.
Personal Evaluation:
As a reader, I found myself thoroughly engaged with the world of Ludus. The mix of humor, action, and fantasy made for an entertaining read, and the characters felt relatable, despite the insane circumstances they found themselves in. It’s a fun, fast-paced adventure that doesn’t take itself too seriously, and that’s part of its charm. That being said, it also poses some interesting moral questions, particularly about survival and the nature of choice.
Conclusion:
If you’re looking for a book that combines the best elements of fantasy, sci-fi, and RPGs, *Delvers LLC: Welcome to Ludus* is definitely worth checking out. It’s an exciting start to what promises to be an epic series, with enough humor and heart to keep you invested in the characters’ journey. I’d recommend it to fans of GameLit and LitRPG, as well as anyone who enjoys fast-paced, action-packed fantasy with a twist. Rating? A solid 4.5/5—because who doesn’t want to see what happens when two geeks take on a god and a whole lot of goblins?
Alright folks, buckle up, because we’re diving into *Delvers LLC: Welcome to Ludus* by Blaise Corvin. Published in September 2016, this 379-page GameLit/Fantasy/Sci-Fi mashup kicks off the *Delvers LLC* series with a premise that feels like a blend of *Guardians of the Flame* meets *Jumanji*. Henry and Jason—two regular dudes from Seattle—get sucked into a sword-and-sorcery world, complete with magic, monsters, and a god who’s basically just using them for entertainment. Corvin’s world of Ludus is brutal, strange, and filled with more WTF moments than you can shake a sword at. This is a wild, unapologetic ride through a realm where leveling up isn’t just a game mechanic, it’s survival of the fittest. So grab your enchanted gear, we’re about to enter Ludus.
Plot Summary:
Our story kicks off when Henry, a former military guy turned EMT, and Jason, a snarky IT geek, are snatched up by Dolos—a deity with a twisted sense of humor—and dropped onto Ludus, an alien planet that plays out like an RPG nightmare. With no way back to Earth unless they complete a vague, seemingly impossible task, the duo is forced to adapt quickly, learning the rules of the world and gaining magical abilities via orbs gifted to them by their apathetic kidnapper. Their new reality is one filled with orcs, goblins, and deadly beasts, but the real challenge lies in surviving long enough to figure out what the hell they’re supposed to do.
Along the way, they pick up a motley crew of companions—most notably Mareen, a local with her own tragic backstory, and Uluula, an alien elf-like warrior who joins their party. As they navigate the political and social intricacies of Ludus, Jason and Henry find themselves embroiled in fights, betrayals, and all sorts of high-stakes action. The world-building is rich, blending medieval fantasy elements with modern-day snark, and Corvin never lets you forget that Ludus is unforgiving. No one’s coming to save them, so they better figure out how to save themselves.
The Author:
Blaise Corvin is one of those authors who knows how to mix humor with grit in a way that feels fresh, especially in the GameLit and LitRPG genres. A veteran of the US Army, Corvin brings a sense of authenticity to his action scenes, while also keeping things light with quick-witted banter and a no-BS approach to character development. His writing isn’t overly concerned with spoon-feeding you every detail; instead, he’s all about dropping you into the middle of the action and letting you figure things out alongside the characters. Corvin’s ability to balance intricate world-building with fast-paced narrative makes *Welcome to Ludus* a standout in the LitRPG genre, especially since it doesn’t lean too heavily on game mechanics like some other series. It’s more about survival and adaptation, with a dash of “let’s see how these nerds handle a real-life RPG.”
Characters:
Henry and Jason are the heart of the story, and their dynamic is what makes *Welcome to Ludus* such a fun read. Henry is the pragmatic, battle-hardened guy who’s used to thinking on his feet. He’s got a cool head in a crisis, but he’s also dealing with the emotional baggage of his past—specifically his time in the military. Then there’s Jason, who’s all snark and sarcasm, but with a sharp mind that proves to be just as valuable as Henry’s combat experience. Together, they form a duo that plays off each other perfectly, with Jason’s tech-geek knowledge blending surprisingly well with Henry’s physical prowess.
Mareen, their first ally, brings a level of emotional depth to the story. She’s not just a damsel in distress, even though they rescue her from a pretty grim situation. Mareen quickly becomes integral to the group, and her personal growth is one of the highlights of the book. Then there’s Uluula, an alien warrior with her own agenda, who adds some badassery to the mix. She’s not your typical love interest, which is refreshing—her motivations are complex, and she has her own reasons for sticking around.
The real wildcard is Dolos, the god who brought Henry and Jason to Ludus. Dolos is an enigmatic, almost trickster-like figure who doesn’t seem to care whether they succeed or fail. He’s there to stir the pot, and while his appearances are brief, they’re impactful. Dolos embodies the chaotic nature of Ludus, and his nonchalance about the fate of the people he toys with gives the story an extra layer of tension.
Structure:
Corvin keeps the pacing tight, moving the story along without getting bogged down in unnecessary details. The book is divided into a series of events and battles that gradually increase in intensity, reflecting the characters’ growing understanding of Ludus and its dangers. One of the unique narrative techniques used is the “dream” sequence where the characters spend points on abilities. It’s like a mini character creation screen from a video game, but Corvin makes it feel organic to the story. The shifts in perspective, while primarily focused on Henry and Jason, occasionally dip into the viewpoints of other characters, adding depth to the world and giving us insight into the minds of their companions and enemies.
The pacing, while generally fast, does slow down during certain world-building moments, but these pauses never feel out of place. Instead, they serve to give the reader a breather between the high-stakes action scenes. It’s a clever balance that keeps you hooked without feeling overwhelmed.
Themes & Analysis:
At its core, *Welcome to Ludus* is a survival story. It’s about two regular guys trying to adapt to an extraordinary situation—one where the rules of their old world don’t apply. But beyond the survival aspect, the book delves into themes of personal growth, loyalty, and the question of morality in a world where killing is not just accepted, but necessary. Henry and Jason both struggle with their new reality, and Corvin doesn’t shy away from exploring the psychological toll it takes on them.
There’s also a running theme of choice versus fate. Dolos, in all his god-like glory, gives them just enough freedom to think they have a say in their destiny, but the looming question is: do they really? The choices they make—whether it’s to help a village or slay a band of goblins—are all dictated by the cruel game that Dolos has set up. It’s a commentary on agency, and whether or not the characters can truly forge their own path in a world designed to manipulate them.
Scenes:
While there’s no explicit romance in the book, there are hints of budding relationships, particularly between Jason and Mareen. Corvin keeps it subtle, focusing more on the camaraderie and growing trust between the group than on any overt romantic developments. That being said, there’s a definite chemistry between the characters, and it’ll be interesting to see how these relationships evolve in later books.
The action scenes are where *Welcome to Ludus* really shines. Corvin knows how to write a battle, and the fights are brutal, visceral, and often unpredictable. Whether it’s fending off goblins in a cave or taking down a band of marauders, the stakes always feel high. Corvin doesn’t pull any punches when it comes to the violence, but it never feels gratuitous. Each fight serves a purpose, either to advance the plot or to force the characters to confront their own limitations.
World-Building:
Ludus is a world where magic and science blend in ways that shouldn’t work but totally do. Corvin’s world-building is meticulous, from the way magic functions to the social hierarchy of the different races inhabiting the planet. One of the most interesting aspects is the matriarchal society of the Orukthians, which adds an extra layer of complexity to the political landscape of Ludus. The gods are another fascinating element—Dolos isn’t the only deity, and there’s a sense that Ludus is just one experiment in a larger cosmic game.
What sets Ludus apart from other fantasy worlds is the game-like mechanics. Henry and Jason’s abilities are tied to the magical orbs they receive, which allow them to level up and gain new skills. It’s a clever way of incorporating RPG elements into the story without making it feel too much like a straight-up game. The world feels lived-in, with its own history, cultures, and conflicts that make Ludus feel more than just a backdrop for the action.
Praise & Critique:
Corvin’s greatest strength is his ability to blend humor with action. Henry and Jason’s banter feels natural, and it adds a lightness to what could otherwise be a very grim story. The world-building is top-notch, and the pacing is solid, with enough twists and turns to keep you invested. The action scenes are exciting, and the characters—while occasionally falling into familiar tropes—are likable and well-developed.
On the flip side, the dialogue can sometimes feel a bit forced, especially when it comes to Jason’s “geek speak.” While it’s fun to see a character nerd out over RPG mechanics, it occasionally pulls you out of the story. Some of the side characters could also use a bit more depth—Mareen, in particular, feels a little underdeveloped, though she has potential for growth in future books.
Comparison:
*Welcome to Ludus* stands out in the GameLit genre for its balance of humor and grit. It’s not as stat-heavy as some LitRPGs, which makes it more accessible to readers who aren’t as familiar with the genre. Compared to Corvin’s other works, like *Secret of the Old Ones*, this book leans more heavily into the fantasy and adventure side, with less focus on the game mechanics. It’s also less dark, though there are definitely some heavy moments.
Personal Evaluation:
As a reader, I found myself thoroughly engaged with the world of Ludus. The mix of humor, action, and fantasy made for an entertaining read, and the characters felt relatable, despite the insane circumstances they found themselves in. It’s a fun, fast-paced adventure that doesn’t take itself too seriously, and that’s part of its charm. That being said, it also poses some interesting moral questions, particularly about survival and the nature of choice.
Conclusion:
If you’re looking for a book that combines the best elements of fantasy, sci-fi, and RPGs, *Delvers LLC: Welcome to Ludus* is definitely worth checking out. It’s an exciting start to what promises to be an epic series, with enough humor and heart to keep you invested in the characters’ journey. I’d recommend it to fans of GameLit and LitRPG, as well as anyone who enjoys fast-paced, action-packed fantasy with a twist. Rating? A solid 4.5/5—because who doesn’t want to see what happens when two geeks take on a god and a whole lot of goblins?
November 22, 2018
Enjoyable book.
The story is good and enjoyable the book was a little predictable and slow to start. Overall the book kept me engaged with the plot and I enjoyed how the author worked to make sure that the readers learned more about the world and the characters. The characters continue to grow and develop in the book so I liked that.
The story is good and enjoyable the book was a little predictable and slow to start. Overall the book kept me engaged with the plot and I enjoyed how the author worked to make sure that the readers learned more about the world and the characters. The characters continue to grow and develop in the book so I liked that.
February 24, 2022
Not impressed
I think this must be for a different target audience. It felt really... Boring? Like oatmeal raisin cookies or a TV sitcom for people in the Midwest. The writing isn't bad, it's just bland... No flavor.
I think this must be for a different target audience. It felt really... Boring? Like oatmeal raisin cookies or a TV sitcom for people in the Midwest. The writing isn't bad, it's just bland... No flavor.
January 28, 2017
Don't be fooled by the three stars–I loved this book! "Welcome to Ludus" was fun, exciting, and had a relatability I really enjoyed. The book follows two fairly normal American guys who are suddenly dropped into a fantasy world with nothing but their wits and a bag full of supplies to guide them. What I liked the most about this book is that I could really see myself in it–Jason and Henry, our protagonists, approach their strange new circumstance logically and like reasonable people. If you've read "The Martian," you know what I'm talking about–"Welcome to Ludus" makes you feel like you're right beside these guys having an adventure, and approach the same old fantasy-world tropes with a refreshing element of modern logic.
I loved this book, and it was a hard decision to rate it with only three stars, but while this book is really quite enjoyable it admittedly has a lot of room for improvement. I can tell Blaise Corvin has yet to master his writing style. There are some moments of the book which are meant to be emotional but aren't, other moments that are actually emotional and seem to be overlooked, and moments where Jason and Henry act a little too stupid to be relatable. My biggest critique to Corvin is that the romance part of the book really doesn't add anything to the story, and that the girl characters that we're romantically involved with are really not that strong. I understand the point of a side character–really, I do. But it's just that when the two lead female characters are so unimportant, boring, and horribly cringe-worthy they exclude any possibility of a female audience for this book, one must wonder why Blaise Corvin included them at all. I myself am pretty sick of the one-dimensional girlfriend-type character in RPGlit, and I think it cheapens the genre.
But that aside, my final thoughts are that if you like adventure, magic, dungeon-crawling, and know what "RPG" stands for, this book is for you. I'm personally really looking forward to the next book of this series, but I really, really hope the romance aspect takes a backseat or at least becomes slightly more interesting.
I loved this book, and it was a hard decision to rate it with only three stars, but while this book is really quite enjoyable it admittedly has a lot of room for improvement. I can tell Blaise Corvin has yet to master his writing style. There are some moments of the book which are meant to be emotional but aren't, other moments that are actually emotional and seem to be overlooked, and moments where Jason and Henry act a little too stupid to be relatable. My biggest critique to Corvin is that the romance part of the book really doesn't add anything to the story, and that the girl characters that we're romantically involved with are really not that strong. I understand the point of a side character–really, I do. But it's just that when the two lead female characters are so unimportant, boring, and horribly cringe-worthy they exclude any possibility of a female audience for this book, one must wonder why Blaise Corvin included them at all. I myself am pretty sick of the one-dimensional girlfriend-type character in RPGlit, and I think it cheapens the genre.
But that aside, my final thoughts are that if you like adventure, magic, dungeon-crawling, and know what "RPG" stands for, this book is for you. I'm personally really looking forward to the next book of this series, but I really, really hope the romance aspect takes a backseat or at least becomes slightly more interesting.
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