The Dungeon Anarchist’s Cookbook is the third book in the Dungeon Crawler Carl series by Matt Dinniman. In the third installment of the phenomenal LitRpg series, Carl and Princess Donut are on the fourth floor of the dungeon, where they find themselves navigating the Iron Tangle, an impossibly-complicated subway system. Grinding their way through the train system and fighting monsters in the railway stations, Carl, Donut, and other crawlers work together to survive, all while coming to terms with the fact that they now have bounties on their heads.
The Dungeon Anarchist’s Cookbook dives even further into the video game mechanics and the complexities of the Borant system. This book really takes advantage of the fact that readers are already familiar with the dungeon by the end of the previous books, which allows Dinniman to introduce more characters and much bigger schemes unfolding at the universe level. Even though the knot of the Iron Tangle was a bit hard for me to disentangle at times, I still had a fantastic time and enjoyed this experience thoroughly, especially now that the worldbuilding is ever expanding and we’re adding more and more characters (PS: I love Katia and her ever so weird class).
Read our full summary and review of The Dungeon Anarchist’s Cookbook below. This post contains spoilers.
The Dungeon Anarchist’s Cookbook
Description
Earth has been transformed into the set of the galaxy’s most watched game show: Dungeon Crawler World, a nightmarish, multilevel, video game–like dungeon filled with traps, monsters, and mind-bending puzzles. Carl and Donut have survived so far, but this fourth level is unlike anything they could imagine. The Iron Tangle: an impossibly complicated subway system tied together into a knot of trains of all kinds, from classic steam engines to sleek modern cars. Up is down. Down is up. Close is far. The cars are filled with monsters, the railway stations aren’t always what they seem, and the exit is perpetually just a few stops away.
The top ten list is populated, and Carl and Donut have made it. But that popularity comes with a price. They each now have a bounty on their head. They must work with other crawlers to solve the puzzle of the floor, but how can they do that when they don’t know who to trust? The secret to unraveling it all may be hidden in the pages of a seemingly useless book.
Welcome, Crawlers. Welcome to the fourth floor of the dungeon.
Includes part three of the exclusive bonus story “Backstage at the Pineapple Cabaret.”
Tropes
- LitRPG
- Found Family
- Adventure
- Humor
Review
How are you reading Dungeon Crawler Carl?
How are you reading Dungeon Crawler Carl?
Overall Impressions 😊
While I enjoyed The Dungeon Anarchist’s Cookbook greatly, and the audio version continues to deliver a superior, fun experience, I found the setup on the fourth floor of the dungeon with the trains, Iron Tangle, and portals a bit convoluted for my taste. The trains and portals did not quite mesh for me, especially with the added subtext of the floor, and at times the overall design felt harder to track than it needed to be. I did love the integration of Katia, Elle, and Imani, and I really appreciated getting more depth from both the crawlers and the dungeon “staff” as more of them are physically introduced into the story.
With the expansion of the Borant universe and the growing schemes around the game, I’m genuinely looking forward to the rest of the Dungeon Crawler Carl series. Since I’m getting so much more attached to the growing cast, I occasionally wished this book leaned even more into character development instead of layering on so many mechanics. Still, I had a blast. The humor is unmatched, and I’m excited to see where Matt Dinniman takes the series next.
Jeff Hays is absolutely incredible as the audiobook narrator. He makes a funny book hilarious, giving each character a distinct personality, and the voice effects carry the novel just as much as the plot does.
Perfect For Fans Of… 🧭
As a lifelong gamer, this is the first book I recommend to any of my friends who love video games as much as I do. Ever since I started reading Dungeon Crawler Carl, I’ve been looking for an exact dungeon crawler game. It’s kind of a mix of Dungeons & Dragons meets action RPGs like Diablo IV or Path of Exile. So if you like either of those game types, this book is a must read. Also if you find any games that scratch the itch, I want to know.
Although this is my first LitRPG experience, I don’t know how any other book can top it in the genre. I honestly cannot wait to finish the series and try another LitRPG to test if this is a genre that truly works for me, or if I read the golden standard for the genre on my first try.
The aforementioned audio experience is superb, a satisfying reading experience taken to spectacular in this format. So if you enjoy quality audiobooks, say Project Hail Mary, Dungeon Crawler Carl has to be in your TBR.
There’s a little bit of everything in this series: fantasy, science fiction, drama, and humor.
And since Dungeon Crawler Carl is recently dubbed on social media, despite my annoyance, a “boy book for the girls,” it’s worth calling out that there is no romance in this series, nor should there be. The found family vibes are endless though, so for you trope hunting girlies, this is a peak experience.
And if you enjoy the chaotic animal companion vibes of Tairn or Andarna from Fourth Wing, Princess Donut is just as iconic. She is always there for comic relief, perfectly delivered sarcastic remarks, and genuinely spectacular character growth.
Characters 👥
Carl is my favorite protagonist archetype. He’s a loose cannon who holds a grudge. Not only is he resourceful and clever, he’s also devious in a way that feels deeply satisfying, constantly looking for ways to get back at the game masters for putting him in this mess. I feel like he’s coming more and more into himself, especially with the arrival of the secret cookbook, and I genuinely cannot wait for him to step into the leadership position he’ll inevitably grow into.
Princess Donut, who is a cat but not exactly a cat, is like a toddler constantly asking why. While I do appreciate her clever remarks and funny jabs at Carl, what I really love about her is her innocence and the lens she sees the world through. It makes the ending of this book not only funnier, but also surprisingly impactful.
Mordecai might honestly be my favorite character after Carl. As the jaded game guide turned manager, he has a wealth of information, and his dry sarcasm works perfectly against the chaos of the dungeon.
Katia is growing on me so much, and I truly hope there isn’t a romance between her and Carl because their platonic alliance and friendship is everything.
I truly enjoy every time Zev, Hekla, and other crawlers or dungeon staff come onto the page, not only because they add more depth to the story, but because they remind us there are so many different kinds of people trying to survive this. I love all the characters and honestly cannot get enough of any of them.
Plot 🗺️
In The Dungeon Anarchist’s Cookbook, Book 3 of the Dungeon Crawler Carl series, the fourth floor of the dungeon drops Carl and Princess Donut into the chaos of the Iron Tangle, one of the world’s subterranean railway systems tangled together with portals and layered mechanics. Individually, I loved the concepts. I love trains. I love portal magic. On paper, this floor should have been made for me.
But the more physics and interconnected mechanics were introduced to explain how the trains and portals functioned together, the more detached I felt from the story. My main issue was that it became difficult to visualize how everything fit together, like a deadly puzzle where someone kept adding pieces from a different box, which made some of the strategic beats harder to fully land.
That being said, it was still a blast. At some point, I decided I wasn’t going to chase every puzzle piece or fully map out how everything connected, and once I let that go, I enjoyed the book so much more. The chaos became fun again instead of something I was trying to solve.
I could have done without a few smaller plot elements, like the Bobka hands or the monsters suffering from the DTs, but those are honestly minor nits in the grand scheme of things.
What really worked for me were the plot beats that brought the crawlers together. The betrayal mid-book hit harder than I expected, and the tension it created carried the rest of the story. Hekla and her daughters arriving and interacting with the main crew added emotional depth to what could have otherwise been a purely mechanical floor.
And I love the concept of the cookbook itself. Anything that extends the lore and expands the world shows how much Matt Dinniman cares about this universe. The Dungeon Anarchist’s Cookbook is not just a gimmick title. It actively deepens the larger game, the history behind it, and Carl’s evolving role within it.
My Favorite Quote 📣
“You tried to kill Katia you fucking bitch!” Donut cried. She blasted a full-strength Magic Missile right into Hekla’s face.”
Matt Dinniman, The Dungeon Anarchist’s Cookbook
Writing Style and Narration ✍️
Dinniman’s unhinged imagination is both hilarious and a little bit terrifying. His mind comes up with the most absurd, bizarre concepts that are somehow both horrifying and funny at the same time, hello, mantaur. There’s genuine social commentary tucked into the chaos too, the kind that sneaks up on you. It is truly a delightful experience to read anything he comes up with. The NPCs who are traumatized in this book, along with the emotional depth given to the survivors of the Borant Corporation’s alien invasion of Earth, are genuinely something to behold. That balance between unhinged dungeon chaos and very real life and death consequences is what makes this series work so well for me. It never feels like the absurdity cancels out the stakes.
Even when the mechanics get a bit too complicated for my liking, especially on a floor like this one, it’s still a blast. The LitRPG elements are layered into the story in a way that still feels character driven and funny, even when things are complicated.
And then there’s the audiobook. This book must, should, and honestly is required to be consumed in audiobook format. Carl’s voice is gritty and compelling, Donut is petty and childish in the best way, and Mordecai is sardonic and weirdly hot. Not to mention “NEW ACHIEVEMENT!” is permanently stuck in my head after every listening session. This is truly peak audio production.
Synopsis
Synopsis
Entering the Iron Tangle
Carl, Donut, and the rest of their party enter the fourth floor of the dungeon, the Iron Tangle. It’s one of the world’s subterranean railway systems, impossibly complicated and full of monsters, with train stations serving as areas where they can grind and shop.
Donut selects the Football Hooligan class.
The train is also full of trash mobs, and the party finds themselves in a special cart, the Janitor cart. Carl uses his protective shell to squish a bunch of creatures while the train is moving, since the shell itself remains stationary. They receive their fan boxes and coupons to upgrade their personal space.
They get crafting tables and place them in their personal space, including Alchemy, Sapper’s, and Engineering tables. Then it’s off to grind for levels on the Yellow Line. On the Yellow Line train, they meet Vernon, the train’s conductor. Vernon tells them there is a transit hub at station 433, and the end of the line is 435. After that, the train resets and the staff magically find themselves back in the train yard.
They find a reward cart where they can claim lost suitcases. Carl gets a potion. Donut gets fire ants.
They discuss the reality NPCs feel with their fake wives, friends, and animals, while Zev reaches out and tells them Katia needs to become more “entertaining.”
As they grind, they realize mobs are collecting drugs and teleporting back, cracking the gameplay loop wide open. They also find some automatons without being able to discover what they are for. Carl explodes the inactive automatons and farms their materials for scraps.
Mongo finishes growing and reaches his full size. As a reward, he gets a saddle, and Donut can ride him.
The group finds themselves in a spin the wheel game show. The host, Chaco, however, has history with Mordecai. The second he sees Chaco, Mordecai attacks him. Having attacked game staff, he is put on a 7 day time out.
Carl spins the wheel and chooses a cookbook as his reward.
The Dungeon Anarchist’s Cookbook Revealed and Ochre Line Chaos
The book Carl received is The Dungeon Anarchist’s Cookbook, a secret item that is passed down from one crawler to another for like minded individuals. Carl has a new tab in his inventory where he can make additions to the cookbook. It contains past crawlers’ experiences and gives useful tips, but here’s the catch: it is forbidden to mention what the item truly is.
Carl and Donut visit the Desperado Club. They are attacked by an assassin, but Elle, the former nursing home resident turned Frostmaiden, defends them and kills the attacker. As an apology, the Desperado Club gives them a free bodyguard during their visit for a lifetime. They hire two rock golems, Bomo and the Sledge.
Donut drinks a Dirty Shirley and gets on the dance floor. She is attacked by another crawler who wants to claim her bounty, and she kills him in self defense, receiving a skull next to her name.
They go back to grinding on the train tracks, this time on the Ochre Line. Elle lets them know that each 5th station has a Kraken Boss.
Carl derails a train to get the train engineer out of his room so they can get a key for the line. The conductor is a mantaur named Gore-Gore, half man and half man. Yes, you read that right. They fight Gore-Gore, and Carl almost summons Grull, the god that his gauntlet has a chance of summoning.
They receive their sponsors. Princess Donut is sponsored by Princess D’nadia, and Katia by Princess Formidable. Carl is summoned by the Valtay Corporation. The sponsorship program begins.
The party gets on a named train called Dismemberment Limited. Zev tells them they’re going on a show named Planet Beautiful. Carl buys an armor table and builds a backpack for Katia so she can carry more mass, becoming stronger. Carl receives his first sponsor gift, a neural enhancer that lets him see what’s on the other side of portals.
Quan, the guy who received the celestial robe from the floor before, is wrecking trains to gain experience without a care for how it affects the other contestants.
Carl begins touching every crawler he sees to get as many of them into chat as possible. They want to take control of another train named Nightmare Express. Carl navigates the train through a Station Repair portal and gets to the trainyard.
They figure out there are multiple ways to get to the trainyard to access the stairs. Donut gets sunglasses as her sponsor gift.
Quan’s derailing of trains leaves many other crawlers stranded. Imani and Elle find a secret passage to Terminus Station 433.
The party gets to know Fire Brandy, an NPC in charge of fueling the train’s engine.
Hekla and the Daughters
They realize that if the mobs on the floor don’t get the drugs they need, they suffer from DTs. At the last stage of the DTs, they turn into festering ghouls, which the trainyard is full of. The group escapes the trainyard and takes Madison, an NPC, with them using the staff line.
Bautista and some of the other crawlers are in Station 434 fighting a mimic. Elle and Imani are sending ghouls to the train yard via minecart. Carl discovers stairs and one of the Escape Velocity lines at Station 23. Katia tells Carl she’s found PVP coupons given to Donut as a reward for killing a crawler.
As the other crawlers try to make their way to the stairways, Carl goes to the Desperado Club and runs into Frank Q. Frank has lost his will to live, and his last act of vengeance is gifting Carl a ring that makes him hunt and be hunted. Chris, Brandon’s brother, kills Frank. Bautista’s group cannot handle the boss they’re fighting and decide to make their way to the abyss.
Hekla and the Daughters reach Carl and his party and enter their safe room. They ask for Carl’s help to save stranded crawlers. They plan to use Katia’s flexible shape and have her act as a plow to kill as many mobs as they can. Carl doesn’t like using Katia like this, especially with the way Hekla and Eva, Katia’s friends from Iceland, are acting toward them.
Elle messages Carl to let him know festering ghouls converge and become something bigger. As they plow through stations and Katia kills monsters, she nearly dies a few times. Carl and Donut frantically try to heal her, but Hekla and the other healer she brought with her party mysteriously ignore her.
Donut realizes Hekla has been shooting invisible arrows at Katia and has instructed the healer not to heal her. Donut freaks out and is enraged that Hekla would turn on one of her own, and attacks her. Eva and the Daughters attack Katia, Carl, and Donut.
They fight, and Eva keeps goading Katia. Eventually, she uses her Rush ability and rams into Hekla like a train. Hekla is splattered against the wall.
The Dungeon Anarchist’s Cookbook Ending Explained
Princess Donut uses her second chance spell to reanimate Hekla and they managed to dispel the enemies from the cart. It’s a chaotic, satisfying moment. Stage 3 DT monsters begin attacking the train. Katia loots Hekla’s crossbow, which makes a female wielder incredibly strong the more women they’re surrounded with. Pretty cool item mechanic. Carl decides he needs to go save Bautista.
Back in their safe space, Katia receives a Desperado club pass and Hekla’s bounty. She officially makes it to the top of the leaderboard.
A new PR agent named Loita reaches out and lets them know Zev has been relieved of her duties.
Carl and the rest of the party have to cut a gnoll’s hand over and over again to operate the train carts and save the crawlers stranded in the Abyss. Because of course that’s how it works.
A group of crawlers accidentally detonate a soul crystal and all die. After stage 3 DTs, the creatures begin exploding and becoming Krakaren Crotch Dumplings. Yes, that’s their actual name. No, we don’t make the rules. The party makes it to the Abyss and gives out hats to the crawlers.
Katia receives a special crossbow bolt from her sponsor while Mordecai returns. She also discovers that the Tangle is a mirrored universe and if they dig through the floor, they’ll reach an upside down version of a different line.
With one day left on the floor, the Krakaren begin flooding the stairwell stations. They decide to blow every generator and along the way meet the goat lady and her goats.
Carl summons Grull, who is being controlled by the Maestro. Grull takes on the Mimic and kills it. Carl tries to handle this one solo but the rest of the party shows up anyway, despite his protests. Together they manage to send Grull to the Abyss.
The ghoul generators all blow and they make it to the stairwell.
In the epilogue, they finally meet Loita in person. She tells them Zev has been sent to a reeducation camp. Then things get interesting: on Odette’s show, they’re warned about Chris, Brandon’s brother.
They enter the next floor. Donut chooses a sector, completely unaware of what they’re stepping into next.
FAQs
What is The Dungeon Anarchist’s Cookbook about?
The Dungeon Anarchist’s Cookbook is the third book in the Dungeon Crawler Carl series by Matt Dinniman. It follows Carl and Princess Donut on the fourth floor of the dungeon, where they navigate the Iron Tangle, an impossibly complicated underground railway system packed with monsters, crawlers, and layered mechanics. It also introduces the cookbook itself, a secret item passed between like-minded crawlers containing tips and lore from previous dungeon runs.
Is The Dungeon Anarchist’s Cookbook legal?
Sort of. While the Cookbook itself does not violate games rules, it is required to be kept secret.
What is the next book after The Dungeon Anarchist’s Cookbook?
The Gate of the Feral Gods is the next Dungeon Crawler Carl book.
Do you love trains as much as we do? Well, hold onto that thought.🚇😈
The Iron Tangle was a lot, and I won’t pretend the mechanics didn’t lose me a few times. But the cast is too good, the humor is too unmatched, and Mordecai is too weirdly hot for me to stay mad at it. Onto Book 4.
I’d happily keep crawling through every floor Matt Dinniman throws at us, especially now that the stakes are getting bigger and the cast keeps getting better. Carl’s leadership arc cannot get here fast enough.
And if you want to keep up with what we’re reading next, did you know we’re on Instagram? 📸
We post all of our new reviews, reading updates, and other bookish chaos over there ✨📖
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