Fizzlesprocket – Neven Iliev

ELLC is placed in a world that behaves like an online game. Not a fantasy world inspired by a game - a world where fighting a monster can actually result in a voice informing you that you’ve achieved a higher level in one or more skills. The first book (Morningwood) reverses the usual game-lit tropes by making a very-minor dungeon monster the protagonist. It was surprisingly entertaining to follow a Mimic as it beat the odds, then beat the dungeon.

Fizzlesprocket was darker, and less entertaining. The Mimic is now in an actual city (trying to keep anyone noticing that it’s a monster), interacting with people (not one of the protagonist’s better skills), and things go wrong. There is more gratuitous sex and violence (not one of the writer’s better skills), and heavier-handed plot devices to steer the story. The plot device that sets up volume three is so heavy-handed that there’s a name for it.

Fizzlesprocket herself is the gnome on the cover. She has the bad luck to be in the wrong place (any place the Mimic is) at the wrong time (ditto), and (speaking of darker) her life is destroyed. She and the Mimic come out of the story harmed and diminished - and on a mission that might make things better.

I will read volume three. Volume one was surprisingly entertaining. I didn’t care for the way the author wrenched the plot into position for the next volume - but what he’s set up has considerable promise.