Django Wexler has done it again! How to Become the Dark Lord and Die Trying is a fantastic story about a woman who has exhausted all of her options fighting for the forces of good (and gone a little mad while doing it), and decides that she is going to win once and for all by becoming the Dark Lord herself. Hilarious and action-packed, this satirical novel pokes fun at literary tropes while imbuing its heroine with genuine heart. Highly recommended.

⭐️: 2
DNF’d at 23%. I really wanted to like this book, but I couldn’t get into it. I felt like nothing was happening, but not in a good way.

3.5 stars, rounded down to 3 because this is not a book that will age well. There are a lot of pop culture references that non-fantasy readers may not know, and that are possibly too timely and won’t age well. For a well-read fantasy reader like myself each reference was easily identified but I’m not sure even someone who knows a lot of fantasy pop-culture will get them all. It’s not that you need to know them to get the story but they are all the focus of jokes made by MC Davi.

Two more reasons why I ranked this one a bit lower..
It took me forever to read. At first I thought it was just me, but then I listened to some of the audiobook and realized it’s that my brain trips over the made up words. Especially the species names that have roots in Latin but are still made-up and difficult to pronounce. There is a fine line between creating new words for your fantasy realm and creating words that readers brains will trip over or stumble on. It may sound silly, especially if you’re a reader (like myself) who reads words but doesn’t say them in their head. However I have experienced this before and it is definitely a weird effect that happens when we read.
Finally I was not a fan of the abrupt, unresolved ending. Be forewarned it is a bit of a cliffhanger and you may not feel satisfied by the ending. I certainly did not feel like I had any sort of resolution.

What’s odd is that, all that said about what I felt didn’t work in Wexler’s fantasy comedy story. I still enjoyed it and will definitely read the next book. Not only is this very witty, sexy, and overall ridiculous; but it also quite entertaining. Although I’ll confess I did enjoy the book Dreadful more, I would say if you like narrators that know they are narrating a story, silly or over-the-top comedic fantasy then definitely check this one out. So long as it’s read in the next 10 or so years it should date itself just yet (even if I believe it will eventually).

Please note: I received an eARC of this book from the publisher via NetGalley. This is an honest and unbiased review.

Davi has spent the last 1000 years living & dying to try & save the fantasy realm she finds herself in. Eventually, she decides to throw caution to the wind & be the bad guy. Things can’t get any worse, right?

My immediate thought in reading this was if the Heir Apparent book by Vivian Vande Velde had been written by the creators of Deadpool. This is an irreverent, raunchy, violent take on your typical portal fantasy story.

I think, with a less talented author, this would have been terrible. Davi’s humor and snark in the middle of a truly unimaginable situation brings a lot of lightness to the story, even when she’s discussing war and battle.

The world building has me completely engaged! I loved how the magic works differently for different people, and the wilders! I loved all the different animal hybrids so much. Especially Jeffrey.

I am a little disappointed with the very abrupt ending plus a cliffhanger. At least the main storyline is resolved.

Thanks to NetGalley and Orbit Books for this arc!

Groundhog's Day meets Deadpool in a fantasy setting is the perfect way to describe this book. It's light it's fun and it's fast-paced. I'm definitely not used to reading fantasy with this much humor in it but that was a plus to this book. I'm definitely looking forward to the second one and if irreverent humor is your thing I think it's worth giving it a go!

Unfortunately, while everything about the premise and description sounded right up my alley, I had to DNF at around the 20% mark.

While I've been a fan of a ridiculous romp through a fantasy setting (Kill The Farmboy as an example), this one was just a little too far on the ridiculous side for me. I also wasn't a huge fan of the almost "stream of thought" writing style, but I think the biggest part was that at 20% through, I still couldn't connect with the main character. I wasn't endeared to them, I wasn't rooting for them, I wasn't interested in them, and I didn't even hate them. It was kind of like spending time with that one mildly annoying friend you kind of like, but only in small doses. Unfortunately, an entire novel was too much of a dose for me with this character.

All that said, while this wasn't for me, I can see why others have enjoyed it, and I've heard really good things about some of this author's other books and won't hesitate to give them a try.

If you're looking for a no thoughts, just vibes fantasy read that leans heavily into that 2000s comedy movie humour, this is probably the book for you!

Thank you to the publisher and Netgalley for this arc!

I decided to dnf this book because especially now I am not in the mood for this kind of book. I was very excited to read this book. However, a female character written by a man shows too much, and I am tired. So I may return to this book later

Thank you Net Galley for this e arc. How to Become the Dark Lord and Die Trying is a quirky fantasy about the a hero deciding to survive and transform themselves to the villain. Our main character is a firecracker trying to figure how to live past a few quest she is given. Truly this book was hilarious. I will say the plot of the story wasn't that exciting.

I tried multiple times to get through this book since downloading it, but apparently this one just isnt my cup of tea. The author did a great job at catching attention with the starting chapter, but I have noticed I am not typically a fan of comedy in fantasy which is why I struggle with this particular book. I do think this would be a good match for those that like medival comedy based books like Assistant to the Villain and Dreadful!

This premise is so fun - Davi wakes up in a mysterious fantasy world as the chosen one, destined to defeat the dark lord, but she always dies and wakes up at the beginning, like a video game. That happens for 1,000 years until Davi gives up and tries to become the dark lord.

This is funny and quirky and full of pop culture references. However, my problems are as follows - there is one glaring plot hole, Davi made some assumptions toward the end of book that didn’t track, and she is mostly definitely the stereotypical “woman written by a man”. This last issue let up toward the end and the plot of super intriguing so I am still looking forward to the next book.

Thank you Orbit and NetGalley for an advanced reader copy.

For reasons unknown, Davi is stuck in a time loop wherein she is tasked with defending humankind against the Dark Lord, and after more than 200 unsuccessful tries (read: she literally died trying), Davi has had enough. On try 238, she decides to become the Dark Lord instead of fighting him/her/them, and while it takes her a few short lives to get the hang of it, Davi learns that she has a knack for leading a horde of orcs and other wild beings.

This is a fun, raunchy, irreverent fantasy novel, full of pop culture references and snarky humor. It may throw off those new to the genre (as there isn't really a great explanation for the Earth-centric pop culture references other than Davi musing that she "must've come from Earth at some point"), but for others, this is will be a welcome goofy adventure. Read it if you liked Dreadful, Soon I Will Be Invincible, Hench, or other novels with a fantasy antihero.

This has contention of being my favorite book of 2024. I have already been recommending it to so many people and I have a list of people I will be buying this book for. This is such an fun and amazing story and I am floored that I am not seeing more of it. I am a huge "Restaurant at the End of the Universe" series and this book had all those feels but Fantasy. I was just in love from Chapter 1.
The Groundhog Day story line of how Davi gets to start her journey on being the Dark Lord literally had me laughing out loud. And I knew I was hooked on this story. Then we plunged into the epic adventure of her journey to the Convocation. I just love the witty fast paced way Davi collects her hoard and starts her journey. I am a huge sucker for found family stories and her little group of Wilders and Rock Peoples just melted my heart.
The adventure and battle scenes were very well done and I was flying through the story. I can't wait for the next installment to see what Dark Lord Davi is going to do.
I can't say enough good things about the story. If you like adventure stories, witty almost dark humor in places, a heroine that really knows what she is doing or she will die and try it again, found family and just a really imaginative creative fantasy world I would recommend this story to you.
Notes I would recommend people get the traditional published book- the footnotes which really create and amazing story on their own and are really super fun and different were a little difficult when doing an electronic copy as you can't just move back and forth to read the footnotes.

I really love other books by Wexler: particularly The Thousand Names, so I was really excited to pick this up since the premise sounded great. Unfortunately, the humor just ever quite meshed for me. In general, In general, I'm not a sexual-humor type person, so it might just be a personal preference. At first, the over-the-top humor seemed to be a coping mechanism for our character, and I understood where it was coming from: but as the book progressed, our character just...never changed. Even when the stakes got really high, she remained as light-hearted and jokey, which made me feel like no progress was made other than plot - and I'm usually a pretty character-forward reader (which again, is why I liked his other works so much). This was Wexler's first foray into humor, and so I'm hoping he can balance the jokes with the more grounded character elements in the future as he gets more comfortable with it.

I really wanted to like this one more
. It was funny and the idea of a normal mundane person becoming the dark lord was exciting .The footnote formatting is very difficult (for me, this is where I lost a lot of interest). Unfortunately, the story itself and a lot of the supporting characters fell flat. There just wasn’t very much tension as I would have loved to have seen.

This had its moments but felt a little too forced in my opinion. There were times where it was genuinely funny but others didn’t land at all. I think it’s going to be rather polarizing in its audience

This book was very different than anything I've read. Dark, irreverent, and unapologetic. A bit of a genre bending blend of the time loop trope and Deadpool. Entertaining and memorable

A fun and enjoyable read that is brought down slightly by the incessant pop culture references and horniness of the protagonist. Not enough to change my mind about recommending this book, but it did knock a star down. Really inventive world building and secondary characters. Eagerly looking forward to the next book

How To Become The Dark Lord And Die Trying
Django Wexler
3⭐️

Pub Date: 5/21/2024

This one started out really strong for me. Page 2 and I was already chuckling. The writing style is very casual, obscene and not very artsy but it set up the tone of this book- hilarious. There were so many pop culture references that were not very hard to understand (even though I'm not one that's usually attuned to references much) so that was a plus for me. However, this style got old quickly. It was TOO casual. The plot started out really strong- isekai (Japanese fantasy genre where the MC is transported to another world to survive. Yes the author note mentioned that he took inspiration from this). But as it went on, the plot slows down and not very relevant parts were inserted more. This, plus the continuously obscene and spunky MC suddenly were not doing it for me anymore. She was s*x-obsessed and truly insufferable. Female MC obviously written by a man. Entertaining for a while but became largely annoying as the story went on.

Plot had promise but I feel like it was stretched out too long. I will say that this book was consistent with its tone. There were plenty of chuckle-worthy scenes here and the action was written well enough. Also, the footnotes were VERY entertaining. I do wished I liked this more as I was very excited when I got this ARC. I'm 50-50 about reading the next one when it comes out.

Thank you Netgalley and Orbit Books for the gifted e-ARC and finished copy of this book.

How to Become the Dark Lord and Die Trying is the first book in a new fantasy series by Django Wexler. Released 21st May 2024 by Hachette on their Orbit imprint, it's 432 pages and is available in paperback, audio, and ebook formats. It's worth noting that the ebook format has a handy interactive table of contents as well as interactive links.

This is a funny fantasy full of completely bonkers over the top tropes and silliness. There's a "groundhog day" element where MC Davi keeps getting resurrected to save the universe, only to fail spectacularly (fatally), over and over and over for 1000+ years. She decides to turn the tables and -become- the dark lord instead of trying to fight him. So far so good.

It's funny, and cleverly written, with whiplash prose and it's full of wry and sarcastic humor. However... it really reads like a female MC *clearly* written by a guy who honestly doesn't have much of a clue what women think, how women think, and doesn't give a crap about trying to find out. She's oversexed, and the book is *full* of sexual sadomasochistic torture, graphic death and violence. For some readers, this will be a feature, not a bug, and honestly, it's written for them.

It's deeply misogynistic (unintentionally?), easily the most violent read of 2024, and unevenly paced. The language and humor are roughly Deadpool-level (not the plot, just the humor and language), and this one is juvenile, raunchy, and intentionally vulgar.

Three and a half stars. It will find its audience, and will either delight or disgust (or both). It will certainly be picked up for most public library collections, but probably won't be a good fit for school library acquisitions. It would potentially make a good choice for a buddy read (with the right reading buddy).

There are flashes of homage to John Norman's hysterically awful Gor books scattered throughout, and for those who remember them fondly, this is a worthy torch bearer.

Disclosure: I received an ARC at no cost from the author/publisher for review purposes.

I am not normally a prude when it comes to swearing but this book in the first handful of pages just used swears too many times. Took me out of the book that I couldn't even finish