Just wondering what 2020ish or later cyberpunk books/authors you’ve read and would recommend. Every list I find is either the same handful of admittedly quintessential 1970/80s stuff (Gibson, Stephenson, Dick, etc), mega compilations that aren’t deliniated by year/quality (and haven’t been updated in years), or wildly irrelevant bot slop.
Human authors only… nothing AI/LLM-generated, please.
“The Murderbot Diaries” sounds spot-on to what I’m looking for, bonus points for being a series! Added it to my list.
I’ll check out “Dungeon Crawler Carl”, but I’m not really sure what LitRPG is. Glancing through the wiki entry it seems like I’ve got plenty of experience with RPG-but-not-LitRPG books (i.e. tabletop supplementals, actual RPG rulebooks/scenarios, in-universe-inspired, “choose your own adventure”, etc), but never LitRPG itself. Should at least be a curious stroll… I’m not usually big on aliens so we’ll see. Running Man + Hitchhiker’s Guide (the later being my all-time favorite series) has me very interested.
I wouldn’t bother with DCC it seems like a weird rec to me. Litrpg is a new kind of genre fiction slop that’s emergent because video game literacy is at an all-time high but it just amounts to scenes with characters reading menus, achievement toasts, and their stats.
Ah, that’s kind of what I gathered it would be but wasn’t sure. I may still take a gander out of curiosity, but I’ve spent too many decades playing games as it is so I’m not sure I’d get much from reading about characters doing the same inane tasks. Barring some outstanding story that just uses it more as flavor/set-dressing, that is.
I wouldn’t call DCC cyberpunk.
But it is an entertaining read, and probably the best of what LitRPG has to offer, besides maybe He Fights With Monsters. If you like the genre will depend entirely on how cringy or not you find rpg mechanics in your stories.
To be fair, DCC is not cyberpunk. I’ve read … all of the hugo and nebula winners. Plus the top 100 sci fi books. Also every major sci fi major series from the masters (Dune, Foundation, Ringworld, Culture, Heechee, Hyperion… etc etc).
Yeah … a LOT of sci fi.
Now having said all of that. DCC is an amazing series … IF AND ONLY IF, you read it as intended as an extremely DARK traumatic post apocalyptic alien invasion series. Yeah it is lit-rpg, but those elements virtually get lost in the amazing storytelling and intricate plot. I’m talking Nabokov plot level here.
Unfortunately, a lot of people read DCC as a fun dungeon crawler book and seem to gloss over the true terror/horror the characters are going through.
So if you are looking for a fun/dark read, its 100% worth it as long as you read past the first level. (and its pretty easy to do so!)