3.25/5 stars! I loved the title and premise of the book and have enjoyed one of Django's other series, so I was excited to read this. Overall, I enjoyed it. I think my issue (and this is mostly on me), is that groundhog day type stories are really difficult to keep interesting since there is so much repetition. I do wish Davi was allowed to have a personality outside of "she's a FEMALE...see her? It's a GIRLLLLL." It felt like the author either wasn't familiar with writing female characters or didn't care enough to let her be fully formed as a character.

In this book we join Davi who is stuck in a timeloop, sick of being repeatedly killed and decides to become the Dark Lord to defend the kingdom from the current Dark Lord.

I really enjoyed this book and found myself laughing out loud several times. You have to feel for Davi and all the struggles and ridiculous situations she finds herself in. Didn't expect the little romance in it and I just loved the various creatures she comes across. Would definitely recommend.

This was a solid 4 star for most of the book but it's getting a 3 out of spite for that ending. I am sick to the back teeth with duologies, and this book is yet another example of how tighter pacing could keep it a single book but if you drag it out you get more money. The closer I got to the end the more obvious it became that there was no actual resolution coming and it was being dragged into a book two I hadn't signed up for.

Before I finished reading I wrote myself a note about my pet peeve: you need to pick a lane on whether Davi remembers her original life or not. Sometimes she's saying it all blurs together and Superman might be Darth Vader's father, but then she makes such specific pop culture references throughout, including about Star Wars, that that can't be true. I enjoy the references but sours a little when she insists she doesn't remember much because it's been so long. My suspension of disbelief will stretch to most things, but not muddling Vader and Superman while also making specific references to Brave New World.

This has now been superceded by the ending but it still stands. Davi's characterisation is wobbly in places like this, and favours jokes over development, which isn't necessarily a problem in a comedy but does drag a little when her main personality trait is horniness.

But the thing is, I still really enjoyed her, and the coterie of characters she gathered around her. There's a lot of fun and good chemistry in the group and it works really well. Both romances, if they can be called that, are fun, though for all the trope demolishing this book gleefully indulges in, the half baked love triangle is apparently impossible to dodge even when actively parodying the genre. Even so, the moment when the attack happened and Davi actually died broke me a little, genuinely horrified starting the next chapter, and the revelations that began to come out from there were so strong: the change of reversal, the realisation of how disposably she'd been treating people because everything was temporary until it wasn't: I wanted so much more of that, but it happened so late that there wasn't time.

I think I'm mostly disappointed with this book because I was enjoying it. There was a lot to enjoy, a lot of solid laughs, and an intriguing story that deserved more than 300 odd pages of walking and then a rushed set up for a second book. There's so much potential here and it could absolutely have developed into a series, but because this book spent so much time setting up for later it didn't do itself the justice it deserved.

*Thank you to the publisher and to Netgalley for providing me with a copy of this book in exchange for my honest review.*

Well that was a whole lot of fun! I love the idea of taking a chosen one trope and making them go “evil”.

Davi is a chosen one. Well into three digits of lives and four digits of living, she’s had enough. And frankly, I don’t blame her! Trying something different, instead of integrating into and then leading The Kingdom, she wades into the dubious world of Wilders to become the Dark Lord. Honestly, even at her worst she’s definitely on the campy Disney villain side of things, and that is brilliant. She’s definitely not evil even when she’s at her slightly more callous, and she’s always striving to be a good leader which I love.

The humour in this is silly but perfection. At points the pop culture throw away references did push me out the story a little, but they are still so funny. Very American though, so not all of them worked for me. Most did, but there were a couple I know I didn’t get.

Davi’s casual attitude to romance is understandable given her many lives (and deaths) and it’s nice to see her figure some of that out as the book progresses. It’s also a clever mix between fade to black and some spicy comments that are just enough to both make you laugh and make you feel the connections. As always with main characters (but possibly especially Davi), she would greatly benefit from classes in communication but who wouldn’t?!

Honestly great fun and I already can’t wait for book two! Thank you so much Orbit for sending me this 💙
4 stars.

Love Wexler's Thousand Names series. I have read it many times and consider it one of the best, but this one did nothing for me. I struggled along for a bit and then set it aside. I don't blame the author. Humour in fantasy for me is a head thing for an author to get right and this just didn't grab me.

As I've got older, I think I've started to appreciate villains much more than I did when I was younger (ha ha!) and this book was the perfect read for someone like me. Great fun throughout - very intrigued to hear there will be a sequel!

Django Wexler es un autor polifacético que lo mismo te escribe flintlock fantasy que ciencia ficción o se descuelga con How to Become Dark Lord and Die Trying una divertida historia que raya en el litRPG pero con una protagonista con las hormonas más desbocadas que un adicto a los poppers y un vocabulario más sucio que los establos de Augías antes de que pasara por allí Hércules.


Davi lleva años y años repitiendo en bucle una aventura en un mundo de fantasía en la que debería cumplir la profecía que la designa como la gran salvadora del mundo. Pero cada vez que muerte el ciclo comienza de nuevo y Davi está ya un poco harta magos grandilocuentes y sufrimiento extremo para no llegar a ningún sitio, en una suerte de Día de la Marmota eterno del que no sabe cómo salir. El libro comienza con una idea para escapar del bucle infinito: si no ha conseguido nada siendo de los buenos, ¿qué le impide probar a convertirse ella misma en el Señor Oscuro que todo lo destroza a su paso? Y esta es toda la idea en la que se base How to Become Dark Lord and Die Trying.

El libro aguanta su peso sobre todo basándose en el humor con el que está escrito y en la nada despreciable cantidad de energía sexual que desborda cada página. Me recordaba ese capítulo de los Simpsons en el que Moe se mete a actor y al final acaban desgranando todos los guiones de la serie “con erótico resultado”. Pues Davi, que tiene sus partes pudendas a temperatura de fusión nuclear, no desperdicia oportunidad alguna en liberar tensión de la forma más natural posible. Y no le importa que el contrario sea del mundo animal, vegetal o mineral, aquí no se hace ascos a nada.

La verdad es que la lectura, aunque entretenida y plagada de bromas y referencias a la cultura pop, se va haciendo pesada por tramos. Davi tiene que presentarse a las pruebas de Señor Oscuro y para eso necesita una horda, pues vamos a tirarnos capítulos y capítulos reclutando carne de cañón para su ejército (Deloitte approves!), aunque Davi tiene su corazoncito y tampoco quiere matar a la gente porque sí.

Lo que también brilla por su presencia son las disparatadas notas a pie de página, que sin llegar a ser un marchamo de la novela como consigue Jasper Fforde, sí que añaden cierta variabilidad que se agradece a la obra.

En definitiva, How to Become Dark Lord and Die Trying es entretenido aunque un poco repetitivo. Queda pendiente la lectura de la segunda parte en la que se desvelarán los misterios que envuelven la aventura de Davi, seguramente con erótico resultado.

A intriguing story about the chosen one being sick of their destiny and choosing to defy it by becoming the dark lord. Because evil always wins right ?

Davi is stuck in a time loop where while being the chosen one, she never wins, and has to do it all over again. So she’ll try to join the winning side this time.

This was a fun action packed journey that to be fair kind of hit me with a cliffhanger on the end, and the only downside for me is just me being a bit squeamish.

4.2 overall rating

How to Become the Dark Lord and Die Trying is... interesting to say the least. It has a somewhat unusual premise - Davi has spent the last one thousand years and 237 lives trying to prevent the Dark Horde from overrunning the Kingdom. In that time, she has been killed in multiple various ways and is sick to the back teeth of it. This time, life no. 238, is going to be different. This time she is going to become the Dark Lord!

A few things to note. First, there is a lot of graphic violence, with several references to self harm and portrayal of suicide. The first chapter includes depiction of torture. Chapter one includes Davi, rather vividly, killing the wizard Tserigern. This is NOT a book for everyone. There is a content warning at the beginning of the book, which I would suggest that people take seriously. Secondly, there are a LOT of references to sex and most of them are fairly crude. Most of the actual sex scenes are fade to black but there are still an actual bucket load of references throughout the text. If you prefer clean fantasy, this is not for you. At all.

The third thing is the pop references. The book is narrated in the first person and Davi talks in a very particular way. Not only is she obsessed with sex but she is constantly comparing things to earthly pop references in the early 21st Century. At this point, we know she is American but not really which time she is from. I got the feeling (and this might be utterly wrong) that she was taken from her timeline in the late 90's maybe but there are many references to things from 2010's and onwards. So I was a bit confused by that. Also, this constant patter can get a little bit annoying. Davi is a complex character; she has lived over 230 lives and has died brutally at the end of most of them. That will mess practically anyone up. Now she has decided to switch to the dark side, which is only surprising in that it took 1000 years to get there. I completely and utterly support this effort but I'm not sure (even after finishing the book) if I'm rooting for Davi or for the various side characters around her. I'm not sure if I *like* Davi at all. I mean. she's fine and I understand but I don't think I could spend a lot of time in her company. Which made finishing this a bit tricky. I did and I'm glad but there was a bit of a struggle.

The book itself is a sort of GrimDark comedy, if there can ever be such a thing! But although there are incidences of a brutal nature, there are some genuinely witty moments as well. I wouldn't say it had me rolling about laughing but there were definite smiles to be had. The plot got me invested fairly early, which meant I was finishing it no matter what. The rest of the characters are interesting and varied, with lots of "don't judge a book by it's cover" thrown in. I loved the variety we see in the Wilders and this is complemented by some great worldbuilding.

I liked "How to become the Dark Lord..." but I didn't love it. I think that the plot is very smart and kept me rolling with the punches. There is a mystery there that I need to know the answer to. Some people will find the sex and violence a bit (very) too much and should take heed of that content warning. My main issue was Davi which, as the main character, did cause me some issues. It took me longer to get through it for this reason but that plot got me over the line. And that mystery along means that I will be reading this second part of this duology "Everyone Wants to Rule the World Except Me".

This was a really fun read! It reads like a computer game, with lots of references to pick up on. I really enjoyed the main character and her no-sh*ts-given attitude. It was just my type of humour and the footnotes were brilliant. I love a good footnote and these ones were used really well, especially the footnote within a footnote action! I would say, if pressed for a negative, that it's not got a lot of emotional depth to it, but it's not really what it's about. If you want an action packed, fun adventure read, with a heroine who's about had enough of all this nonsense she's being subjected to, then look no further! As soon as I finished it I wished I had the next one to read and I will definitely pick it up when it comes out. Definitely recommend!

How to Become the Dark Lord and Die Trying by Django Wexler is certainly a book that tries hard - whether it dies in the trying or not is going to be purely subjective. Humour in a book is hard to pull off, and this foul mouthed, promiscuous and pop-culture referencing woman trapped in a time loop in a fantasy world has a narrative voice that will almost certainly be grating to many if the humour doesn't pay off. As Davi has tired of her supposed calling to save the Kingdom of humans and defeat the Dark Lord and their wildling minions (apparently who the Dark Lord is can change from cycle to cycle) after dying and being reborn at the same moment again and again for a thousand years, she decides to try something new and become the Dark Lord herself, which is easier said than done. A lot of the story is about Davi building up her forces and allies as they travel to the conclave, and in this it feels a lot like a litrpg without the stats - she even gets upgrades as she absorbs the various types of gemstones that the magic in this realm comes from.

For me, I was mixed on the humour, but the story has a good amount of momentum to it that kept me going, and the fantasy world was just enough different from the usual Tolkein clones to be interesting. As you might expect, it also spends a bit of time parodying those sorts of worlds and storylines, although it rarely goes deeper than the usual 'what if the humans were also bad' kind of shtick. If the idea of a Deadpool-esq character wisecracking her way through brutal deaths in a Tolkein-esq world as she builds an army of orcs and various other less usual minions, then I think it's worth a try.

How to Become the Dark Lord and Die Trying was hilarious from start to finish. The main character Davi is fabulous as are all the side characters. The world was imaginative and the references to modern culture done in a non-cringey manner (no mean feat). A great adventure and I didn’t stop laughing. Would definitely recommend for fans of Skullduggery Pleasant.

While this book can be considered as instructions , I wouldn’t recommend following it as one - she really isn’t joking about the die trying.

Absolutely dripping in acerbic sarcasm and wit, this book is both light hearted and very grimdark. I did feel at times that it was trying to convince me that it was a really tough adult book by using all the bad words and scenes. There are some great jokes and the character development is a treat once it starts. This is a fantasy world where the chosen one has been ripped from our world to save theirs. Only she’s tried doing what’s expected and now she’s pissed. My only issue is how much you can see a man wrote her, especially how sex is treated. Woman can be sex obsessed, but this just read like a man.

The beginning it didn’t quite meet the expectations I had from the awesome title. But the storyline itself definitely improves and I am very interested to see where book two goes !

Firstly, this isn’t one for the faint-hearted. The book starts off with some grisly torture scenes with a lot of swearing. While there is nothing too graphic and it’s all delivered in a spritely tone – it took me a couple of goes to get into this one. However, as the book wore on and Davi became increasingly caught up and invested in her adventure – I grew to like her a whole lot more. The bawdy, rollicking tone continues throughout the book, with Davi discussing her sexual urges in amongst all the adventuring, double-crosses, battles and scheming. Though I’m very relieved to report that Wexler keeps the sexual content to the occasional hot kiss.

As for the storyline – overall, I thoroughly enjoyed it. Davi’s decision to switch sides and become the Dark Lord, instead of the plucky Chosen One makes entire sense – given that her attempt to hold back the hordes always ends in failure. She dies in a variety of gory ways, only to find herself once again back at the start of the adventure where the wizard is busy telling her how she is The Kingdom’s best, last hope and she has a Glorious Destiny ahead of her… As you’ve no doubt already picked up, Wexler is playing with a number of well-established tropes within epic fantasy and Lit RPG adventures. As with all the best parodies, that doesn’t prevent the plot from being nicely twisty, if also cosily familiar.

As for Davi, it took me a while to warm up to her character. But as she gets increasingly invested in her ragtag army of non-humans, I liked her courage, ingenuity and strong loyalty to her followers. I ended up reading far later into the night than I’d planned to discover what happens next. And Wexler drops a bit of a bombshell right at the end of this one, so I’m very keen to also get hold of the next book to discover what happens next. While I obtained an arc of How To Become a Dark Lord and Die Trying from the publishers via Netgalley, the opinions I have expressed are unbiased and my own.
8/10

How To Become The Dark Lord And Die Trying is, as its title suggests, a not altogether serious take on fantasy tropes. It wears its influences on its sleeve, and its fundamental plot is literally that of a computer game (albeit one from perhaps the 80's when you couldn't save). Our hero Davi has somewhere in her life been transported to a fantasy world, and woke up in a cave being hailed slowly as the hero to save them from the rise of the Dark Lord. And every time she fails, and she has failed a lot, she end up back at the beginning, learning from her mystakes, but clearly not enough to succeed. So this time, which at her guess is about the 600th life she has led, she decides to mix it up and go straight to becoming the Dark Lord herself.

Its a fun take on some of the fundamental issues in the time loop / Groundhog Day scenario. The urge to be heroic seems to be there fromt he set up, but is conflict really the answer. And are Dark Lords really all that bad? Its just a title after all, and anyone positioning themselves into a position of responsibility will inevitably hurty some feelings on the way up. Wexler clearly wants to have their cake and eat it here, and so does their best to make sure that Davi is never really all that evil on the rise, the worst she does is confuse a few sexual partners and lead a bunch of idiots who would have died without her, into a different death. And whilst the book happily comments on the fantasy tropes it is playing with (and Davi does get quite fighty in the footnotes*) it does eventually settle down into its quest and strategy scenario. It even ends with something resembling one of those interminable YA four day tournaments of worthiness, and doesn't really comment enough on that particular trope. But it is fun without being too cute, and because its perspective is aligned against the normal in fantasy, its quite a refeshing read.


*Yes, its that kind of comic novel.

DNF at 50%

I tried so hard with this one... I really did. The premise sounded great - someone stuck in a time loop gets tired of it and decides to flip the script and go their own way. And I often enjoy funny fantasy (Terry Pratchett is one of my favourite authors - no, I didn't mind the footnotes other reviews complain about but I have yet to find someone who can do them as well as Pratchett). But the way these were put together just didn't work for me, although I know it will for others.

My main problem was the main character. It was told from a first person perspective and I just couldn't stand her. She feels like a combination of an edgy teen and the stereotype of a horny cartoon character. And... yeah. That's not really my style. Apparently maturity doesn't come with spending a thousand years (give or take a few hundred) in a time loop. Take out the more graphic sex jokes and maybe tone down some of the violence and you have a lovely YA book. Maybe even MG if you tone it down enough. The actual writing style (minus the more adult contents/edginess) makes me think of something like Fergus Crane by Paul Stewart (which I loved as a kid!). I think the humour working for you is a massive, massive., massive part of if this book will work for you or not. I could see where the jokes were meant to be, but they weren't funny to me. Granted, there were one or two that made me smile, but overall they were more annoying than funny or enjoyable. I also found the constant references to Earth jarring. Especially as she supposedly doesn't remember much of her time there anymore?

I'd strongly suggest reading a sample if possible before going in so you can see if the writing style works for you. If it does, I think you'll have a great time. If it doesn't... Well it doesn't get any better. I think I would have loved this had it been written differently. But to each their own and I hope others have the fun time the author was aiming for!

I've never read a book quite like this. It took a while to get into it, but I'm so glad I pushed through! The irreverent tone was hilarious and engaging, and while there are lots of questions left unanswered, I'm very much looking forward to reading the second book in the duology. I have high expectations!

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing my ARC in exchange for an honest review.

This book was a bawdy brawl from start to finish that had me laughing out loud and the D&D player in me delighted in all the little references to the game that were sprinkled throughout this. It had everything that makes a D&D game (or at least my D&D games): Magic, Sex, Mystery, Twists, Gore and a range of various different races and species of humanoids and creatures alike. I enjoyed the light hearted tone of this and thought that this would be a great read for fans of books like Can't Spell Treason Without Tea, Til Death Do Us Bard and Legends & Lattes (although it isn’t cosy in the sense they are). This felt quite unique compared to anything currently released that I've read and I enjoyed the use of footnotes which is a quirky little technique that can really help to bring a character and their voice alive if done well- this was a great example of that because I felt like they added to the narrative and characterisation of the main character, rather than being done for the sake of it. Although this was a fairly easy read I did find the chapters seems quite long but this is most likely just my personal preference. I will say this did give off very similar vibes to Long Live Evil which is out later this year by the same publisher and has a similar premise so if you enjoy this you will most likely enjoy that and vice versa.

The characters in this book were memorable and likeable (unless you were meant to dislike them, then they were easy to dislike) the world was built well with interesting inhabitants and magic systems ( although it was basically a standard D&D or Witcher esque fantasy setting) and although I didn't realise this was book one of two going into it I'm really looking forward to seeing what happens in the second book- I'll definitely be giving it a read.

Unfortunately, to me this is a DFN.

I tried to push me into reading this book as far as I could get, because at first I thought that I had some difficulties with it due to a reading slump. Although, I realized that I simply didn’t like HTBTDLADT. From what I’ve read (38% circa), I couldn’t really emphatize with the MC. Davi is an interesting character, but I found her oversexualised. In general, she gave me the vibe of a female MC written by a man (which, alas, she is).

I still think that the plot of the book potential, and yet I can’t get myself to finish it. I’ve lost interest in reading also because I didn’t quite enjoy the writing style. It felt too casual and chaotic. I didn’t mind the gore, still I would have preferred it if it was more measured.

I also had some issues with the queer representation (especially with the bi rep of the MC). I’m still trying to figure out what gave me the ick, but whatever it is it’s annoying.

I was send an ARC from the publishing house via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

This was the first book I picked up by Django Wexler. Oh my lord, it was hilarious! I’m not usually a fan of footnotes, but these were killing me off.

In this book, we follow Davi who is stuck in a never ending cycle of dying and waking up in the same pond. Doomed to repeat the same moment ever single time, and she has had enough. In order to break the cycle, she decides to try and become the Dark Lord.

It’s kinda high fantasy, with a sprinkle of urban references, but it makes sense.

I gotta pick up more Django Wexler books now!