Friday 1 March 2013

Critical Failures by Robert Bevan

Critical Failures is an interesting blend of a novel. The story starts with a group of lads Tim, Cooper, Julian and Dave awaiting the arrival of a new Games Master for their weekly game of Caverns and Creatures, a Dungeons and Dragons style role playing game. As you might expect the author takes every opportunity to poke fun at the stereotype gamer, nerds with absolutely no prospect of ever finding a girlfriend. When the Games Master finally arrives, wearing a cape, they all take the opportunity to have some fun at his expense. Matters go from bad to worse and our "heroes" find themselves magically transported to the Games World with the GM having full control over this environment.

Bevan neatly combines the fantasy and comedy genres with quite a lot of action for the characters but with them of course fully aware of their game characters strengths and weaknesses. The strength of this novel lies in the humour. I found myself laughing out loud a lot but also rooting for our hapless heroes. Fantasy and RPG fans will get the jokes and find this funny. Anyone who is partial to slapstick humour will enjoy this also I'd imagine. It's not a high brow book and the humour isn't subtle but we all need a laugh sometimes and Critical Failures does this effortlessly.

Genre: Fantasy / Humour
Format: Paperback & E-Book
Rating: 5/5


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