We’re seven books into The Wandering Inn series at this point. There’s been highs and lows (emotionally, the quality of the writing has remained fairly high), characters have come and gone. There’s been jokes, horror and sorrow. And one thing I can say without exaggeration.

This book is the best so far.

It just doesn’t let up. Every single chapter is readable and rereadable, there are no low points or bits you might want to skip on a second readthrough. It is everything good about the previous books turned up to 11 and it never lets up.

The last book ended with General Zel Shivertail getting jumped by the Necromancer in the middle of a battle and going down hard. And that’s a big deal that this book does not skate over. But it’s not the first big death that Erin has faced and though her heart still bleeds it has hardened. The world and the story, after a brief pause, goes on.

Once again I’m awed by the sheer variety of moods this series is able to evoke. Most of the time it’s fairly light-hearted, full of jokes and whimsy. Menacing characters get lost, fights are stopped with the tactical throw of a cake and people can be silly. But then something dramatic happens, there’s an attack and everyone’s fighting for their lives and it’s all really tense. Because the work has been put in, we’ve lost major characters before and we might lose more. And at times, usually when people start exploring a dungeon, the story turns into a horror.

I really like the horror aspect of dungeon delving. A lot of LitRPG’s treat it as just part of the adventure and occasionally a kind of contrived part. But Wandering Inn treats them properly. They are places of great treasure, yes, but also of great danger, with unspeakable monsters and traps lurking around every corner. I still go back and read the encounter with Skinner in the first book and it still evokes the same sense of fear in it. It’s all so fantastically written.

Finally there’s another battle in this book and I just love the way that it’s written. The build up to it, the fight itself, seeing the perspectives of so many different people, including in a [Message] conversation, and then the reactions to everything afterwards. It’s so good and I’ve read that bit separately from everything else over and over again.

And this book is only the first third of Volume Five! If anything it’s just a set up and things get real in the next book. And it just keeps getting better!