Butler to the Dark Lord: A Grim Choices Gamebook by Sam Bowring

Butler to the Dark Lord: A Grim Choices Gamebook Reviews

• 
  Shaheen

  4.5/5
  
  Remember the Goosebumps Choose-Your-Own-Adventure books? You'd read them and at the end of every chapter you had to make choices: to go inside the creepy dark tunnel or not, to investigate the noise coming from downstairs or not, to split up from your best-friend to cover more ground at the haunted carnival. Each choice changed the story slightly and there were two or three different endings to the book, depending on the choices you made.
  
  Sam Bowring has written a book in a similar format for ADULTS, and I think it's superb!
  
  Butler to the Dark Lord is about YOU. You are the butler and chief man-servant to Malacandros, a Dark Lord who enjoys fine dining and killing things. You have to navigate your way through a very important week in the Dark Lord's service - you must prepare the castle to receive visitors and make sure that the Stygias ceremony goes off without a hitch, while making sure the stables are clean, that dinner is served on time, and that your Master isn't embarrassed in front of his relatives and rivals.
  
  The first time I read this book I read it while trying to choose the 'good' options. I always picked the most diplomatic or understanding options, which was fun, but I totally missed A Large Chunk of the Plot, and had to start again!
  
  The second time I read it I tried to do the opposite: I picked the options I thought were the worst, and still ended up in hot water in the end.
  
  It was only on my third read that I discovered the SPOILER-FILLED THING, and then it took me a fourth read to actually thwart it.
  
  There are nine different endings to this book, and whole plot-lines hinge on whether the stables are clean or what you decide will be served for dinner. I think it's amazing that Bowring has taken this form of story-telling and used it to tell a fantasy story to an adult audience.
  
  Although this Choose-Your-Own-Adventure stuff is familiar to me because I first saw it in a children's book, Butler to the Dark Lord is definitely not for kids! There are ribald jokes and double entendres through-out, and some of the options available to readers are decidedly not child-friendly. Malacandros is also a terrifying boss (but sometimes he's really nice!), and the atmosphere of the book is danger-filled and darkly humorous.
  
  I loved reading this story and think the idea is executed brilliantly. Bowring's work as a comedian certainly shines through, and I think this story will be enjoyed by audiences who are willing to give this kind of story-telling a try. Like all of Bowring's other works, there isn't much out there like this!
  
  A copy of this book was provided by the author for review.
  You can read more of my reviews at
  Speculating on SpecFic.
• 
  David Caldwell

  As the butler to the evil overlord, you have to make decisions on how to run the castle and avoid getting fireballed by your master.
  
  This is like those choose your own adventure (CYOA) books that were popular a few years ago (and probably still are with kids). But this one is geared towards a slightly older audience (adults who still think like kids at times). It is filled with slightly dark humor.
  
  There are a few upgrades to those old CYOA books. Since it is on the kindle, there is none of that turn to page this or that. You just tap and go. Depending on previous choices, you may get a different list of choices when you read through the story again. Since you are evil, you don't always have to pick the nice choice to succeed.
  
  I have already read through the story multiple times with several different endings, everything from being burned to death for making the overlord angry to getting a raise for foiling a scheme to kill the overlord (and killing the schemers to boot).
  
  My only minor complaint is that you can't backtrack very easily. This can prove annoying when you have read most of the story only to end up making a bad choice and then having to start over. This means you read certain sections several times. Of course, you can always bookmark the choice pages.
  
  While I get that you are playing an evil character, some of the choices go a little too far to be funny.
  
  This should appeal to fans of humorous fantasies and those that look back fondly on the CYOA books.
• 
  M. C.

  The pressures of butlering on the eve of your Dark Lord's big virgin sacrifice ceremony make a perfect setting for a gamebook: there are plenty of side-paths to go down, plots to foil (or assist), useful information to overhear and ferret out, and opportunities for insta-death at the hands of your fireball-loving master, not to mention dinners to serve and a dark household to manage.
  
  The Dark God appreciates cheating to some extent, but tracking your stats (in the form of bits of information you've gleaned or tasks you've accomplished) can get confusing the tenth time through the story, especially if you start skimming or imbibing too much down in the wine cellar. But the tale remains very re-readable and highly entertaining no matter how often and foolishly you die.
• 
  Nick Nielsen

  Thoroughly entertaining. This is a choose-your-own-adventure book; the title explains it all - you try to do a good job for your boss, the Dark Lord, without him killing you. Very quick to finish, although there are 300k words behind this. There are several branches in the plot, though, so I'd say there are probably 50k words for a given read. Lots of re-read value if you make different choices.
  
  I read this on my kindle and it worked great for automatically flipping to parts of the book based on choices I made.
• 
  Mjhancock

  The Dark Lord is having everyone over to a dinner party, and as his foremost butler, you are tasked with keeping everything going according to plan, with as few unscheduled assassinations as possible. A lot of Choose your own adventure books go for a relatively neutral, black slate character to increase the sense that you're inhabiting your character; by picking a fairly evil alignment, Butler to the Dark Lord bypasses that, though you're relatively to free to pursue the particular approach you'd like. To counter the dark subject matter, the book takes a very comic tone, with a sort of gallows humour to its violence and a castle full of violent, eccentric characters. It also does surprisingly sophisticated things with its choice system; how you handle early choices assigns you a demeanour. If you make diplomatic choices, that makes you a more even keeled character, and opens later diplomatic oriented options. I've seen "state" elements in CYOA before, but Bowring's approach is very elegant. As such, there are a few different paths to be taken, and alternate outcomes. Fun, reasonably well-constructed CYOA title. (Maybe a little too violent, and a little too risque (in the virgin sacrifice section) for younger readers)