Have you ever looked at a bratwurst and felt a deep, primal fear regarding the nature of your own existence? No? Well, neither had I until I decided to ignore my thesis for three straight days to listen to this absolute fever dream of a book.
I picked this up because the title felt relatable—John Dies at the End—which is exactly how I feel about my grad school trajectory right now. I expected a goofy, stoner comedy. Maybe something light to play while I grinded XP in my latest RPG obsession. What I got instead was... well, let's just say I stopped coding. I stopped grinding. I just sat there, staring at my second monitor, wondering if the soy sauce in my fridge was watching me.
The DM Is Drunk (And It's Glorious)
Look, I usually preach the gospel of Hard Magic systems. I want rules. I want consistency. I want Sanderson-level mechanics where A leads to B. This book? This book takes those rules, sets them on fire, and then summons a meat-monster from the ashes.
It feels exactly like a D&D campaign where the Dungeon Master has completely lost control of the party but keeps rolling with it anyway. The logic is dream-logic. One minute you're fighting a monster made of frozen meat products, the next you're dealing with interdimensional shadow people. It's chaotic. It's disjointed. And honestly? It works. Once and Future Witches has that same kind of controlled chaos, though it trades meat monsters for spell-slinging sisters.
The pacing is frantic—like, "trying to finish a project the night before it's due" frantic. If you're the type of listener who needs a linear plot where every Chekhov's Gun goes off exactly when expected, you're gonna hate this. (My mom would despise it. Sorry, Mom.) But if you like the idea of a universe that is hostile, absurd, and fundamentally broken, you're home.
Stephen Thorne: The King of "I'm Too Tired For This"
Okay, let's talk about the voice in my ear. I admit, I'm a Steven Pacey stan (Logen Ninefingers forever), so I'm picky. I couldn't find a ton of background on Stephen Thorne before diving in, but—wow.
He nails the specific tone of "David," the narrator. It's this perfect blend of terrified and exhausted. The voice of a guy who has seen the apocalypse and is just... annoyed by it. He delivers lines about unspeakable horrors with this dry, sarcastic wit that actually made me laugh out loud on the MARTA train. (Got some weird looks. Worth it.)
His character voices are a bit caricature-heavy—John sounds exactly like the kind of chaotic-neutral friend who would get you killed—but it fits the satire. The book is absurd, so the voices should be absurd. If he played it straight, the whole thing would collapse.
Roll Initiative or Walk Away
Queue this up if: You love cosmic horror that doesn't take itself seriously, you've ever described something as "chaotic good," or you want a book that feels like a late-night Wikipedia rabbit hole about cryptids—but funnier and way more unsettling.
Skip it if: You need tight plotting, hate randomness-for-randomness-sake humor, or get frustrated when stories refuse to explain their own rules.
Saving My Progress Here
Is it perfect? No. The middle drags a bit, and sometimes the "randomness" feels a little forced, like a teenager trying too hard to be edgy. But the highs are incredibly high. It's genuinely creepy in parts—like, check-behind-the-shower-curtain creepy—and then immediately hilarious.
I listened to this instead of fixing the procedural generation bug in my code, and honestly? No regrets. It's a wild ride. Just... maybe don't listen to it while eating sausage. Trust me on that one.
