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Turns out, books take a long time to make. Sometimes longer than a writer has available to them. And that is fine, because we’re not necessarily owed an ending to our favorite series. Many fans expect writers to tell someone – anyone – how their current series ends, just in case the worst should happen. However, Matt Dinniman hasn’t told anyone how Dungeon Crawler Carl ends, and he (rightly) thinks that is everyone else’s problem.

During a recent interview, which included assuring fans that the Dungeon Crawler Carl TV show is still happening, Matt Dinniman was asked if he had told anyone how the books will end. Book 8 is out in May 2026, with a further two books planned before the series is finished. Dinniman admitted that he knew how Carl and Donut’s story would end, but he hadn’t told anyone.

What happens if something happened to him and he wasn’t able to finish the last two books? “That is your problem,” Dinniman said before adding, “Maybe you could get Brandon Sanderson to write it?”

That last quip is clearly a joke about the fact that Sanderson finished Robert Jordon’s Wheel of Time series following the author’s death and has long been tapped as a potential writer to finish A Song of Ice and Fire should George R. R. Martin succumb to the ravages of time. While Brandon Sanderson is an accomplished and prolific author, it is hard to see his epic narrative style fitting with a series about a man and his talking cat on an intergalactic gameshow/deathmatch.

Best just hope Matt Dinniman finishes Dungeon Crawler Carl on his own, really.

Just like yourself, the Popverse staff spends a whole lot of time with our respective noses in respective books. It's why we've come up with stuff like:

• The hottest upcoming fiction
• Queer romance to add to your reading list
• A genre fiction literary column called If It Bleeds, We Read

...and a whole lot more. Join our metaphorical library, won't you? There are no late fees and you can be as loud as you want, so long as the people you live with are OK with it.