Minecraft Woodsword Chronicles – Dungeon Crawl

Nick Eliopulos's Minecraft Woodsword Chronicles Dungeon Crawl is a gaming adventure for 7 year olds about five friends digging straight down into the scariest dungeon they've ever found.

What happens

Po, Morgan, Ash, Harper and Jodi share a secret. Their science teacher's VR headsets don't just play Minecraft. They drop the friends right inside it, blocky bodies and all.

This is the fifth Woodsword Chronicles book, and the team is finally going after the Evoker King. He's a computer program loose in the game, and he's very good at breaking its rules. (He even talks to them through their scarecrow before setting it on fire. Poor Scarecrow Joe!)

So they each pick a fantasy role, wizard, knight, ranger, rogue and alchemist, and head underground. There are spider riders, a floor that drops away and a whole sea of lava. Is there anything better than watching Jodi turn that lava into a cobblestone path with one swing of a pickaxe?

Minecraft fans will love spotting the real game tricks. Sea pickles for light. Water poured on lava. A block that fires fireballs standing in for a wizard's spell. But you don't need to know the game at all, because the friends explain everything as they go.

The chapters swap back and forth with real life at Woodsword Middle School, where everyone's getting ready for the school play. Morgan badly wants an acting part and is super nervous about it. Po plays wheelchair basketball and wants a part too, but he ends up running the lights. He's lovely about it. You can still tell it stings.

That mix is what makes it work. The dungeon is exciting, but the little worries about friends and trying something new feel very real. Po's trick for nerves (imagine everyone dressed as a chicken) might even come in handy!

The very first page warns that things won't go their way this time, so there's proper tension from the start.

What to read next

If your reader loves the idea of getting sucked inside a game, try Tom Nicoll's Level Up next. Flo borrows her mum's unfinished invention and ends up on a moon inside her favourite video game, with her best friend Max and a lot of laser fire.