The Prince Has No Pants

What makes it funny?

In the opening prologue, a newly elected space-elf ruler imagines complaining that a star's color looks wrong and ordering engineers to replace it. He mostly wants to torment a rival. His election took a thousand years, followed by a victory party that lasted five.

The comedy at work

The galactic scale gives petty behavior enormous room to spread. Aldus Divine expects supreme power to mean uninterrupted pleasure and opportunities to humiliate people. The narrator pauses his grand entrance to check on Ben, who is deciding whether to take science-fiction books to Hawaii.

Try this if…

The story spends time on space-elf politics before settling into Ben's adventures and his friendship with the shark Short Bus. Dungeon fighting and character progression take a larger role later. It suits readers who enjoy elaborate comic detours and unusual companions alongside game rules.

Good to know

The prologue includes profanity, sexual and drug references, torture and suicide references. A painful character-creation scene also makes room for emotional material.