Gunboat

A LitRPG Adventure (Gunboat, Book 1)

By: Dean Henegar

Narrated by: Alex Perone, Marissa Parness

Coast Guard Captain Jesse Watkins is killed in action.

Instead of moving on to the afterlife, Watkins wakes up as something different. He has been reborn as the core of a war-ravaged starship and must work to repair his vessel if he wants to find his way home.

Threats to his new existence abound, both in the darkness of space, and lurking aboard the ruined hulk of the ship he now commands. Despite the danger, Captain Watkins has a lifetime of naval service experience to call upon. With the help of his system adjunct, they must rebuild and prepare their vessel for the battles to come.

Captain Watkins must become something more than he was before. He must become a vessel powerful enough to survive the journey home.

©2025 Dean Henegar (P)2025 Royal Guard Publishing LLC

Nice take on LitRPG / Dungeon core

refreshing take on a saturated concept. Good balance of LitRPG/system and story elements. Liked the sci-fi setting. Good pacing and engaging characters. Excellent narrators, really helped the immersion. worth a credit

Characters

Great story love the Coast Guard twist. Great to see some respect for that branch.

A fun return!

I was really glad to see Dean return to the Derelict universe, and switching to two narrators was a good idea. I’m interested to see where the story goes, since this book seems to take place some time after the original series.

Wow was that good!

I really seriously enjoyed this book for it brings forth creativity and realism of the way that ships are maintained and staffed and fought

If you play EVE online then this is a book for you.

It's an interesting concept with a base of time involved skill progression as well as skill point investment from task completion, it drives the similarities to EVE online as the longer you play the more your skills progress, and always having to balance what you want to train next.

The characters are engaging, and for fantasy based readers (or listeners) there is a bit of DnD referencing in creature names that protagonist encounters.

I am not sure if accuracy of ship building is comparable to real ships but I have always struggled to visualize how a ship is laid out. I don't count this as a fault but for me to picture how the ship is built I have to stop and kind of draw it out, or just submit to a vague idea in my own mind of how things are laid out.

overall I think it's a fantastic book and anyone interest in the litrpg series I highly recommend.