Stray Cat Strut 5: A Cyberpunk LitRPG

Stray Cat Strut, Book 5

By: RavensDagger

Narrated by: Hollie Jackson, Pavi Proczko

Cyborg samurai Cat LeBlanc takes charge when aliens overrun a city—only to discover humans may be the greater threat—in this cyberpunk adventure.

A small city mostly populated by well-to-do retirees, Burlington, Vermont, is now home to the Antithesis. The alien flora has taken root underground and throughout the surrounding woodlands, giving birth to monstrous beings driven by instinct to consume Earth's own living creatures. With only three rookie samurai to protect them and resources dwindling fast, the people of Burlington are facing extinction.

Cat LeBlanc's success against the Antithesis in the megacity of New Montreal has raised her profile amongst the samurai. And despite her antiauthoritarian attitude and appetite for destruction in combat, she's been assigned to assume command of Burlington's defenses. Against her better judgment—and though it means taking time away from her girlfriend, Lucy, and their adopted gang of children, "the kittens"—Cat accepts the mission.

Accompanied by pyrotechnic nun Gomorrah, Cat finds Burlington's downtown is indeed struggling to survive, but the privileged residents of River Heights thrive behind the protection of their privately funded militia. Worse, the undisciplined trio of samurai-in-training she's supposed to lead are variously arrogant, rebellious, and insecure. Now, Cat must forge a fighting force out of them while playing politics with the city's wealthiest power brokers.

Unfortunately, their enemy doesn't also suffer from political and personal conflicts. The Antithesis is of one mind, a hive determined to spread their contagion across Earth. And if Cat can't rally the samurai, soldiers, and citizens of Burlington to work together, the fall of the city may foretell humanity's eventual fate . . .

The fifth volume of the hit LitRPG sci-fi series—with more than nine million views on Royal Road—now available on Audible and wherever ebooks are sold!

©2023 RavensDagger (P)2023 Podium Audio

love

these books are great. Can't wait for more. moves at good speed and holds attention

good book, some holes, but different take on genre

I love the characters, though Cat's character development is very slow in the intellectual/self actualization departments. The interaction between characters is great. And I love the budding relationship with Gom and Franny. What I find appaling, is Cat’s lack of willingness to spend points, and her hate of self improvement. We are told multiple times in the first several books about how the Samari self-improve, or become less human d/t the self-improvements they can buy. But they can then protect themselves and humanity better because of it. Cat has gotten so many civilians killed due to her lack of skill or equipment. So many times things could have gone pear shaped because she was unwilling to buy the equipment she needed, and she was only protected by plot armor. For example, in the middle of the book, when she’s protecting Burlingham, she has like 90k points, what does she do with them? Outfit a bunch of civilians WASTING over ½ her points on useless SHIT. If she’d simply used her tokes to buy the next category of the sun catalog to level 3, she could have gotten a MUCH better ship that the one she bought in book 7, and a MUCH MUCH better mech or sets of them, and DEALT with the whole problem on her on, like DiasX. And would have been setup to do a better job in book 6 and 7 where she is STRUGGLING to make points. She literally made more points in one book than she’s made in all the other combined and WASTED them. To me it’s just sad. It’s like the writer think’s she’s Stupid and writes her as so, with no common sense at times. I mean she’s off the street/orphan. She should have a lot of street smarts. Her freaking alien AI badgers her all the time to buy better equipment, but when it really matters, He lets her waste her points without bringing up MUCH better suggestions on how to use these points. I just find the entire situation appalling. By the end of the 7th book, she’s using much worse mecha, and a MUCH worse mecha carrier than she could have had, so she’ll have to WASTE even more points in the future getting a better one. So sad ☹

Good

I like that the fifth book of this series is not just an ever increasing escalation of difficulty. The challenge is difficult, but it is proportional to the characters growth from the last book and more just a different type of problem than straight escalation.

it's a fun story

I enjoy the humor and excitement throughout the series. The comedic jobs at current society is good stuff

Entertaining, funny, lots of action

I do appreciate a strong main character that is witty, caring, and a bit odd. I have enjoyed this series and can’t wait for book 6 to hit audible.