Lured by Dragons

The Elfish Gene: Dungeons, Dragons, and Growing Up Strange, by Mark Barrocliffe

I did not grow up in England, rather here in Maple Valley, but I did meet my English husband at a Dungeons and Dragons party, and I feel a strong connection to this book on a few levels.  I'm an anglophile and a geek and rather proud of it now, although it caused pain earlier in life when I didn't fit in, so I can vividly relate to this biography of another fantasy misfit.

Growing up in England, Mark Barrocliffe was smitten at the age of twelve by the allure of the new fantasy role-playing game, Dungeons and Dragons, a game in which you can create the character of your dreams and destroy the enemies of your nightmares, but almost assures you'll never get a date.  The enthusiastic boy immersed himself in the worlds of elves and orcs, wizards and warriors, of magic light and dark; of gaming sessions that would last anywhere from hours to days and where the final goals were to kill the Goblin King, save the fair maiden, and loot an amazing Frost Wand, to be used in the next game.  Barrowcliffe speaks with uncompromising clarity of the choices he made as a teen and why, of the odd, lonely, and equally strange young men he met through gaming (very few girls play), and the effect such a youth had on later life and his relationships.  The game consumed him to the point it drove his parents to distraction, drove some real friends away, and surrounded Barrowcliffe with other slightly broken people with the same goals; occasionally cruel boys who'd sit in a damp basement for hours eating junk food and rolling twelve sided dice, rather than going on a beach holiday with friends.  If you've lived the nerdy life of fantasy role-playing before it was popular, have been in situations where you haven't fit in but long to, or are just curious about that crazy D & D you've always heard about, this book will lure you into one young man's world of obsession and adventure, and what some might call his subsequent escape.