It's All Fun And Games by Dave Barrett
Allison is your typical every day teenager and one day agrees to accompany her best friend, TJ, to a weekend of LARP. It’s not her normal idea of fun but it’s something to do and THE boy at high school is going to be there. Upon meeting her fellow questers and learning some rules (don’t hit people in the upstairs or downstairs) and choosing her character class sets out with the rest of her group as a healer looking to just embrace the experience for what it is. However a fatal encounter, the manifestation of some incredible powers and the unfolding of a genuine quest make this a weekend that is anything but ordinary.
TJ is a wizard and casts spells, though his beanbags are soon replaced by fire and lighting coming out his palms, Jimmy is the beserker beast whose eight foot long pvc pipe becomes a long sword of mythical proportions and properties, Simon is the being from an alien race, Stu is the scout and archer and finds himself with special arrows and camouflage and Chucky is the thief.
One of the most interesting elements of the book was the merging of characters and the conflicts this created. As time passes with them in their fantasy form the memories of their own backstory start to become their own. The beserker in Jimmy wants to charge into battle despite the boy knowing that his friends will need him, Allison finds her status as a mystical healer with a magical artifact lends her a regency and diplomacy she never knew she had, but perhaps most intriguing is Chucky. He is the thief with a very dark backstory involving assassination and torture and has devoted every earned skill point to detecting traps, finding treasure and picking him locks but left his offence and defence almost untouched. He finds his nature and choices constantly judged by the others as his unwillingness to throw himself head first into a fight is at odds with the rest of the group’s style of play which gives him a little bit more depth in a novel that is otherwise fairly light on characterisation. We spend a bit of solo time with Chucky which I was hoping for but his scenes don’t really compare if you are using characters like Jimmy the Hand of Locke Lamora for comparison, which if you’ve read them you cannot help but do.
The title really does describe this book well and I received it and read it within 24 hours which is something I don't normally do. It is a short light-hearted romp that enjoys itself and never takes itself too seriously. It’s all Fun and Games will appeal to D&D players, fantasy readers and fans of writers like Ernie Cline. The quests has only really just begun and it's good effort for a first book and particularly one that younger fantasy readers will enjoy.
I was sent a copy of this book by the publisher and it in no way shaped my review of the book.
