I can almost smell the pollen from here...

Spring Reading Guide

This week I share a few books you can grab for the beach or the picnic blanket that will captivate any and all game enthusiasts.

Your Move: What Board Games Teach Us About Life

By Joan Moriarty and Jonathan Kay

Part history lesson, part musing on philosophy and good living, this short-but-gripping text takes you on a ride across iconic board game scenes to reveal the insights of their founding as well as their various impacts on humanity and culture.

The History of Fantasy Sports: And the Stories of the People Who Made It Happen

By Larry Schechter

The nuts-and-bolts details about the people who dreamed up the origins of what we now embrace today as one of sports fandoms' most fervent pastimes. It features amusing anecdotes you can't find anywhere else about some truly colorful and passionate characters from the 1960s through the present day.

The Elusive Shift: How Roleplaying Games Forged Their Identity

By Jon Peterson

Don't let the academic tone put you off: this is the absolute finest deep dive into the formative core of what makes pen and paper roleplaying games what they are and retells the long-distance, often slow-motion debates that shaped the genre (Spoiler: we're all arguing about the same stuff these geeks were back in the 1970s!)