Appendix N

The Literary History of Dungeons & Dragons

By: Jeffro Johnson

Narrated by: Virtual Voice

APPENDIX N: The Literary History of Dungeons & Dragons is a detailed and comprehensive investigation of the various works of science fiction and fantasy that game designer Gary Gygax declared to be the primary influences on his seminal role-playing game, Dungeons & Dragons. It is a deep intellectual dive into the literature of SF/F's past that will fascinate any serious role-playing gamer or fan of classic science fiction and fantasy.

Author Jeffro Johnson, an expert role-playing gamer, accomplished Dungeon Master and three-time Hugo Award Finalist, critically reviews all 43 works and authors listed by Gygax in the famous appendix. In doing so, he draws a series of intelligent conclusions about the literary gap between past and present that are surprisingly relevant to current events, not only in the fantastic world of role-playing, but the real world in which the players live.

Disappointed

This book sells itself as “a literary history of Dungeons and Dragons.” It isn’t sadly. That book has yet to be written.

What it is a series of blog posts put into book format. Johnson’s thoughts on each title are often arbitrary and border on rambling. He seems to be having a one way conversation with himself instead of communicating with the reader. The main problem is that very rarely do I come away feeling like I know more about the books or authors he reviews and how they’re related to Dungeons and Dragons. For example, on the short chapter on Jack Williamson’s Legion of Space he writes that the climax is as satisfying as Star Wars but doesn’t even tell me the premise. He adds lengthy quotes too but I don’t know what they’re supposed to tell me without context. I still have no idea what the book is about besides whatever I took from the title. With books that I have read his thoughts seem strangely specific to him and the guy just isn’t an insightful or profound author. In the chapter on Andre Norton he goes off on a long tangent on how something he barely describes might help him run a game.

There are occasional instances of what I wanted this book to be, like letting the reader know the origins of certain game mechanics or monsters but these are few and far between.

Overall, ambitious but just not worth it.