Synopsis:
Maggie is an unapologetically grumpy forty-eight-year-old hermit. But when her college-aged son makes her a deal—he’ll be more social if she does the same—she can’t refuse. She joins a new online gaming guild led by a friendly healer named Otter. So that nobody gets the wrong idea, she calls herself Bogwitch.
Otter is Aiden, a fifty-year-old optimist using the guild as an emotional outlet from his family drama caring for his aging mother while his brother plays house with Aiden’s ex-fiancée.
Bogwitch and Otter become fast virtual friends, but there’s a catch. Bogwitch thinks Otter is a college student. Otter assumes Bogwitch is an octogenarian.
When they finally meet face-to-face—after a rocky, shocking start—the unlikely pair of sunshine and stormy personalities grow tentatively closer. But Maggie’s previous relationships have left her bitter, and Aiden’s got a complicated past of his own.
Everything’s easier online. Can they make it work in real life?
Review:
My hunt for great books with a gaming theme is yet to be successful. Role Playing was a decent read but I should have read it in a different format. The audiobook did not work for me.
The production of Role Playing is a little off. Firstly, there are often large pauses between dialogue, sometimes even during sentences. Secondly, the female narrator is almost completely monotonous and don’t get me started on her ‘male voice’. I get that Maggie is feeling a little down on life and she’s not the most upbeat person but conveys that with her dialogue, not the entire narration.
Maggie talking to Aiden constantly outside of the game even though she thinks he’s really young is a little weird. She says something along the lines of “it’s completely platonic so it’s fine” but even though I know Aiden is actually older than her it still felt a little gross.
It would have been so easy for Maggie to enter the guild and straight away say “I’m on the slightly older side (48) just so this isn’t weird how old are the rest of you?”. I get that it’s a college guild so they’re at least 18 (I think? I don’t know how college works in the US) but still.
This very much read as a book written by and for Millenials/Gen X and ““If you can’t handle me in sweatpants, you don’t deserve me in stilettos” very much proves that. But at the same time, it was a nice change to read a romance book with older leads.
I think there were some spicy scenes but I genuinely can’t remember. I went away for the weekend straight after finishing this book so I didn’t give myself time to sit with what I’d just read or make any notes on how it ended.
Part of me wishes I didn’t listen to the audiobook as I think I’d like Role Playing a lot more otherwise. The poor narration and production made this a not so fun read, but did enjoy the story. I love the idea of slightly older people connecting through a love of gaming and you don’t often get romance books with characters in their 50s.
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