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D&D Geek Admits To Growing Up Strange

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By DAN SCHERAGA

The Tampa Tribune

Published: November 9, 2008

"The Elfish Gene: Dungeons, Dragons and Growing Up Strange," by Mark Borrowcliffe (Soho Press, $25)

As the recent cult documentaries "King of Kong" and "Darkon" have shown, geeks make for great entertainment - even for those who don't necessarily share their weird interests. Mark Barrowcliffe's humorous, self-deprecating memoir of his misspent youth, "The Elfish Gene," is another welcome addition to the growing "nerdsploitation" genre.

"I knew far more about the wants and needs of a golden dragon than I ever did a girl," he concedes early in his story.

That's because at an impressionable age, he discovered Dungeons & Dragons, the fantasy role-playing game that was a sensation among adolescents in the 1970s and 1980s before it was supplanted by online games such as World of Warcraft.

With the fervor of a religious convert, youthful Barrowcliffe immerses himself in his newfound fantasy world. His imagination shifts into overdrive as he applies the game's mores to his everyday life, whether they have any bearing on reality or - far more frequently - not.

An example of this appears early on when Barrowcliffe tries to extinguish his family's flaming home by conjuring a rainstorm as he waits beside his weeping mother for the fire department to arrive.

Usually, though, the stakes are little more than Barrowcliffe's own social standing and self-esteem. D&D soon becomes his main interface with the world, and he manages to disenchant nearly everyone he meets - even other devotees - by smothering them with his obsession.

Dan Scheraga writes for The Associated Press.

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