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The Outer Worlds is one of my favorite games in recent years. I’ve played through it twice and a bit. I didn’t finish my third run as a melee fighter, but I was delighted to fire it up again with my original character to play the DLC.

Peril on Gorgon begins with the captain of the Unreliable receiving a package containing a severed arm and a datapad. The datapad instructs the recipient to meet with Minnie Ambrose in her manor on Gorgon.

Minnie is trying to track down the journal of her mother, Olivia, who was a scientist working in a lab on Gorgon where things went very, very wrong. (As often occurs in video game labs.) Minnie wants to restart her mother’s experiments on Adrena-Time, and needs some to comb through the marauder-infested labs of Gorgon to piece together what happened with Olivia’s experiments.

On Gorgon, we find a ravaged, lawless world that makes Edgewater look civilized. There is one small outpost, the Sprat Shack, that serves as a hub of sorts, but otherwise it’s a largely hostile and barren world with lots high-level enemies to fight. There are a few interesting vignettes in keeping with the game’s signature offbeat humor, but it’s largely fighting, with much of the plot delivered from audio logs scattered around the planet.

Which is fine. The combat in Outer Worlds is smooth and fun. There is one thing I found a little disappointing, and this is pure gamer nit-picking, so readers not interested in a discussion of equipment crafting may skip the following three paragraphs.

One of the things the DLC promises is new weapons and armor. And indeed, there are plenty of new armor sets and unique weapons. The armor was fine, but I have two issues with the weapons. First, with the exception of three new science weapons, they look identical to the weapons in the base game. There’s nothing inherently wrong with that, but it’s a little bit of a letdown when you get a new revolver that belonged to one of the major characters in the DLC that looks like any other revolver.

Second, and more importantly, the unique weapons aren’t that great. Pretty much all of my weapons were modified to Tartarus and back before I ever set foot on Gorgon, and whenever I would try a new weapon from the DLC, I’d inevitably put it aside after a few minutes and go back to my heavily-customized arsenal.

Now, I know: not every player is into crafting, and for those who aren’t, the unique weapons could be a lot more exciting. I admit, I was hoping for additional equipment on a level similar to that found in the DLCs for Outer Worlds‘ spiritual ancestor, Fallout: New Vegas. Every New Vegas add-on delivered new and interesting weaponry, from Dead Money‘s holorifle to Honest Hearts‘ Thompson gun to Old World Blues‘ K9000 to Lonesome Road‘s Red Glare.

But that’s really only a small quibble. The game itself is highly enjoyable–it’s more Outer Worlds, after all, so how can that not be good? Minnie’s quest to restart her mother’s work has a variety of possible outcomes, and the one I got was very satisfying. (I don’t want to spoil anything, but let’s just say I did a quick re-spec of my character and put 150 points in the Persuade skill in order to get it.)

The Outer Worlds is a game perfectly suited to DLC. It’s logical to add a new planet to explore with each add-on. I’m eagerly looking forward to the next one.

Lastly, one word for anyone who already played Peril on Gorgon and is just reading this to see what I thought:

Llama!

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This is a fantasy novel set in a world where elves, goblins and changelings (shape-shifters) are perennially maneuvering against each other. The main source of conflict is the precious gems which are used for all manner of magical purposes. The three factions are not at war, but rather a state of uneasy peace which is frequently threatened, as when elves encroach into goblin territory.

There are three main characters: Alue, an elf, Talin, a changeling who for some time has disguised himself as Alue’s familiar, and Naj’ar, a goblin-changeling halfbreed. The three keep finding themselves drawn together, as often as not due to Alue’s reckless behavior.

The overarching plot of the book is left pretty vague. There are a lot of dubious goings-on among the three factions, as well as problems with something called The Veil. This book is unusually lean on world-building for a fantasy novel, which I can see might be disappointing to some readers. Personally, I actually liked the fast-paced nature of it. I don’t read much fantasy, exactly because so many fantasy books tend to get bogged down in world-building, so this was refreshing.*

Alue was the character who was most interesting to me. At first, I didn’t like her, largely due to the fact she had a tendency to disregard rules, and then whine when punished for it. (I call this “Anakin Skywalker syndrome.”) But as the book went on, I came to like her more–she really does want to do the right thing. Usually.

Talin was a bit tougher to get a handle on; his motives are ambiguous and at times it seems like he’s in denial about his own desires. Na’jar seemed to be the most honest and reliable of the three.

I think fans of fantasy will find a lot to like here. This is the first in a trilogy, and by the end, the shape of the overarching plot is beginning to emerge. It’s an entertaining read for anyone who enjoys a good adventure. If you’re still on the fence about whether to read it or not, check out Audrey Driscoll’s review.

*You’re saying, “But you read Sci-Fi novels that also have lots of world-building!” Yes, this is true. What can I say? Somehow Sci-Fi can hold my attention in a way that Fantasy doesn’t. It’s just a quirk of mine, and can’t be interpreted as a comment on either genre.

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Okay, I know most of you couldn’t care less about American football. But hear me out on this.

George Plimpton was a pioneer of participatory journalism—that is, journalism in which the writer actually participates in what he’s writing about, as opposed to simply describing it as a bystander. His many exploits included playing in the New York Philharmonic Orchestra, boxing with Archie Moore, and pitching in an MLB game.

But arguably his most famous act of participatory journalism was his time as quarterback of the Detroit Lions. Plimpton joined their camp during the 1963 season, and participated for five plays in an inter-squad scrimmage. Here’s how he introduces the fateful moment:

“The offensive team in their blue jerseys, about ten yards back, on their own twenty yard line, moved and collected in the huddle formation as I came up, and I slowed, and walked toward them, trying to be calm about it, almost lazying up to them to see what could be done.”

After his five plays were run, the Lions had lost 29 yards. Certainly an inauspicious playing career, although as time has gone on, it’s proven to be far from the most embarrassing thing to happen to a Lions quarterback.

How interesting could a book about a man being terrible at football be, you ask? Well, that’s just it. Plimpton may have been a bad quarterback, but he was a magnificent writer. He could make anything sound interesting. Something as boring as lining up under center, he makes memorable:

“I took a few tentative steps toward Bob Whitlow, the center, waiting patiently over the ball. I suddenly blurted out: ‘Well, damn it, coach, I don’t know where to put my… I just don’t know…’

The coaches all crowded around to advise, and together we moved up on Whitlow, who was now peering nervously over his shoulder like a cow about to be milked.”

What makes Paper Lion great isn’t Plimpton’s scrimmage performance by itself. That just serves to give the book a structure and a dramatic climax. But the real meat of the book is in Plimpton’s descriptions of what goes on behind the scenes of an NFL team, like the annual revue they put on after the final roster cutdowns, in which the rookies mock coaches, veterans and league officials. Plimpton describes himself performing in the role of then-NFL commissioner Pete Rozelle:

“I wore a Napoleon hat, a cloak, a wooden sword, three cap pistols and a rubber dirk; and I carried a pair of handcuffs, a tack hammer, and a frying pan. These artifacts… were supposed to suggest the inquisitorial aspects of Rozelle’s office.

…and when I clanked toward the footlights, and said ‘Howdy, I’m Petesy Rozelle,’ the audience delivered a stiff barrage of invective.”

Or, during a hazing session where rookies are made to sing their college fight songs before the entire team, Plimpton struggles to recall his alma mater:

Crimson in triumph flashing

‘Til that last white line is past.

er… We’ll fight for the name of Harvard

‘Til… that last white line is past….

There are his depictions of all the Lions players, like Earl Morrall, the journeyman quarterback who would later go on to join the legendary 1972 Miami Dolphins, and of George Wilson, the Lions’ firm but good-natured coach. Dick “Night Train” Lane, whose record for interceptions in a season still stands to this day. Dick LeBeau, who would go on to a Hall of Fame career as a defensive coach, was a member of the team, whom Plimpton recalls the players likening to a pop star.

Above all, there are the antics of lineman Alex Karras. Karras was suspended for the 1963 season for gambling, but he still makes his presence felt as Plimpton recounts stories of him. Karras was a hambone, a performer by nature, always improvising skits and stories to amuse his teammates waiting in the hotel before a game, as in his recollections of an imagined “former life” in World War II:

“I knew all those cats, Runstedt, Goering–Bavaria Fats we called him–and Rommel. He had a terrible weak stomach, Rommel did. He used to get sick all the time. I’d come rushing up to him in the morning to fling the salute at him, and say, ‘Hello, hello, heil, heil, good mornin’ gener’l,’ and he’d get sick.”

It’s no surprise Karras went on to a career in acting after his football days ended. He had a natural gift for entertaining—but then, as Plimpton describes, as game time drew near, he would grow serious, and sick to his stomach. Karras’ queasiness and unpredictable temper actually reassured his teammates: “Alex is ready,” they murmur when his mood turns sour, “In five minutes he’ll be out there on the field making the poor fellow from Philadelphia opposite him pay for it.” Plimpton concludes the chapter, “We crowded into the elevator. No one said anything going down. Karras would sit alone on the bus.”

Plimpton had an incredible talent for knowing just how to end a chapter. I’m not sure I’ve ever read anyone else who could do it as well as he could. Here’s his conclusion of the chapter about his ill-fated scrimmage, when he hears a woman in the stands call out to him:

“She was wearing a mohair Italian sweater, the color of spun pink sugar, and tight pants, and she was holding a thick folding wallet in one hand along with a pair of dark glasses, and in the other a Lions banner, which she waved, her face alive with excitement, very pretty in a perishable, childlike way, and she was calling, “Beautiful; it was beautiful.”

The fireworks lit her, and she looked up, her face chalk white in the swift aluminum glare.

I looked at her out of my helmet. Then I lifted a hand, just tentatively.”

Plimpton’s time with the Lions occurred in the shadow of departed star quarterback Bobby Layne, who had led the team to multiple NFL championships in the ’50s. Legend has it, Layne cursed the team when they traded him, saying they would not win another title for 50 years. And as of this writing, they still have not, being one of the worst franchises in the NFL over the last half-century.

I wonder if the book would have been the same if Plimpton had chosen some other team for his experiment. He had tried to go to the New York Giants, the New York Titans (now Jets) and the Baltimore Colts. But somehow, it seems right that it was the Lions who had this awkward, lanky quarterback who wore number 0 and who stumbled on his first play from scrimmage. There is a poetic quality to it—someone who knows he hasn’t got a chance, but is trying anyway, because, well, how else to know what it’s like? 

The Lions play on national TV every Thanksgiving. Generally, they lose. Even if they don’t, the game is usually meaningless, as they have almost always been eliminated from playoff contention by that time. But I love this tradition, because there’s a kind of melancholic beauty to it, just as there was to Plimpton’s venture. Sitting down to Thanksgiving dinner on a dreary day—as midwestern November days always are, somehow even when they are sunny—and watching the Honolulu blue and silver appear on the screen as the Lions go into another ill-starred competition makes me think of old Plimpton and his wonderfully nerdy courage. 

It’s said that the owners of baseball’s Chicago Cubs believed that fans didn’t care about winning as much as they did entertainment. They were probably wrong, but I still see where they got that idea. Anyone can cheer for a winner; but it takes something special to cheer on a perennial loser, year after year. Don’t we teach kids it’s not whether you win or lose, it’s how you play the game?

And in a way, Plimpton did win. He wrote one of the greatest sports books ever—a book that captures both the details of the game and the poetry of it. Football is a late autumn sport, and is tightly connected with the mood of the season. As John Facenda said in the intro to an NFL films production I once saw, there is “something somber in the eyes of the men, something of winter in their faces…” Paper Lion depicts football’s essence, in all its violent, weird, funny, fading autumnal glory.

I’ve loved football since I was a kid—I first read Paper Lion when I was 13 years old—so I’m probably biased. But I do believe it’s possible to enjoy the book even without being a football fan, because Plimpton was such a fantastic writer. In the introduction to the 1993 edition, Plimpton described an encounter with a rustic fellow who came up to him and said that he had only ever read one book—Paper Lion. Flattered but nonplused, Plimpton asked if he’d ever considered reading another one. The man replied with the greatest compliment a writer can receive: “Have you written another one?”

Indeed, he had, and this is why I think even a non-football fan may enjoy Paper Lion. I’ve read lots of other things he wrote, on subjects which normally hold no interest for me, but which I enjoyed anyway because of his masterful storytelling and wit.

In 2003, less than a week before he died, Plimpton went to Detroit for a ceremony at halftime of a Lions’ game to commemorate the 40th anniversary of the book and reunite with some old Lions’ stars. I remember watching the game on TV, and thinking how weird it was to see number 0 on a football jersey.

Of course, the Lions lost the game, 23-13.

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51s-eBLPWELThis is a collection of four short stories, each set in rugged western landscapes, and each with an ironic twist to them. I learned about it from Pat Prescott and had to check it out. I love weird westerns, and these tales fit the bill perfectly. Each one is a short but memorable concept: An impatient mountain man becomes obsessed with a sinister crow. A would-be stagecoach robber experiences a stunning change in his fortunes. A hike in the mountains turns deadly. 

All these stories are good, but my favorite is “Hangin’ Tree’s Revenge.” This is the story with the strongest supernatural element, and the one that most clearly conveys the mood of a weird western. Frontier justice is never far off from outright revenge, and one feels that the desert is governed by mysterious forces that make little distinction between the two.

Anyone who likes supernatural stories with dark twists will enjoy these tales, and that goes double for people like me, fascinated with bleak desert landscapes. The landscape is very much a character in these tales, as in Bruce’s environmentalist novel Oblivion, and it’s a good way to get lost in the eerie desolation.

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GossamerThis is the sequel to The Gossamer Globe, which I reviewed here. It’s a fantastic book, and I’ll keep the plot synopsis to a minimum because I would not want to spoil the first book. Gossamer Power follows Lucia, Kailani, Ms. Battenbox, Jevan and other characters from Globe, as well as introducing some terrific new ones, including the handsome Sebastian, who is irresistibly fascinating to almost everyone, and a character known simply as “Glorious Leader” or to use his full name, “Oh Great Glorious Leader.”

All the things I loved about the first book are present here as well: the humor, the sword-fighting, the political intrigue. I was worried this installment wouldn’t live up to the high bar set by the first, but I enjoyed this one almost as much. I say “almost” because this one ends on a cliffhanger, so it doesn’t have a totally satisfying ending. Tonally, it’s definitely The Empire Strikes Back to Gossamer Globe’s A New Hope. 

So much of what makes these books wonderful are the little things, as in when, on having traveled by airship to his native land, the Glorious Leader shows Jevan and Lucia the flying carriages of his home, commenting that the people who clamored for them had no “regard for the fact that an airship is, essentially, a flying carriage. They already existed.” And indeed, how many times have you heard people talk about not having flying cars when in fact that’s basically what an airplane is?

The book is full of little moments like this. Ms. Battenbox isn’t in it much, which is kind of a pity, since she was one of my favorites from the first book, but her keen mind for strategy and her biting wit are still in evidence during her few scenes. At one point, she remarks, “There are many state secrets this sham government will never know about… How stupid are you commoners to think you could imprison me in it?”

In addition to being a bawdy, swashbuckling adventure, Gossamer Power, like its predecessor, is also a clever satire, touching on everything from the “Internet of Things” to the modern surveillance state. Like any good fantasy, for all its outlandish elements, there are some things that really ring true.

It’s a worthy sequel, and I can’t wait for the next one!