Nordic live action role-playing games are a unique form of expression. Yet very little coherent and accessible documentation exists regarding these games. An annual article collection on Nordic role-playing has been published since 2003, but though these books have had an instrumental role in developing the tradition, actual games are documented rather poorly.
The Nordic Larp book project is a concentrated effort to document a representative sample of Nordic larps. The main body of the book is comprised of approximately 30 descriptions of relevant Nordic live action role-playing games. Each game will be presented with six to ten pages of photographs and text.
They are related to role-playing games and larps around the world, but are also a tradition apart. Drawing from theater, performance art, historical re-enactment, the scout movement and ludological theory, Nordic larps go beyond fun. The book features fantasy games with gigantic animatronic dragons (Dragonbane), sociological queer scifi deconstructions of gender (Mellan himmel och hav), dreary examinations of life in a refugee center (Europa) and many of the most influential and archetypal art house larps in Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden in the last 15 years.
The book will be published by the end of the year, but we still lack a little funding for that extra special sparkle a good coffee table book needs. You can support the book project by pre-ordering it now for a special benefactor price of 50 euro. The retail price of the book once published will be around 29.90 euro, so you’ll be paying a little extra to get your name in the book (and the bragging rights that go with helping this dream become reality). And of course the book will be delivered to you as soon as it is published.
The book is edited by Jaakko Stenros and Markus Montola.