Novel: Jules Verne: An Antarctic Mystery (Mondial 2006, orig. 1897)
An Antarctic Mystery is Jules Verne’s sequel to the most enduring classic of Antarctic fiction, Edgar Allan Poe’s novel The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket. Poe’s novel has spawned a number of sequels by various authors. It follows in the typical pattern of a [...]

Solmukohta is an annual larp and roleplaying event held in the Nordic countries. Next year, it will be in Helsinki. Traditionally, the convention has been accompanied by a book of articles by the best and brightest of Nordic and world roleplaying writers.
This year, the book will be edited by me. I’m looking for contributors. More [...]

Knudepunkt 2011 is still a few weeks away, but the unprecedented three books published this years are already online.

Do Larp, edited by Lars Andresen, Charles Bo Nielsen, Luisa Carbonelli, Jesper Heeboll-Christensen & Marie Oscilowski, features “scripts” from larps made in recent years. I have one article in this book, detailing the production of my game [...]

I published an article called Role-playing and the Mainstream in Andrea Castellani’s anthology Larp Graffiti (2010). It’s been translated into Czech. Part 1 is here and part 2 here.

Nordic Larp is a photobook about the Nordic larp scene and the best games it has to offer. It’ll be released on the 22nd of December, 2010. I wrote for it an article about Luminescence, a game I did with Mike Pohjola.
Here’s info about the release parties:
Nordic Larp hit the printers a few weeks ago. [...]

I wrote an article for the book Larp Graffiti, edited by Andrea Castellani and published in conjunction with the Italian roleplaying convention Larp Symposium 2010. Larp Graffiti is a collection of classic Nordic articles translated into Italian, as well as some new English and Italian language material.
My article is called Role-Playing and the Mainstream and [...]

Non-fiction: Richard E. Byrd: Discovery (G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 1935)
Discovery is Richard Byrd’s account of his second big Antarctic expedition. The difference between this and accounts of the expeditions of Scott and Amundsen is striking, even when the difference in time is not so long. Amundsen used dogs, Byrd uses tractors and flies around in an [...]

Non-fiction: Herbert G. Ponting: The Great White South (Cooper Square Press, 2001, orig. 1921)
This is yet another account of Scott’s doomed final Antarctic expedition, this time by the photographer Herbert Ponting. Ponting is one of the two famous photographers of the Heroic Age of Antarctic exploration. Frank Hurley is the other one, and while Ponting’s [...]

Non-fiction: ed. Elge Larsson: Playing Reality (Interacting Arts, 2010)
Playing Reality is the book of this year’s Knutpunkt roleplaying conference, held in Sweden. It’s published by the Swedish participatory art collective Interacting Arts and edited by the grand old man of Nordic art larp, Elge Larsson. It’s available for free here.
As with every year’s collection of [...]

Novel: Thomas Keneally: The Survivor (Angus & Robertson Ltd, 1969)
Thomas Keneally’s The Survivor is the second Antarctic novel by the same author featured in this blog. The first was Victim of the Aurora. It’s the story of an aging university man who was the only survivor of an ill-fated Australian Heroic Age -expedition. It’s a [...]

Novel: James Vance Marshall: White-Out (Soho Press, 1999)
James Vance Marshall’s White-Out is in many ways the quintessential Antarctic novel. Its centerpiece is a long sledging journey undertaken across the Antarctic Peninsula by a group of men fighting for survival. All the usual privations from hunger to the blizzards are featured in turn.
The story starts like [...]

I recently read the book Nuoren toimittajan eloonjäämisopas (The Young Journalists’ Survival Guide) by the journalists Anni Lintula and Meri Valkama. I was surprized how little it reflected my own experiences. It wasn’t too long ago when I was a young journalist too.
Many colleagues have commented that this is a book that makes even professional, [...]

Children’s book: Kenneth Hite & Christina Rodriguez: Antarctic Express (Atlas Games, 2009)
Ken Hite’s Antarctic Express sounds like a joke: it’s a children’s picture book version of H.P. Lovecraft’s Antarctic tale At the Mountains of Madness. Surprisingly, it’s pretty good, probably because it feels like it’s been done in all seriousness. I haven’t seen many tales [...]

Pohjoismaisen roolipelaamisen seura ry julkaisee tämän vuoden Ropeconissa kaksi roolipeliä. Toinen on norjasta käännetty surrealistinen peli nimeltä Itran kaupunki ja toinen on oma pingviiniaiheinen esikoispelini Ikuisuuden laakso.

Ikuisuuden laakso on paikka, jonne pingviinit tulevat kuolemaan. Etelämantereen loputon jäätikkö on armoton vihollinen. Siellä selviävät vain rohkeimmat pingviinisankarit ja katalimmat antipingviinit.
Pingviinisankari elää elämänsä yksin. Hän on nähnyt asioita, [...]

Non-fiction: ed. Nancy Robinson Flannery: This Everlasting Silence - The love letters of Paquita Delprat and Douglas Mawson 1911-1914 (Melbourne University Press, 2000)
The Australian Douglas Mawson is an Antarctic explorer contemporary with his more famous colleagues Roald Amundsen, Robert Falcon Scott and Ernst Shackleton. He’s less known because he never attempted stunts like being first [...]