THE POISONOUS LIBRARY

A bright, colorful comic kicks off a series by introducing readers to role-playing games and interactive storytelling.

The questmancer (a big-eyed creature in a hooded cape) leads players through the rules of the game and the collaborative story. After picking heroes from a list of options, the questers follow maps of Chimeria, defeating monsters, solving puzzles, and picking up items on a mission to save the queen’s life. The player characters have specific abilities: Coran, a brown-skinned human priest, wields a mace and a healing spell while Zix, a nonbinary dragonfolk wizard (scaled, horned, and bipedal, with humanlike hands), reads languages and casts lightning bolts. While some puzzles are designed to be solved by precisely these skills, the majority of this quest demands creativity rather than strict rule following. Readers are encouraged to come up with backstories for their traveling party, personal touches that may or may not play into their puzzle solutions. Multiple play-throughs are possible, and either several players or a single dedicated reader can enjoy the adventure. Players within the book (illustrated as an Asian girl, a Black boy, a White boy, and a brown-skinned hijabi girl) are invited to tell stories of side characters or create their own maps. Experienced RPG players will recognize this as a classic game module: a stand-alone story with plenty of room for creativity. A clear message of fighting intolerance and racism offers a wholesome frame for a magical world-saving mission.

This is a warm, welcoming introduction to RPGs and collaborative storytelling.