A thin book, somewhat dated but still relevant. Taylor doesn't say much that hasn't been said before, but she does express some ideas more clearly and rigorously than can be found elsewhere in the literature. As a fairly light read, this is a decent entry point to the study of virtual worlds for reasonably informed readers; those who need a bit more hand-holding should start with Castronova. The fact that Taylor focuses on Everquest, which is strangely ignored by many scholars in her field, also helps to set this book apart from the rest. Not essential reading, but hardly a waste of time. ( )

T.L. Taylor is a long time player of EverQuest and uses her experience as a social researcher to explain the complexities of the social interactions to non-players. As an online gamer myself, I appreciated her thoughtful look at how players change the games they play and create ways to connect with each other. One of the most effective chapters was called Where the Women Are and looks at how the gaming world is mired in stereotypes and doesn't know how to make women welcome and feel like gamers first and not women. This is a book that I would recommend to anyone who spends their time networking online as through the lens of EverQuest, Taylor makes many good points about how online communication allows us to move between many worlds. ( )

I enjoyed this a lot. While not necessarily a fan of World of Warcraft and the like, the key points still resonated with me in regards to my own gaming experiences. Much food for thought here. ( )

http://staff.washington.edu/schenold/texts/taylor_playbetweenworlds.html ( )

It's now available as an ebook on the MIT press portal http://mitpress-ebooks.mit.edu/product/play-between-worlds