Role Playing

By: Cathy Yardley

Narrated by: Chris Brinkley, Elyse Dinh

An AudioFile Best Romance Audiobook of 2023

From Cathy Yardley, author of Love, Comment, Subscribe, comes an emotional rom-com about two middle-aged gamers who grow their online connection into an IRL love story.

Maggie is an unapologetically grumpy forty-eight-year-old hermit. But when her college-aged son makes her a deal—he’ll be more social if she does the same—she can’t refuse. She joins a new online gaming guild led by a friendly healer named Otter. So that nobody gets the wrong idea, she calls herself Bogwitch.

Otter is Aiden, a fifty-year-old optimist using the guild as an emotional outlet from his family drama caring for his aging mother while his brother plays house with Aiden’s ex-fiancée.

Bogwitch and Otter become fast virtual friends, but there’s a catch. Bogwitch thinks Otter is a college student. Otter assumes Bogwitch is an octogenarian.

When they finally meet face to face—after a rocky, shocking start—the unlikely pair of sunshine and stormy personalities grow tentatively closer. But Maggie’s previous relationships have left her bitter, and Aiden’s got a complicated past of his own.

Everything’s easier online. Can they make it work in real life?

©2023 Cathy Wilson. (P)2023 Brilliance Publishing, Inc., all rights reserved.

Critic reviews

A New York Times Best Romance of the Year

“Chris Brinkley and Elyse Dinh pair up for a delightful performance in this fresh nerdy romance.… Dinh's and Brinkley's performances have the right intense beats when narrating gameplay. The romance unfolds more slowly so that listeners can savor its moments. Both narrators depict the genuine struggle faced by characters who are coping with life's new chapters and finding joy in unexpected places.”—AudioFile Magazine, Earphones Award Winner

“If ever there were a story for our times, Role Playing…is it. …deftly narrated by the team of Chris Brinkley and Elyse Dinh who are able to bring the entire story along with its distinctive characters to life in a true theatre of the mind experience for the listener.”—Midwest Book Review

“Elyse Dinh's narration…hits her stride once Maggie and Aiden meet IRL. Chris Brinkley, who narrates for Aiden, captures the rumbling, warm nature of this lovable character. Yardley's (Ex Appeal) latest is a perfect fit for patrons looking for heartwarming, slow-burn romances featuring middle-aged characters.”—Library Journal

So Full of Awesome

“If you can’t handle me in sweatpants, you don’t deserve me in stilettos.”
This was a very slow burn, friends-to-lovers tale. I think this is my favorite romance trope. We get to know each of the characters and I love how they got to know each other. Ms Yardley is a new to me author and I’m so happy I discovered her work. I will be reading more from her.
Part of the Kindle Unlimited catalog.

ABSOLUTELY ADORABLE

I loved the characters and I related so much to Maggie! I hope to be like her when I’m in my 50s. 10/10

A unique and entertaining romance

I loved this romance by Cathy Yardley. I listened to the audiobook, and the narrators were wonderful - Chris Brinkley is one of my favorite narrators, but Elyse Dinh was new to me. They both really brought the story to life for me.

Role Playing was very entertaining, and really kept my interest from start to finish. I highly recommend.

great read!

the story was lovely. very different than your average, surface-level rom com. I thoroughly enjoyed this one.
I love both narrators however, it was a bit incongruous to have the female main character be raised by whites and still have a slight Asian accent.

So cute

Love this realistic look on romance. Queer representation which is amazing as well! Low on the spice level for those wondering also. Super good and nerdy!

Cute

Enjoyed this cute, funny, and clean story. If you’re looking for a low smut option and you like nerdy stuff definitely give this one a shot!

Cute, but I didn't love the narration

Overall 3.5 stars
Performance 4 stars
Story 3 stars

This was a great story about loving yourself and embracing who you are. The slow burn friends to lovers romance was really sweet and I loved how it developed exactly at the pace our characters needed. Maggie and Aiden's assumptions about the other in the beginning were so funny and I laughed so hard when the truth was revealed lol. I also really appreciated that the story featured main characters that were older (Aiden is 50 and Maggie is 48). They were both so supportive of each other and Aiden's cinnamon roll golden retriever worked so well with Maggie's grumpy black cat. I would probably classify this more as women's fiction than romance since the heart of the story is the growth of each character, especially Aiden and his exploration and understanding of his own sexuality. There were a little too many gaming details for this non-gamer and the family drama on both sides was a lot, but I was cheering for these two to find their own happily ever after (however that might look). I also loved that Aiden set clear boundaries with his family at the end and put himself first for a change. The epilogue was very sweet and was perfect for them <3

I mainly listened to this on audio and I'm not sure I would recommend that unfortunately. I think I might have enjoyed the story more if I hadn't listened to it. Both narrators were overall great, but Chris Brinkley had a southern accent that didn't match Aiden's character and Elyse Dinh didn't have a ton of variation in the voices she used (Kit and Maggie sounded the same) and the pronunciation of some words was a bit odd. There were also strange pauses/breaks throughout the story (I think this is a production issue and had nothing to do with the narrators) which broke up the flow and made me check if my audiobook had stopped playing.

CW: death of parent (past), cheating ex (past), complicated and unsupportive family relationships (especially between parent and child), social anxiety, divorce, parental abandonment, toxic masculinity, homophobia, forced outing

Adorable, nerdy characters and a cozy, introvert love story!

My new mantra: “If you can’t handle me in sweatpants, you don’t deserve me in stilettos”

Be aware: the pacing is very slow, and there isn't an overwhelming amount of plot. This story is more character driven.

The audiobook is pretty good. Narrators made this more enjoyable!

Content warnings: queerphobia, toxic family dynamic

My rating: 3/5

Spice: 1/5 (very slow 🔥)

Loved it!

This book was a lot more than I went into it expecting. I honestly didn't read the description, I saw rhe title and cover design and wanted to read it. I've been increasingly interested in Tabletop RPG's so I thought it might be about that. While it was more MMORPG, I absolutely loved the book. complex characters and family dynamics, lots of nerdy references, LGBTQ+ themes that I haven't really read about in other books. Being in a complex LGBTQ+ relationship myself, it was refreshing to hear a story about a couple with similar challenges. Highly recommend.

Great LBGTQ+ representation

I love the queer representation and the real isolation and pushback those who fall into the LGBTQ+ spectrum face from family members. It was some great representation on some of the LGBTQ+ letters that people don’t understand as well/have as much representation. In this case, covering terms like asexual (ace) and demisexual does a world of good toward helping others understand and accept. Great and cute storytelling!