Audrey Maddox writes about the science fiction she reads and the board games she plays, plus the odd personal post about life in between.https://audreyslittleworld.com/en-UShttps://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/book-chaos/https://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/book-chaos/A book about the history of an idea more than the idea itself, and once I stopped expecting equations I liked it a lot more.Sat, 15 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMTChaosAudrey Maddoxhttps://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/game-race-for-the-galaxy/https://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/game-race-for-the-galaxy/A small box that hides a genuinely brutal iconography wall, and a eureka moment on the other side of it that made me forgive everything.Fri, 07 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMTRace for the GalaxyAudrey Maddoxhttps://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/essay-priya-taught-herself-to-read-again/https://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/essay-priya-taught-herself-to-read-again/She'd stopped finishing books years before I met her. Watching her come back to it through, of all things, Children of Time, has been one of the better things about this year.Wed, 29 Jul 2026 00:00:00 GMTpersonal_essayAudrey Maddoxhttps://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/book-candide/https://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/book-candide/Everyone gets a butt cheek cut off, a monkey steals a girlfriend, and somehow it ends with a garden. Short and mean in the best way.Tue, 14 Jul 2026 00:00:00 GMTCandideAudrey Maddoxhttps://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/essay-teaching-marcus-root-was-a-mistake/https://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/essay-teaching-marcus-root-was-a-mistake/I ignored every warning I'd read about not unboxing this one cold, and Marcus still hasn't fully forgiven me for the Eyrie.Sat, 11 Jul 2026 00:00:00 GMTpersonal_essayAudrey Maddoxhttps://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/book-too-like-the-lightning/https://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/book-too-like-the-lightning/Flying cars, gender pronouns as a taboo topic, and a narrator who addresses you directly like you're both living in 1750. Ends mid-scene and I was furious about it.Thu, 25 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMTToo Like the LightningAudrey Maddoxhttps://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/book-snow-crash/https://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/book-snow-crash/A pizza delivery guy named Hiro Protagonist and a linguistic virus that hacks your brainstem. Loses steam right when it should be sprinting.Sun, 21 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMTSnow CrashAudrey Maddoxhttps://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/game-unmatched/https://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/game-unmatched/A skirmish game where the whole appeal is picking your favorite legendary weirdo and finding out if they're secretly overpowered.Fri, 19 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMTUnmatchedAudrey Maddoxhttps://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/game-oathsworn/https://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/game-oathsworn/The Gloomhaven comparisons follow this game everywhere it goes, and after one campaign I understand exactly why.Tue, 16 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMTOathsworn: Into the DeepwoodAudrey Maddoxhttps://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/essay-forty-minutes-no-phone/https://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/essay-forty-minutes-no-phone/The one non-negotiable habit in a schedule that otherwise runs on whatever the clinic needs that day.Sat, 13 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMTpersonal_essayAudrey Maddoxhttps://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/book-foundation/https://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/book-foundation/A galactic empire falls in slow motion over centuries, and the whole thing plays out like a series of one-act plays with a tiny cast.Mon, 01 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMTFoundationAudrey Maddoxhttps://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/book-children-of-time/https://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/book-children-of-time/A generation ship, a terraformed planet full of uplifted spiders, and somehow the spiders end up more sympathetic than the humans.Sat, 30 May 2026 00:00:00 GMTChildren of TimeAudrey Maddoxhttps://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/book-the-social-conquest-of-earth/https://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/book-the-social-conquest-of-earth/An ant biologist takes on the biggest questions in the room, where we came from, what we are, where we're going, and mostly earns the swagger.Sun, 03 May 2026 00:00:00 GMTThe Social Conquest of EarthAudrey Maddoxhttps://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/book-ninefox-gambit/https://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/book-ninefox-gambit/Calendrical heresy, fingerless gloves, and a general who's been dead for four hundred years. I had to reread the first fifty pages twice and I'd do it again.Wed, 29 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMTNinefox GambitAudrey Maddoxhttps://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/essay-triage-brain-at-the-game-table/https://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/essay-triage-brain-at-the-game-table/Six years of deciding what's actually urgent at the clinic has ruined me for games that pretend every decision matters equally.Sat, 11 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMTpersonal_essayAudrey Maddoxhttps://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/book-the-end-of-eternity/https://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/book-the-end-of-eternity/Time travelers who make tiny edits to history to minimize human suffering, until minimizing suffering starts to look like its own kind of tyranny.Sun, 05 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMTThe End of EternityAudrey Maddoxhttps://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/essay-i-still-buy-the-paperback/https://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/essay-i-still-buy-the-paperback/An ereader would make more sense for someone with my apartment's shelf space. I'm not getting one and I've made peace with the irrationality of that.Sun, 29 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMTpersonal_essayAudrey Maddoxhttps://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/essay-the-cat-that-didnt-make-it/https://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/essay-the-cat-that-didnt-make-it/Some shifts you can't read your way out of afterward. I tried Star Realms alone at eleven at night instead, and it actually helped.Tue, 24 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMTpersonal_essayAudrey Maddoxhttps://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/essay-riding-the-bus-to-the-clinic/https://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/essay-riding-the-bus-to-the-clinic/The two years I didn't have a car and read more books than I have since, which I've never fully figured out how to feel about.Wed, 25 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMTpersonal_essayAudrey Maddoxhttps://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/game-star-realms/https://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/game-star-realms/A tiny box that fits in a jacket pocket and still manages fun-per-dollar numbers most bigger games can't touch.Wed, 25 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMTStar RealmsAudrey Maddoxhttps://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/game-dune-imperium-uprising/https://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/game-dune-imperium-uprising/A heavier, denser sequel to a game I already loved, and I'm still not sure the sandworms are as balanced as the box wants me to think.Sun, 22 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMTDune: Imperium – UprisingAudrey Maddoxhttps://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/essay-people-who-ask-if-its-a-good-game/https://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/essay-people-who-ask-if-its-a-good-game/A small, specific pet peeve about a question that only sounds simple.Thu, 12 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMTpersonal_essayAudrey Maddoxhttps://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/game-root/https://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/game-root/Adorable art hiding a genuinely nasty asymmetric war game, and you should not open this one for the first time without someone at the table who already knows it.Wed, 11 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMTRootAudrey Maddoxhttps://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/essay-the-game-i-was-wrong-about/https://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/essay-the-game-i-was-wrong-about/I sold my copy of Race for the Galaxy after one bad session years ago. I owe it an apology and a repurchase.Tue, 27 Jan 2026 00:00:00 GMTpersonal_essayAudrey Maddoxhttps://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/game-dominion/https://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/game-dominion/The game that basically invented the deckbuilding genre, and it still sets up faster than almost anything I own.Mon, 19 Jan 2026 00:00:00 GMTDominionAudrey Maddoxhttps://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/game-moon-colony-bloodbath/https://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/game-moon-colony-bloodbath/A death spiral of a game where you're all sharing one increasingly poisoned deck, and it is somehow the funniest way I've lost in months.Mon, 12 Jan 2026 00:00:00 GMTMoon Colony BloodbathAudrey Maddoxhttps://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/game-too-many-bones/https://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/game-too-many-bones/A dice-building game with the nicest components I own, undercut a little by a rulebook that sends you to Google mid-session more than it should.Sat, 13 Dec 2025 00:00:00 GMTToo Many BonesAudrey Maddoxhttps://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/book-the-core-of-the-sun/https://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/book-the-core-of-the-sun/An alternate Finland where women are eugenically bred into submissive eloi and defiant morlocks, and the drug of choice is chili peppers. Handmaid's Tale by way of Kafka, and it works.Fri, 12 Dec 2025 00:00:00 GMTThe Core of the SunAudrey Maddoxhttps://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/essay-what-central-new-york-winters-didnt-teach-me/https://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/essay-what-central-new-york-winters-didnt-teach-me/I grew up in real snow country and Vermont still found a way to humble me my first year here.Wed, 10 Dec 2025 00:00:00 GMTpersonal_essayAudrey Maddoxhttps://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/game-harmonies/https://audreyslittleworld.com/articles/game-harmonies/A quiet little landscape puzzle with gorgeous wooden pieces and almost zero table talk, which is either a feature or a bug depending on your group.Tue, 02 Dec 2025 00:00:00 GMTHarmoniesAudrey Maddox