History Literature / TheEgyptGame

* DeathByNewberyMedal: A kid does die, but in this book it's someone the characters didn't know. In the aftermath Melanie realizes that April is much less worldly than she appears due to not having close relationships with family or friends and having access only to "the children's part of libraries", and ends up explaining criminal insanity to her.[[note]]Fridge: Melanie is not just female, she's black, so will have gotten a little girls' version of "the talk" as it was at that time, especially as her parents are educated UsefulNotes/CivilRightsMovement activists who find reasonable ways to explain such realities to her.[[/note]]

** Disney, no less, attempted to option this for a movie. However, according to her longtime editor Karen Wojtyla in an interview, Disney "wouldn't guarantee a multiracial cast." "She was very forward-thinking, and wouldn't sell them the rights."

** MissingMom: Toby's mother. April's mother is still living, but, well, see below...
*** April's self-absorbed mother Dorothea sends her to live with her grandmother Caroline, promising her this will be a very temporary arrangement. Months pass, Dorothea doesn't write much, doesn't send for April when she said she would, and finally sends a letter explaining how she ''[[ParentWithNewParamour freakin' got married]]'' without her daughter and is now living in an apartment with her new husband. All the while, April gets to come to the slow and painful realization that she has essentially been abandoned.

''The Egypt Game'' is a classic 1967 children's novel by Creator/ZilphaKeatleySnyder. It won a UsefulNotes/NewberyMedal in 1968. As one of very few children's books about sustained imaginary games, it was cited by scholar Cathlena Martin in the ''American Journal of Play'' (vol. 10, #2, Winter 2018) as children's literature that "advocates and illustrates role playing", a cultural forerunner to tabletop roleplaying games like ''TabletopGame/DungeonsAndDragons'' -- "an early outpost in roleplaying history" rather than a direct inspiration[[note]]"What sets ''The Egypt Game'' apart is its sustained account of WorldBuilding within a realistic fictional setting with a narrative nexus of role playing. Snyder has created within a work of realistic fiction not a game, ''per se'', but a depiction of the primitive construction and implementation of a rule set by children for role playing -- that is, she offers a model of role play for children." Snyder has a similar account of sustained imaginary games and worldbuilding roleplay in ''The Changeling'' (1970).[[/note]]

''The Egypt Game'' is a classic 1967 children's novel by Creator/ZilphaKeatleySnyder. It won a UsefulNotes/NewberyMedal in 1968. As one of very few children's books about sustained imaginary games, it was cited by scholar Cathlena Martin in the ''American Journal of Play'' (vol. 10, #2, Winter 2018) as children's literature that "advocates and illustrates role playing", a cultural forerunner to tabletop roleplaying games like ''TabletopGame/DungeonsAndDragons'' -- "an early outpost in roleplaying history" rather than a direct inspiration[[note]]"What sets ''The Egypt Game'' apart is its sustained account of WorldBuilding within a realistic fictional setting with a narrative nexus of role playing. Snyder has created within a work of realistic fiction not a game, ''per se'', but a depiction of the primitive construction and implementation of a rule set by children for role playing -- that is, she offers a model of role play for children."[[/note]]

* MustMakeAmends: After learning the Professor wasn't responsible for the murders and saved April's life, everyone in town comes to his shop and buys items they don't need.
* OnlySaneMan: Ken sees himself this way. When the rest of the group acts as if they believe in their invented rituals, he says they're "cracking up".
* ParentalAbandonment: April's self-absorbed mother Dorothea sends her to live with her grandmother Caroline, promising her this will be a very temporary arrangement. Months pass, Dorothea doesn't write much, doesn't send for April when she said she would, and finally sends a letter explaining how she ''[[ParentWithNewParamour freakin' got married]]'' without her daughter and is now living in an apartment with her new husband. All the while, April gets to come to the slow and painful realization that she has essentially been abandoned.

* ParentsAsPeople: April's self-absorbed mother Dorothea sends her to live with her grandmother Caroline, promising her this will be a very temporary arrangement. Months pass, Dorothea doesn't write much, doesn't send for April when she said she would, and finally sends a letter explaining how she ''[[ParentWithNewParamour freakin' got married]]'' without her daughter and is now living in an apartment with her new husband. All the while, April gets to come to the slow and painful realization that she has essentially been abandoned.

* SequelHook: "Melanie, what do you know about Gypsies?" It took thirty years in real time for Melanie to answer "Not very much, I guess. Why?"

''The Egypt Game'' is a classic 1967 children's novel by Creator/ZilphaKeatleySnyder. It won a UsefulNotes/NewberyMedal in 1968. As one of very few children's books about sustained imaginary games, it was cited by scholar Cathlena Martin in the ''American Journal of Play'' (vol. 10, #2, Winter 2018) as children's literature that "advocates and illustrates role playing", a cultural forerunner to tabletop roleplaying games like TabletopGame/DungeonsAndDragons -- "an early outpost in roleplaying history" rather than a direct inspiration[[note]]"What sets ''The Egypt Game'' apart is its sustained account of WorldBuilding within a realistic fictional setting with a narrative nexus of role playing. Snyder has created within a work of realistic fiction not a game, ''per se'', but a depiction of the primitive construction and implementation of a rule set by children for role playing -- that is, she offers a model of role play for children."[[/note]]

''The Egypt Game'' is a classic 1967 children's novel by Creator/ZilphaKeatleySnyder. It won a UsefulNotes/NewberyMedal in 1968. As one of very few children's books about sustained imaginary games, it was cited by scholar Cathlena Martin in the ''American Journal of Play'' (vol. 10, #2, Winter 2018) as a cultural forerunner to tabletop roleplaying games like TabletopGame/DungeonsAndDragons - "an early outpost in roleplaying history" rather than a direct inspiration, as it is one of few works of children's literature that "advocates and illustrates role playing"[[note]]"What sets ''The Egypt Game'' apart is its sustained account of WorldBuilding within a realistic fictional setting with a narrative nexus of role playing. Snyder has created within a work of realistic fiction not a game, ''per se'', but a depiction of the primitive construction and implementation of a rule set by children for role playing -- that is, she offers a model of role play for children."[[/note]]

''The Egypt Game'' is a classic 1967 children's novel by Creator/ZilphaKeatleySnyder. It won a UsefulNotes/NewberyMedal in 1968. As one of very few children's books about sustained imaginary games, it was cited by scholar Cathlena Martin in the ''American Journal of Play'' (vol. 10, #2, Winter 2018) as a cultural forerunner to tabletop roleplaying games like TabletopGame/DungeonsAndDragons - "an early outpost in roleplaying history" rather than a direct inspiration.

''The Egypt Game'' is a classic 1967 children's novel by Creator/ZilphaKeatleySnyder. It won a UsefulNotes/NewberyMedal in 1968. As one of very few children's books about sustained imaginary games, it was cited by scholar Cathlena Martin in the ''American Journal of Play'' (vol. 10, #2, Winter 2018) as a cultural forerunner to tabletop RPGs like Dungeons and Dragons, "an early outpost in roleplaying history" rather than a direct inspiration.

''The Egypt Game'' is a classic 1967 children's novel by Creator/ZilphaKeatleySnyder. It won a UsefulNotes/NewberyMedal in 1968.

Set in a California college town, ''The Egypt Game'' follows the adventures of a group of kids who become utterly fascinated with AncientEgypt and create an imaginary world where they can live out their own rituals and dramas. This all takes place in the backyard of the local MisunderstoodLonerWithAHeartOfGold, known only as [[EveryoneCallsHimBarkeep the Professor]]. But all is not well in their neighborhood when two children are murdered and [[ConvictedByPublicOpinion everyone thinks the Professor is behind it]]. (You didn't think a Newbery book would be free of [[DeathByNewberyMedal death]], did you?)

* FriendlyAddressPrivileges: Marshall's character in the game is Marshamosis, a boy pharaoh. Elizabeth's is the queen Neferbeth. The other's roles are a bit more mutable. When they join the game, Toby insists that they should ''all'' have Egyptian names, and not use their real names at all when in Egypt. Toby chooses Ramose, after a famous Egyptian wise man[[note]]there were several well-known people with this name, but Toby is probably thinking of [[http://www.touregypt.net/featurestories/ramoset.htm the Governor of Thebes]] who was also UsefulNotes/{{Akhenaten}}'s [[http://www.touregypt.net/featurestories/vizier.htm vizier]][[/note]]. April picks Bastet, after the goddess. Melanie names herself Aïda after the heroine of the [[Theatre/AidaVerdi opera]], which she's seen with Afro-American soprano Leontyne Price[[note]]a beloved role model to black girls and women at that time[[/note]]. Ken is Horemheb, like the one who had been a great general and also a pharaoh.

** Disney, no less, attempted to option this for a movie. However, according to her longtime editor Karen Wojytla in an interview, Disney "wouldn't guarantee a multiracial cast." "She was very forward-thinking, and wouldn't sell them the rights."
* FreeRangeChildren: A DeconstructedTrope. The novel was written in 1967 and this trope is played straight--11-year-olds walk to school, and the library by themselves--until the murder of a child in the neighborhood causes the adults to temporarily be overprotective. (In other words, exactly the way they are all the time nowadays.)[[spoiler:And at the end, April is almost killed by the murderer when she goes down to Egypt at night.]]

* RedOniBlueOni: April and Melanie. April is the volatile Red Oni to Melanie's responsible Blue Oni. April is more worldly, while Melanie is more mature.

''The Egypt Games'' is a classic 1967 children's novel by Creator/ZilphaKeatleySnyder. It won a UsefulNotes/NewberyMedal in 1968.

* DeathByNewberyMedal: A kid does die, but in this book it's someone the characters didn't know. In the aftermath Melanie realizes that April is much less worldly than she appears due to not having close relationships with family or friends, and ends up explaining criminal insanity to her.

* FriendlyAddressPrivileges: Marshall's character in the game is Marshamosis, a boy pharaoh. Elizabeth's is the queen Neferbeth. The other's roles are a bit more mutable. When they join the game, Toby insists that they should ''all'' have Egyptian names, and not use their real names at all when in Egypt. Toby chooses Ramose, after a famous Egyptian wise man[[note]]there were several well-known people with this name, but Toby is probably thinking of [[http://www.touregypt.net/featurestories/ramoset.htm the Governor of Thebes]] who was also UsefulNotes/{{Akhenaten}}'s [[http://www.touregypt.net/featurestories/vizier.htm vizier]][[/note]]. April picks Bastet, after the goddess. Melanie names herself Aïda after the heroine of the [[Theatre/AidaVerdi opera]]. Ken is Horemheb, like the one who had been a great general and also a pharaoh.
* FiveTokenBand: April and Toby are white (the latter with a Hispanic surname and turns out to be one-quarter {{UsefulNotes/Romani}}), Melanie and Marshall are black, and Elizabeth and Ken are Asian. The novel was written back when Uhura was making waves by sitting on the bridge of the ''[[Series/StarTrekTheOriginalSeries Enterprise]]'' and saying "Hailing frequencies open, sir."

* WouldHurtAChild: The serial child killer. The kids (naturally) don't take the issue very seriously and are [[SkewedPriorities mostly just upset that their playtime has been ruined]].

* AdultFear: The serial child killer. The kids (naturally) don't take the issue very seriously and are [[SkewedPriorities mostly just upset that their playtime has been ruined]].

* FiveTokenBand: April and Toby are white (the latter with a Hispanic surname and turns out to be one-quarter {{UsefulNotes/Romani}}), Melanie and Marshall are black, and Elizabeth and Ken are Asian. But SomeAnvilsNeedToBeDropped. The novel was written back when Uhura was making waves by sitting on the bridge of the ''[[Series/StarTrekTheOriginalSeries Enterprise]]'' and saying "Hailing frequencies open, sir."

* CelebrityResemblance: The impetus for inviting Elizabeth into the game: in profile she looks like the famous statue of Nefertiti.

* TheSixties: Written and set in the '60s