The extent of my interest, knowledge of and participation in games is limited to traditional board games which get wheeled out at Christmas or social settings where conversation is likely to be stilted or limited. Actually there haven't been many of those lately, so I suppose that's good, but it seems that I'm missing out on a world of wonder, fun and simple play.

Tim Clare is a journalist who regularly contributes reviews of new board games for a couple of magazines dedicated to the subject, but he's also written for the 'Guardian' and other papers. And he's written novels and memoirs, too. 

I spoke to him this week for an article which is due to appear in a Christmas issue of 'Norfolk' magazine. Yes, we're working on Christmas in August. 

The book is much more than a romp through the various popular games and how they came into existence, which is what I anticipated when I picked it up. He does include details of how Monopoly was invented 90 years ago and why, he says, there are so many better games to play today. But he also traces games through the centuries, and even ancient civilisations. It is fascinating!

He describes how playing cards would hide messages in the war for spies and to enable prisoners to escape. He tells of how the throw of a dice would determine your fate if convicted of a crime. And he explains why, though games are considered valuable because they can improve our creativity, numeracy, diplomatic skills, problem-solving abilities or protect us against mental breakdown, their truth worth is in the fact that they enable us to have fun, to play. It's a great book and has left me determined to find some more games to play.