News You Can Bruise for 2006 June 25 (entry 0)

Sun Jun 25 2006 00:29 Lucky Wander Boy: I've had this book for a long time, but I held off reading it because I knew it had thematic overlap with the story I just finished. I didn't want to accidentally plagiarize it, or always be second-guessing myself about similarities.

Now I've read it and I'm happy to report that there's not much overlap. It's true that these are the only two pieces of fiction I know of that use MAME as a dramatic device, but the purpose is totally different. I would actually say this book is closer to Frog/Antifrog.

Okay, about the book itself. The middle is a Douglas Coupland-esque slog, but the beginning is fun and the end has a twist that I should have seen coming but didn't. Good job--the best kind of twist. Plus, there's a tiny piece of exposition hidden in the book that makes the central reveal semi-plausible sci-fi instead of squishy novel mysticism. I think many people who didn't like the ending missed that piece of exposition. But I say, thanks for including it, D. B. Weiss.