Book, slacker, game. Arrrgh! Give me a clue!

February 22, 2009 4:19 AM

Does this book exist or did I imagine it? It was a book of fiction about a 20(30?)-something loser who's working on an obsessive (and as yet unpublished) encyclopedia of every arcade game ever made, or something similar...

...He probably gets some kind of wake-up call to do something with his life, goes through some kind of learning experience, grows and becomes a better person for it, etc. etc., I'm sure. I'm fairly certain it was published only within the last couple of years. I picked it up from the table at Borders that had all the other books about aimless young people trying to find their place in life and so forth and such crap.

Help? Googling any amount of "loser", "slacker", "game", "arcade", "encyclopedia", and "fiction" isn't helping. Pardon the grumpy tone. This is getting me really frustrated because it sounded like a pretty mediocre book when I read the dust jacket at the time and now I'm compelled to search it out to find whether it was in fact as stupid as it sounded.

posted by twins named Lugubrious and Salubrious to Writing & Language (3 answers total)

Best answer: I can't believe I know this.

"...He's nearing thirty, but feckless Adam Pennyman has finally found a purpose: The Catalogue of Obsolete Entertainments, his encyclopedic analysis of every videogame ever made. His research hits a snag with Lucky Wander Boy, the surreal epic videogame that ruled his world years ago."

Lucky Wander Boy even has a Wikipedia page and web site.
posted by amtho at 5:06 AM on February 22, 2009

Response by poster: Oh my God. Thank you.
posted by twins named Lugubrious and Salubrious at 5:40 AM on February 22, 2009

Please call me "amtho" when we're, you know, on the internet.

Truly, I didn't enjoy the book that much, but I hope you like it.
posted by amtho at 6:24 AM on February 22, 2009