A story told through phenomenal art and haunting, fragmented bits of writing that complement each other perfectly -- I found it a superbly immersive experience: a bit like a nostalgic cinematic treat, a lot like a quest room puzzle. The vintage cyberpunk America of people hooked to VR though myriads of wires that sustain them like umbilical cords comes off absolutely fresh, recognizable and strange at the same time. A melancholy, sepia-tinted narration builds up and releases in a way that leaves more questions that answers, but not unsatisfyingly: it takes you on a journey and lets you observe & come to conclusions as you will. Also gives you a fuckton of West Coast road trip feelings (sob).

Did I spend the rest of the afternoon frantically pulling all threads on reddit that could explain to me what happened? I did, and I can say the opinions of the internets are sure diverged: people paying attention to different things leads to vastly different takes on what the story was. Isn’t that great in and out of itself?

Read it and talk to me about it! Or at least check out some of the illustrations from the book.