For The Win- Cory Doctorow

My post for today covers a book I've read three times so far.
FTW by Cory Doctorow

I've included the book jacket copy from Corys website:

In the virtual future, you must organize to survive
At any hour of the day or night, millions of people around the globe are engrossed in multiplayer online games, questing and battling to win virtual “gold,” jewels, and precious artifacts. Meanwhile, others seek to exploit this vast shadow economy, running electronic sweatshops in the world’s poorest countries, where countless “gold farmers,” bound to their work by abusive contracts and physical threats, harvest virtual treasure for their employers to sell to First World gamers who are willing to spend real money to skip straight to higher-level gameplay.
Mala is a brilliant 15-year-old from rural India whose leadership skills in virtual combat have earned her the title of “General Robotwalla.” In Shenzen, heart of China’s industrial boom, Matthew is defying his former bosses to build his own successful gold-farming team. Leonard, who calls himself Wei-Dong, lives in Southern California, but spends his nights fighting virtual battles alongside his buddies in Asia, a world away. All of these young people, and more, will become entangled with the mysterious young woman called Big Sister Nor, who will use her experience, her knowledge of history, and her connections with real-world organizers to build them into a movement that can challenge the status quo.
The ruthless forces arrayed against them are willing to use any means to protect their power—including blackmail, extortion, infiltration, violence, and even murder. To survive, Big Sister’s people must out-think the system. This will lead them to devise a plan to crash the economy of every virtual world at once—a Ponzi scheme combined with a brilliant hack that ends up being the biggest, funnest game of all.

This book covers a lot of ground and while it is listed as a Young Adult book, I would recommend it to ANYBODY interested in learning something new. One of my favorite parts of this book is the surprising economics lesson you receive. There’s a lot of money in play and the plot is entangled in the intricacies of markets and both virtual and real. It is necessary to the plot to know a little about how these things work.

His characters are believable and complex. They are fallible  interesting and sometimes distasteful, and FTW doesn't offer simple redemption or punishment, but satisfying and real conclusions for each of them. They are from all around the world, but then that’s the beauty of the internet, paths can cross without either person needing to leave their chair and Doctorow handles the multiple cultural and linguistic collisions well.

Another great part of the book, that pairs up (obviously) with the economics is the organisation of labor into unions. As a union member myself (shoutout to my brothers and sisters) I feel strongly about workers rights no matter where they may be, or what they may do.

Some of you (geekier people) may recognize the name Cory Doctorow. He is a co-editor for BoingBoing.
Aside from writing posts on one of my favorite websites, and writing fantastically engrossing books he is also a force to be reckoned with in the world of copywrite law. And as such has made every single one of his books free to download as an Epub.

If you are interested in reading FTW, please check it out here: http://craphound.com/ftw/download/

If you're not making art with the intention of having it copied, you're not really making art for the twenty first century-- Cory Doctorow

The Casual Vacancy

The Casual Vacancy by J.K. Rowling (yes THAT J.K. Rowling)

The novel covers the death of a local Councillor, Barry Fairbrother, who croaks in the parking lot of a local golf course. As news spreads throughout town, chaos ensues. The problem arises in deciding whether the estate "The Fields" (which includes a methadone clinic, Bellchapel) should remain as part of Town.

After the election date is announced, the children of those who are standing for election decide to make damaging posts on the Councils online forum. Andrew, is the first person to do so, operating under the name "The_Ghost_Of_Barry_Fairbrother" and informing everyone on the forum that his father had bought a stolen computer. Sukhvinder follows, posting that her mother, Dr. Parminder Jawanda, was in love with Barry. Thirdly, Fats Wall posts, claiming his dad Cubby, diddled a kid.

This book also follows Krystal Weedon. Krystal lives in The Fields with her mother Terri who is a hooker and dope fiend, and brother Robbie. Kay, ( the obligitory Social worker) is determined for Terri to stop her druggie ways and take responsibility for the care of Robbie, however, Terri relapses (of course) and her drug-dealer ends up raping Krystal. Obviously fucked up from yet another traumatic experience in her life. Krystal has hooks up with Fats in an attempt to become preggers. It is during one of these hook-ups that Robbie runs away from the pair in a park, eventually falling and drowning in a river, despite Sukhvinder's attempt to save him. Krystal is so distraught she kills herself via heroin overdose, the novel culminating with her funeral.

The novels major themes were Politics, Class, and Social Issues (such as drugs).
All of which Ms. Rowling, should be able to write about properly, as she was living in the lowest caste of society without being homeless prior to her HP being published.

I feel this book is more CRASS than CLASS. I don't think I went two pages without being assaulted by more "fucks" and "arse" than was even close to necessary for the point of the narrative. I really hope J.K. doesn't stop writing, but I do hope this book comes off the top sellers charts. I feel this book has stayed up there due to her previous achievements.

This is J.K.'s first attempt at an adult book, and it kinda shows. Now please don't get me wrong. I loved her HP series. So much in fact, that when I was last in Orlando I spent a large part of my time at Universal Studios IN the new Hogwarts section.

I was hoping to make my first "official" book review to be something awesome. I guess I was disappointed twice.

I will now leave you with some photos of Hogwarts in Universal Studios.