Welcome to the monthly meeting of the io9 Book Club. In May, we read Austin Grossman's YOU. Jump into comments to get started talking about it! » 6/04/13 5:02pm 6/04/13 5:02pm

With his first novel, Soon I Will Be Invincible, Austin Grossman brought dark, neurotic humor to the superhero genre. With YOU, a semi-realistic novel about a young videogame designer, he does something more profound. His characters' identities are forged during gameplay, so they can only come to terms with the past… » 4/18/13 11:13pm 4/18/13 11:13pm

Like many of us, Austin Grossman has lived with video games his whole life. But, like a lot fewer of us, he went on make them, working as a writer and a designer on beloved titles like Deus Ex and Dishonored. Yesterday, his literary love letter to the medium—a novel called You—hit screens and bookstore shelves all… » 4/17/13 2:30pm 4/17/13 2:30pm

If you’ve ever thought that it’s long past time that someone wrote a novel about people who make video games, then rejoice. YOU—a book of fiction about the how, why and who of video game development by Austin Grossman—comes out today. You can read an excerpt from the book’s first chapter right here. » 4/16/13 12:00pm 4/16/13 12:00pm

What do people really know about how video games get made? Sure, today's players know that games get designed, drawn, produced and tested. That's more than their forebears. Still, the idea of what drives people to make games—other than the fact that it seems like a fun thing to do—remains one that continues to feel… » 10/15/12 3:30pm 10/15/12 3:30pm

Pro tip for anyone wanting to write a video game: "If it's longer than a tweet, a character should probably not be saying it in the play of a game." » 10/11/12 2:30pm 10/11/12 2:30pm