The Impossible Fortress

It all starts with 14-year-old Billy and his friends scheming to get their hands on the Vanna White edition of Playboy magazine, and, not surprisingly, it all goes downhill from there, as Billy readily admits. It's 1987, when computers are still running BASIC and the Internet as we know it does not exist. But there's sex, drugs, and rock and roll—and computer games. During the boys' first harebrained scheme to acquire the magazine, Billy is intrigued by Mary, a girl he notices programming on one of the display computers in the store. The two strike up a tentative friendship as they rewrite Billy's computer game, the Impossible Fortress, for submission in a gaming contest. By now Billy has completely lost interest in the magazine heist and begins to believe that he might have a chance at winning the contest and the girl. But his buddies get caught up in ever more elaborate and ultimately dangerous scenarios, eventually dragging Billy down with them. Teens will relate to the protagonist and his friends as they stumble their way through the byzantine world of high school, girls, and their own dawning sexuality. Chapter headings include a section of code, which will attract aspiring programmers, and there is a live version of the game available on the author's website.