The story of John Carmack and John Romero, archetypes of the hacker and the gamer. The book follows a similar arc to many rock biographies.

There is a steady rise to rock star status, a life of fame, the price of hubris, and its aftermath. Carmack comes across as a brilliant programmer, but obsessed with work and lacking in empathy. Romero is written as a man with an intimate understanding of what makes games fun, but a tendency to try and do everything at once all the time. The story is like a tragedy where you watch these flaws become their undoing.

Worth a read if you've never heard the story. It was all news to me. The whole thing feels a little too neat and I have to wonder what was left out, but that's an Internet search for another time.