Glory Street and Oblivion Avenue: A year in the lives of two brothers, from the dawn of email - Paperback

It's September 15, 1995, at the dawn of the internet: Reagan Pufall sends his first email to his brother Kevin. The subject line: "Message in a bottle." The message: "This is a test of the internet e-mail system. Had this been a real e-mail message, you would be reading something interesting or entertaining at this time. This has only been a test."

What follows is an outpouring of online conversation between the two brothers, lifelong best friends, as they explore wide-ranging topics, question each other's beliefs and choices, support each other in dealing with life's challenges, and make fun of each other and themselves. Join them as they venture into the Internet in its infancy, with sluggish and unreliable connections, but also its promise of connectivity and easy access to information. Experience the early days of online providers Prodigy and AOL, featuring the new technology called e-mail.

Glory Street and Oblivion Avenue covers exciting topics like:

• Hacking a Net
• Chaotic Racing Around and Hollering
• Lack of Specificity Syndrome
• Good Things About Life in the Nineties
• Compound Zen
• Murmuring Voices in Your Head
• Kick the Can
• Dead Bald Cyclops
• Saltines and 7-Up
• What Not to do When You're Depressed
• Lucky Rocketship Underwear

Glory Street and Oblivion Avenue asks the questions no one else will:

• "How big is big?"
• "Should cheese really be considered a food?"
• "What's the deal with science?"
• "Where are those darn bootstraps?"
• "How many dizbusters does it take to screw in a lightbulb?"
• "What's the worst thing you can call a man?"
• "Why am I talking to myself?"

Glory Street and Oblivion Avenue explores a wide range of subjects including:

• Happiness: "When I'm feeling blue, I just rush immediately to the mirror, and there I am, not blue at all, but sort of a salmon color"
• Literature: "The modern reader wants the wildlife element in his fiction, and will not feel he has gotten his money's worth without it"
• Parenting: "Why can't childhood be as sweet as my children are?"
• Humor: "Apparently my moral code does not preclude the use of hackneyed sarcasm in a lame attempt to humorously deflect a serious inquiry"
• Politics: "The problem with populism is that most politicians who call themselves populists are really ignorant demagogues"
• Personal improvement: "I want to be carpe-ing diems on a more or less per diem basis"
• Language: "Your comment about word inflation was the most insightful and penetrating analysis I have ever read"

Glory Street and Oblivion Avenue opens a window on a dynamic stage of life and an intriguing moment in history. It is the story of two brothers who set out to write to each other and ended up writing a book.