diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..8252341
--- /dev/null
+++ b/README.md
@@ -0,0 +1,97 @@
+# Ginger
+
+A scripted lisp language with simple syntax, immutable data structures, concurrency built-in, and
+minimal time between starting the runtime and actual execution.
+
+# Syntax
+
+Ginger is a lisp language, so knowing the syntax is as simple as knowing the data structures.
+
+## Strings
+
+Strings are declared two different ways. The standard way, with double quotes:
+```
+"this is a string\n <- that was a newline, \t \r \0 \" \\ also work
+literal whitespace characters are properly parsed as well
+\s is a space"
+```
+
+The second way only works if your string contains exclusively the following characters:
+`a-z A-Z 0-9 _ - ! ?` (spaces added for readability)
+```
+neat
+this_works
+so-does-this!
+what-about-this?_YUP!
+```
+
+## Integers
+
+Integers are defined the standard way, a bunch of numbers with an optional negative. The only
+interesting thing is that commas inside the number are ignored, so you can make your literals pretty:
+```
+0
+1
+-2
+4,000,000
+```
+
+## Floats
+
+Pretty much the same as integers, but with a period thrown in there. If there isn't a period, it's not
+a float:
+```
+0.0
+-1.5
+-1,003.004,333,203
+```
+
+## Bytes
+
+Singular unsigned bytes, are also supported. There are two ways to declare them. With a trailing `b`:
+```
+0b
+10b
+255b
+```
+
+and with a `'` followed by a character (or escaped character):
+```
+'c
+'h
+'\n
+'\\
+''
+```
+
+## Vectors
+
+A vector is a sequence of elements wrapped in `[ ... ]` (no commas):
+```
+[ a b 0 1 2
+    [embedded also works]
+]
+```
+
+## Lists
+
+A list is a sequence of elements wrapped in `( ... )` (no commas):
+```
+( a b 0 1 2
+    [embedded also works]
+    (and mixed types)
+)
+```
+
+## Maps
+
+A map is a sequence of elements wrapped in `{ ... }`. There must be an even number of elements, and
+there is no delimeter between the keys and values. Keys can be any non-sequence variable, values can
+be anything at all:
+```
+{ a 1
+  b 2
+  c [1 2 3]
+  d (four five six)
+  e { 7 seven } }
+```
diff --git a/parse.go b/parse.go
index 1a21947..11b023d 100644
--- a/parse.go
+++ b/parse.go
@@ -64,6 +64,7 @@ var SpecialCharsMap = map[byte]byte{
                         'n' : '\n',
                         'r' : '\r',
                         't' : '\t',
+                        's' : ' ',
                         '0' : 0,
                       }