diff --git a/nbt.cabal b/nbt.cabal
--- a/nbt.cabal
+++ b/nbt.cabal
@@ -1,5 +1,5 @@
 Name:                nbt
-Version:             0.2
+Version:             0.3
 Synopsis:            A parser/serializer for Minecraft's Named Binary Tag (NBT) data format.
 Description:         This package includes a data type for the NBT file format, notably used to represent saved data in Minecraft.
 Homepage:            https://github.com/acfoltzer/nbt
@@ -29,8 +29,7 @@
   Exposed-modules:     Data.NBT
   hs-source-dirs:      src
   Build-depends:       base == 4.*, 
-                       binary == 0.5.*,
                        bytestring == 0.9.*,
-                       data-binary-ieee754 == 0.4.*,
+                       cereal >= 0.3.4 && < 0.4,
                        utf8-string == 0.3.*
-  ghc-options:         -Wall -O2
+  ghc-options:         -Wall 
diff --git a/src/Data/NBT.hs b/src/Data/NBT.hs
--- a/src/Data/NBT.hs
+++ b/src/Data/NBT.hs
@@ -19,22 +19,22 @@
 
 module Data.NBT where
 
-import Data.Binary ( 
-    Binary (..)
+import Data.Serialize ( 
+    Serialize (..)
   , getWord8
   , putWord8 
   )
-import Data.Binary.Get ( 
+import Data.Serialize.Get ( 
     Get
-  , getLazyByteString
+  , getByteString
   , lookAhead
   , skip
   )
-import Data.Binary.Put ( putLazyByteString )
-import Data.Binary.IEEE754
+import Data.Serialize.Put ( putByteString )
+import Data.Serialize.IEEE754
 
-import qualified Data.ByteString.Lazy as B
-import qualified Data.ByteString.Lazy.UTF8 as UTF8 ( fromString, toString )
+import qualified Data.ByteString as B
+import qualified Data.ByteString.UTF8 as UTF8 ( fromString, toString )
 import Data.Int ( Int8, Int16, Int32, Int64 )
 
 import Control.Applicative ( (<$>) )
@@ -55,7 +55,7 @@
              | CompoundType
                deriving (Show, Eq, Enum)
 
-instance Binary TagType where
+instance Serialize TagType where
     get = fmap (toEnum . fromIntegral) getWord8
     put = putWord8 . fromIntegral . fromEnum
 
@@ -75,7 +75,7 @@
          | CompoundTag  (Maybe String) [NBT]
            deriving (Show, Eq)
 
-instance Binary NBT where
+instance Serialize NBT where
   get = get >>= \ty ->
     case ty of
       EndType       -> return EndTag
@@ -107,11 +107,11 @@
       getDouble n = DoubleTag n <$> getFloat64be
       getByteArray n = do
         len <- get :: Get Int32
-        ByteArrayTag n len <$> getLazyByteString (toEnum $ fromEnum len)
+        ByteArrayTag n len <$> getByteString (toEnum $ fromEnum len)
       getString n = do
         len <- get :: Get Int16
         StringTag n len <$> UTF8.toString 
-                        <$> getLazyByteString (toEnum $ fromEnum len)
+                        <$> getByteString (toEnum $ fromEnum len)
       getList n = do
         ty  <- get :: Get TagType
         len <- get :: Get Int32
@@ -176,17 +176,17 @@
       CompoundTag Nothing ts      -> putCompound ts
     where
       -- name and payload helpers
-      putName n           = putString n
+      putName             = putString
       putByte             = put
       putShort            = put
       putInt              = put
       putLong             = put
       putFloat            = putFloat32be
       putDouble           = putFloat64be
-      putByteArray len bs = put len >> putLazyByteString bs
+      putByteArray len bs = put len >> putByteString bs
       putString str       = let bs = UTF8.fromString str 
                                 len = fromIntegral (B.length bs)
-                            in put (len :: Int16) >> putLazyByteString bs
+                            in put (len :: Int16) >> putByteString bs
       putList ty len ts   = put ty >> put len >> forM_ ts put
       putCompound ts      = forM_ ts put >> put EndTag
 
diff --git a/test/Tests.hs b/test/Tests.hs
--- a/test/Tests.hs
+++ b/test/Tests.hs
@@ -5,9 +5,10 @@
 import Data.NBT
 
 import qualified Codec.Compression.GZip as GZip
-import qualified Data.ByteString.Lazy as B
-import Data.Binary ( Binary (..), decode, encode )
-import qualified Data.ByteString.Lazy.UTF8 as UTF8 ( fromString, toString )
+import qualified Data.ByteString as B
+import qualified Data.ByteString.Lazy as L
+import Data.Serialize ( Serialize (..), decode, encode )
+import qualified Data.ByteString.UTF8 as UTF8 ( fromString, toString )
 
 import Control.Applicative
 import Control.Monad
@@ -22,8 +23,10 @@
 instance Arbitrary TagType where
     arbitrary = toEnum <$> choose (0, 10)
 
+eitherErr = either error id
+
 prop_TagType :: TagType -> Bool
-prop_TagType ty = decode (encode ty) == ty
+prop_TagType ty = eitherErr (decode (encode ty)) == ty
 
 instance Arbitrary NBT where
   arbitrary = do
@@ -59,15 +62,15 @@
     mkArb ty (Just name)
 
 prop_NBTroundTrip :: NBT -> Bool
-prop_NBTroundTrip nbt = decode (encode nbt) == nbt
+prop_NBTroundTrip nbt = eitherErr (decode (encode nbt)) == nbt
 
 testWorld = do
-  fileL <- GZip.decompress <$> B.readFile "testWorld/level.dat"
-  let file = B.pack (B.unpack fileL)
-      dec = (decode file :: NBT)
+  fileL <- GZip.decompress <$> L.readFile "testWorld/level.dat"
+  let file = B.pack (L.unpack fileL)
+      dec = eitherErr (decode file) :: NBT
       enc = encode dec
   enc @?= file 
-  decode enc @?= dec
+  eitherErr (decode enc) @?= dec
 
 tests = [
     testProperty "Tag roundtrip" prop_TagType
diff --git a/test/nbt-tests.cabal b/test/nbt-tests.cabal
--- a/test/nbt-tests.cabal
+++ b/test/nbt-tests.cabal
@@ -12,7 +12,7 @@
   Main-is:	       Tests.hs
   Build-depends:       base == 4.*,
                        bytestring == 0.9.*,
-                       binary == 0.5.*,
+                       cereal >= 0.3.4 && < 0.4,
                        zlib == 0.5.*,
                        utf8-string == 0.3.*,
                        HUnit == 1.2.*,
@@ -20,4 +20,4 @@
                        test-framework == 0.4.*,
                        test-framework-quickcheck2 == 0.2.*,
                        test-framework-hunit == 0.2.*,
-                       nbt
+                       nbt == 0.3