copies of the book were made and distributed
this way. *Hundreds* of *thousands*.

Today, I release my second novel, and my third [
http://www.argosymag.com/NextIssue.html ], a collaboration with Charlie Stross
is due any day, and two [
http://www.fantasticmetropolis.com/show.html?fn.preview_doctorow ] more [
http://www.craphound.com/usrbingodexcerpt.txt ] are under contract. My career as
a novelist is now well underway -- in other words, I am firmly afoot on a long
road that stretches into the future: my future, science fiction's future,
publishing's future and the future of the world.

The future is my business, more or less. I'm a science fiction writer. One way
to know the future is to look good and hard at the present. Here's a thing I've
noticed about the present: MORE PEOPLE ARE READING MORE WORDS OFF OF MORE
SCREENS THAN EVER BEFORE. Here's another thing I've noticed about the present:
FEWER PEOPLE ARE READING FEWER WORDS OFF OF FEWER PAGES THAN EVER BEFORE. That
doesn't mean that the book is *dying* -- no more than the advent of the printing
press and the de-emphasis of Bible-copying monks meant that the book was dying
-- but it does mean that the book is changing. I think that *literature* is
alive and well: we're reading our brains out! I just think that the complex
social practice of "book" -- of which a bunch of paper pages between two covers
is the mere expression -- is transforming and will transform further.

I intend on figuring out what it's transforming into. I intend on figuring out
the way that some writers -- that *this writer*, right here, wearing my
underwear -- is going to get rich and famous from his craft. I intend on
figuring out how *this writer's* words can become part of the social discourse,
can be relevant in the way that literature at its best can be.

I don't know what the future of book looks like. To figure it out, I'm doing
some pretty basic science. I'm peering into this opaque, inscrutable system of
publishing as it sits in the year 2004, and I'm making a perturbation. I'm
stirring the pot to see what surfaces, so that I can see if the system reveals
itself to me any more thoroughly as it roils. Once that happens, maybe I'll be
able to formulate an hypothesis and try an experiment or two and maybe -- just
maybe -- I'll get to the bottom of book-in-2004 and beat the competition to
making it work, and maybe I'll go home with all (or most) of the marbles.

It's a long shot, but I'm