Little Brother

Okay, so I've been a boing-boinger since I figured out how to use a feed-reader, and thus a big fan of Cory Doctorow's for quite a while now. From what I've read, Cory's an interesting guy and I've always enjoyed reading his posts. I'm particularly taken with his view of Creative Commons, and enjoyed reading his rants on the subject over the years.

I was hoping to hold out on LITTLE BROTHER, Doctorow's YA novel until it came out in paperback, but at Meg & Shelley's Orca book launch last week, I succumbed and bought the hard cover.

Man. Money well-spent.

I was up until 2 am last night, finishing the story. Quite un-putdownable, I have to admit. LITTLE BROTHER is a near-future, dystopian look at what happens when the rock of terrorism meets the hard place of human rights. It's a bit of a polemic on the whole hard-line response to the war on terror; pro-technology but anti-information over-load, and owes a lot to the thought processes one Eric Blair incited in a young Doctorow mind, after reading 1984. Fast-paced, exciting and thoughtful at the same time. I really enjoyed it.

If you check out THIS LINK, you'll find a FREE downloadable version of the text of LITTLE BROTHER, in any number of readable formats, as set up by his many fans. Why does he give away his book for free, when he clearly also needs to sell it to make a living? Here's his explanation -- and it ties in closely with his views on Creative Commons.

Okay -- off to get a glimpse of a few other artists at work. More soon!

~kc