Makers by Cory Doctorow

MAKE columnist and Boing Boing super-blogger, Cory Doctorow, has just released his latest novel, called Makers(!) I just got my copy and tucked into it. So far, so awesome. Cory’s books always crackle with such amazing ideas, technological and cultural hacks, that seem just over the horizon, or already in some sketchy warehouse or nerd’s basement, just on the other side of town. Makers is no exception.

Cory says, of his latest effort:

Today is the launch of my new novel, Makers, a book about people who hack hardware, business-models, and living arrangements to discover ways of staying alive and happy even when the economy is falling down the toilet. Weirdly, I wrote it years before the current econopocalypse, as a parable about the amazing blossoming of creativity and energy that I saw in Silicon Valley after the dotcom crash, after all the money dried up.

As with all my previous novels, the whole book is available as a free, Creative Commons download, under a NonCommercial-ShareAlike license that allows you to remix it to your heart’s content and share the book and your mixes noncommercially. And as with my last two books, I’ve created a unique donations program that connects generous people with schools, universities, libraries, shelters, prisons and other cash-strapped institutions.

Publisher’s Weekly writes:

In this tour de force, Doctorow (Little Brother) uses the contradictions of two overused SF themes–the decline and fall of America and the boundless optimism of open source/hacker culture–to draw one of the most brilliant reimaginings of the near future since cyberpunk wore out its mirror shades. Perry Gibbons and Lester Banks, typical brilliant geeks in a garage, are trash-hackers who find inspiration in the growing pile of technical junk. Attracting the attention of suits and smart reporter Suzanne Church, the duo soon get involved with cheap and easy 3D printing, a cure for obesity and crowd-sourced theme parks. The result is bitingly realistic and miraculously avoids cliché or predictability. While dates and details occasionally contradict one another, Doctorow’s combination of business strategy, brilliant product ideas and laugh-out-loud moments of insight will keep readers powering through this quick-moving tale.

Congrats, Cory!

Here’s the book’s website.