I must have been living under a rock, because although I had read the name “Cory Doctorow” online a few times in the past, I really didn’t know who he was or what he was about, until I stumbled upon his book “Little Brother”….

It was earlier this year, on a normal week night around 10:00 pm. Somehow I got directed over to the CrapHound.com web site, and quite randomly chose to click over to Little Brother. I started reading, got sucked in, and didn’t stop until I was done. I read the whole thing in a few hours, finishing up around 3:00 am.

The publishing of this book was interesting to me: the whole thing could be read online for free. I wondered how Cory expected to ever make any money from it. But after reading Little Brother online, now I know I’m going to purchase a physical copy of it, just so I can share it. I know that I could e-mail my friends a link to the book online, and I have, but many of them just won’t read a book online. In the past I’ve freely given away my books to friends, with no expectation that they return them to me. Life is just too short, I don’t think I’m ever going to re-read most books.

The subject of the book, the material that really drew me in, was just how easy it was for “the state” to harass and eventually imprison anyone for essentially doing nothing wrong. I’ve felt this in real life for years now. I’ve seen real life cases of police and government really messing up the lives of innocent people. Maher Arar and David Milgaard easily come to mind, I’m sure that there are hundreds more.

If you choose to read it, I hope that you get as much out of Cory Doctorow’s book as I did.