Free Trip to Vegas

Until the end of the day on February 29, you can download a free electronic copy of Charles Bock's novel Beautiful Children, a Dickensian trawl through the seamy side of Las Vegas. Click here for details.

Why? My theory is twofold: a) Random House wants to get folks talking about the novel, and b) they're testing to see just what the market for electronic books actually might be. The first goal is easily accomplished, but I'm not sure giving away a PDF is the way to go for electronic distribution. The Kindle aside, the emerging market for ebooks seems to be cell phones--see news on that here and here.--David E