Our good friend and Blogcritic John Scalzi has great and interesting news: he published a sci-fi novel in serial form on his website last month, now the book has been picked up by a publisher for "traditional" publication. This is excellent news for John and for the free publication of original content on the Internet in general:

Instead of being available as shareware, Old Man's War will be available either later this year or early next year in a hardcover edition from Tor Books, publishers of (among others) Orson Scott Card, Robert Jordan, Steven Brust and Teddy Roosevelt. Yes, really, Teddy Roosevelt. It's a reissue, I think, not one of those L. Ron Hubbard-eqsue "dictating from beyond the grave" situations.

Am I happy? What a silly question. I'm just glad this is a text medium, so you can't see the footprints on my desk from where I was dancing on it (yes, I could make a little videocam movie. But, no). And it's actually a two book deal, so I get to write at least one more novel and have someone pay me for it. As they say, it beats a sharp poke in the eye. Or in the groin. Or just about anywhere else, for that matter. Sharp poking: Bad. Two book deal: Good.

I'm also pleased to say that the book deal comes as a direct result of having the book up here on the Web site; the editor who made the offer (Patrick Nielsen Hayden, who in addition to being the Senior Editor of Tor is the author of the Electrolite blog) did so after reading chapters on the site and then downloading the complete book.

Amazing, didn't even know the Electrolite dude was a publisher. Heartiest congrats to John and to Patrick - John's previous sci-fi novel Agent to the Stars is available here.