First Book Published Via Twitter
Updated : Jul 15, 2009
An American writer who failed to find a publisher for his novel is putting the book on Twitter -- 140 characters at a time.
Matt Stewart, a San Francisco-based novelist, began "tweeting" his first book, "The French Revolution," on the micro-blogging service on Tuesday -- appropriately Bastille Day.
"As far as I can tell, I'm the first person to release a completed full-length literary novel on Twitter," Stewart wrote on his website, thefrenchrev.com.
"Loosely structured on the greatest identity crisis ever, The French Revolution tells the story of a San Francisco family forging its place in history," he said.
Stewart said putting the book on Twitter was a "social experiment" to "see how the world reacts to a long-form tale told in snippets."
He also acknowledged that he had been unable to find a publisher.
"My agent submitted The French Revolution to all the major publishing houses," Stewart said.
"Many of them loved it, but none were willing to buy what they viewed as a 'risky' novel -- vivid language, elements of fantasy and farce, raunchy humor," he said.
Stewart said it would take approximately 3,700 "tweets" to transmit all of the 480,000 characters in his book.
He admitted it was unlikely that "anybody'll weed through all my tweets" and for more conventional readers, is offering the book for free on Scribd.com or for 1.99 dollars on Amazon's electronic book reader, the Kindle.
Stewart also said he is already at work on his next novel, "Duct Tape," which he said is about a "homeless man in search of his imaginary son."
