Little Brother

"No, no, Marcus is more aspirational than autobiographical," laughs Cory Doctorow about the 17-year-old hero of his newest science fiction novel, Little Brother (Fenn). Principled, literate, brave and, above all, technologically savvy, Marcus puts pebbles in his shoes to fool his school's "gait recognition" software, chats with friends on an IMParanoid messaging program, and takes on the Department of Homeland Security's Orwellian surveillance system in the name of liberty. "He's the teen we all would have liked to have been," says Doctorow, 36, who nevertheless bristles at the thought that Marcus is too unrealistic: "People have said, 'C'mon, no teenager reads Jane Jacobs'; I read Jane Jacobs when I was a teenager!"

Check out the entire article here
And this page about the book