Triple Ought was the name first, but now it's always known as TEOTWAWKI. The novel the survivalists treat as their bible was first circulated by email and downloaded from the Web. It's not online any more, as it is about to come out in book form, published by Huntington House.
"The draft edition (27 chapters long) was titled Triple Ought," the author, James Rawles says. "It was formerly distributed via the Web. During the 18 months it was available, more than 82,000 people downloaded it. It was housed on 11 different sites. These included nine mirror sites in the United States, and one in Northern Ireland."
The book is the story of a group of friends who retreat to the fastnesses of Idaho after a societal collapse, and defend themselves against a variety of attacks. "It was described by one reviewer as `a survival manual . . . fairly neatly dressed as fiction' ," says Rawles. "It is set in the near future and involves a nearly total global socio-economic collapse. The main characters are a group of late-20s survivalists that ride out the hard times at a well-armed and well-provisioned retreat in northern Idaho."
It's a book heavy on useful information if you're into that kind of thing, but a little light on plot and characterisation.
"With the current media attention on the looming Y2K crisis, the novel is bound to be a fast seller," Rawles writes hopefully. Might come in handy, at that. American survivalists are snapping up the virtual version.