Author's Note: This essay is pretty dated, but it still contains some good information. The Blithe House Quarterly stopped publishing several years ago.

I love reading fiction. I'm like you, gentle reader, someone who disappears for hours into a book or magazine. I love the feel of the paper and the general sense of absurdity and wonder that comes from seeing words on a page turn into believable worlds.

I also love writing fiction. I love to form words by placing ink on white paper with faint blue lines or by moving my fingers on a keyboard. I love knowing those words I strung together are being distributed and read—maybe enjoyed, maybe hated or ignored, but read.

Like the majority of writers I know, I also have a "day job." This job involves editing and publishing "content" for a Web company. Content, in Web parlance, refers to all the words you see when you visit a Web site, but the connotation is broader. The words must have meaning and structure as well. For hours each day, I'm immersed in all this content--as broad as it is wide and so deep that it stretches from my super-connected desktop to other desktops in China, India, South Africa, maybe even the North Pole. It's factual content mostly—information and news—but more creative content exists out there in cyberspace, too.

Therefore, naturally, the idea of fiction on the Web appeals to me. The Web has emerged as a new paradigm for publishing, allowing anyone with a browser and an Internet connection to make stories and even novels available to millions of people. No marketing dimwit deciding what can be distributed and what will be deemed "legitimate." Beyond the increased ease of publication and distribution, there is the tantalizing idea that the Web could cause a whole new type of fiction to emerge--non-linear and complex, whose cumulative power comes from the author's careful orchestration of multiple, related stories that can be read in any order and still make sense. This type of fiction would be written specifically for online delivery, taking full advantage of hyperlinks and navigation strategies unavailable to writers working in print.

It's a fascinating proposal, but one that I've had trouble picturing in any way except theoretically. What type of story could be told this way? How satisfying could it be? And how could it possibly make sense when the author has to give up control of the order of events and details? It's much easier to focus on the advantages of the Web as an alternative publishing mechanism for fiction that is meant to be read from beginning to end with nary a hyperlink in sight.

Yet, when most readers and writers hear the words "online fiction," they think of badly written science fiction posted on some geeky Web site. Web publishing of fiction seems to consist mostly of amateur efforts in the worse sense, a "hey kids, let's publish some stories" situation with little-to-no editorial intervention. And the words "gay online fiction" mostly brings to mind pornography—a seemingly endless number of gay porno archives where you can find a story about every possible peccadillo, fetish, aberration, or perversion.

It's not all Star Trek and big dicks out there in cyberspace, however. Besides a number of adventurous e-zines (too numerous and ephemeral to mention), there's an oasis for gay and lesbian fiction online called The Blithe House Quarterly.

Edited by Aldo Alvarez, Blithe House has been around for about two years and is the current star of gay and lesbian fiction online. It has an elegant look, a discerning eye for fresh and interesting writing, and features 8 or 9 short stories per issue. The line-up of writers the journal has published is impressive—John Gilgun, Jameson Currier, Daniel Curzon, Kevin Killian, Ruthann Robson, Alex Jeffers, D. Travers Scott, Leslea Newman, Felice Picano, David Watmough, as well as less familiar, but equally talented writers.

As a reader, I cherish The Blithe House Quarterly. The mix of gay male and lesbian writers helps me keep balanced. The current issue is always available to me. I just click a bookmark in my Web browser and I'm there. I don't have to find space on my bookshelves for the back issues, either. They're also a click or two away. I even am emailed whenever a new issue is published. All I have to do is sit at my computer and read any one of nine stories with every new issue.

I must confess, however. I don't read Blithe House Quarterly online. I print out the stories first, then read. News briefs, information bits, email, short articles with pictures—these are the things that can be read online, but not a sustained piece of fiction. In addition, reading fiction online is physically fatiguing (eyestrain from the flickering monitor, back aches from that not-so-comfortable desk chair) and sometimes seems, well, unnatural. Pages aren't a uniform length, sometimes scrolling endlessly. Paragraphs aren't indented. And there's the genuine pleasure I get from turning a page and progressing toward a work's end.

I've tried to read a whole story online. I'm drawn in by an intriguing opening, but soon, no matter how good the story, I end up scrolling down to see how long it is, wondering how much time it would take to read the story online, wonder how many pages it would be if I printed it out, or if it were in a book. If it were in a book, would it be a hardcover or paperback? Then I remember I was supposed to find out the name and author of a book I told my co-worker about, so I click over to Amazon.com and figure I'll print the story for later when I can get comfortable and read it at my leisure.

Relative to reading from printed pages, reading from a computer screen is still in its infancy. Think about the difference between reading from those awful early computer terminals--amber or green text on a black screen--and compare it to the much more book-like appearance of today's Web pages. Then imagine the next generation of electronic reading--something that looks and feels like a book. Each page is stored electronically, called up to the paper-thin screen as needed in a resolution so crisp and clear it looks…well…like a book. You could carry an entire library around with you and download new work for an electronically transferred fee.

It's already happening, but the devices are expensive and are still several years away from the technology that will make reading electronic text a pleasure.  It's not just the convenience of this approach that is appealing. When text can be stored and delivered in this way, when electronic books are portable and made for humans to read, then the real exploration of non-sequential fiction can begin. Imagine Vladimir Nabokov's Pale Fire, with its elaborate footnotes and annotations, presented as a creatively hyperlinked electronic book. Or picture yourself effortlessly jumping around Julio Cortizar's Hopscotch to your heart's content or spending hours clicking at random through Milorad Pavek's Dictionary of the Khazars—both the Male and Female Editions of that weird and wonderful book available to you at no extra charge.

These works, however, were written to appear in print, their non-linearity designed to work between two cloth or paper covers. So I was still left trying to imagine an electronically conceived, non-sequential work of fiction that is as satisfying as a printed work. I've seen a few attempts, but remained unimpressed until recently.

Geoff Ryman is a vastly talented fiction writer who has never been afraid to try something a little unusual. His deservedly acclaimed novel Was spans 114 years and deftly combines storylines involving the making of the film The Wizard of Oz, an imagined account of the real-life Dorothy Gale—abused by Uncle Henry and later committed to an insane asylum—and the story of a man dying from AIDS into a mesmerizing whole. Ryman has also written imaginative, literary science fiction as well as bleak, but emotionally charged shorter works, such as "O Happy Day," which describes a future where radical feminists rule and straight men are sent to die in concentration camps run by gay male prisoners.

So when Ryman turned his talents to creating a large work for the Web, I expected the result (www.ryman-novel.com) would be provocative. I just didn't expect it would be so funny, entertaining, and moving—even when read online. 253, or Tube Theater: a novel for the Internet about London Underground in seven cars and a crash tells the story of 253 people on a London underground train in the seven and a half minutes it takes the train to go from Embankment Station to Elephant and Castle Station on January 11th, 1995. Each person gets a page of 253 words divided into three sections: Outward appearance, Inside information, and What they are thinking and doing. Before the train reaches Elephant and Castle, however, it crashes into another train, killing or injuring many of the passengers.

The Web site allows you to start with the Journey Planner, which resembles the London Underground map. You can click on any one of the seven cars of the train and then click on any seat occupied by a character. Alternately, you can click on one of several topical references to throw you somewhere into the mix. Some characters are thinking about or are related to other characters, so a hyperlink can send you directly to the related character's page. Asides and footnotes abound, some goofy, some profound. Associated with each of the cars are satiric, self-referential advertisements, such as "Learn the Secrets of the Ancient Canadians," "Become an Author in Your Spare Time," and "Personal Ads: What You Really Need Other People For!"

Ryman informs the reader that "253 happens on January 11th 1995, which is the day I learned my best friend was dying of AIDS." Is this another random fact or does it hold the key to the novel? It's perhaps too neat and tidy to think that the emotional impact of the news sent Ryman off to play God with 253 fictional characters and create a disaster that never really happened. Whatever the impetus, the result is a work that appears as chaotic and vibrant as a subway station at rush hour, but is carefully crafted to create a world both realistic and fantastic. Businesspeople, thieves, and unemployed actors mingle with the ghost of William Blake, an amnesiac named Who?, and a woman who is actually Anne Frank, though she doesn't know it. Gays, straights, women, men, emigrants, and native Brits are all here, as is the author--an informative but ironic voice drifting in and out of the descriptions and asides. Ryman is a talented writer who obviously loves each of the 253 people he describes here.

This is how I entered the novel: after reading the ground rules ("Nothing much happens in this novel. It is ideal fare for invalids. Those seeking sensation are advised to select the End of the Line option."), I went to the Journey Planner and chose the topic "An American Werewolf." I was taken to Mr. Donald Varda ("Ebullient, 30, blond, plump, in a tight grey suit fashionable a decade ago") in Car One, who is "re-imagining the ending to An American Werewolf in London." Clicking on the underlined text took me to a note from the author explaining that after he wrote this section, he discovered that An American Werewolf in London had actually shown on cable television the night before the novel is supposed to have taken place. Going back to Donald, I read that he works at the Kennington Building Society. When I click on that link, I'm transported to Ms. Sabrina Foster in Car 6, who is a teller at Kennington and who has an advertisement in the Time Out personals, which is being read by Mr. Allan Majoram in Car Two. And so on and so on.

253 works because it embraces and plays with the online reader's short attention span and tendency to get distracted by peripheral information. It also mimics fast-paced, crowded urban reality where looking at a stranger on the subway can spark a prolonged reverie as you imagine who the person is and what they're thinking before your attention drifts to the advertisement posted above the stranger's head.  But the novel is also a vast, complex labyrinth. It draws you in and sends you off in scores of directions, though at any point you can jump to The End of the Line and face the inevitable crash.

You can also pick up a paperback version of the novel. It works well in print and has the advantage of being portable, so you can dip into it during those stolen moments on the bus or subway, but it seems clear to me that Ryman conceived 253 as an online experience—one he obviously enjoyed. He is accepting submissions for a sequel entitled Another One Along in a Minute, which deals with the people on another train stalled by the crash recounted in 253. Email him 300 words describing a character stuck in that train for 300 seconds. "Interactivity replaces curiosity about time with curiosity about space (though both are ultimately the same thing)," writes Ryman about the sequel. "The question is not: what happens next? but where will we go next?"

Where indeed? Will books made of paper and cloth become obsolete? Probably not. Even in the 25th  Century, Captain Picard keeps books in his quarters on the Starship Enterprise. It's more likely that publishing and storytelling will just keep evolving into forms we can't imagine. Ted Nelson, the man who coined the term "hypertext" in the mid-1960s, had a vision of a world-wide network of stored writing, graphics, and data. "But the ocean of universal hypertext is not enough: we want free sailing in it, " he wrote. "A world of open hypertext publishing promises extraordinary new freedom of the mind, a new empowerment of humanity." That would be nice, wouldn't it? More realistically, I have a hope that writers keep finding ways to create evocative fiction that touches and troubles us, regardless of the medium—be it print, a paper-flat screen, or a painless download directly into our eager brains.

Originally published in The Harrington Gay Men's Fiction Quarterly, Vol. 1 Number 3, 1999.