Hard, Soft and Wet

First published in 1997 and now available as an ebook.

Who are the digital generation? They are the millions of youngsters who live with, and love, the technology with which they are growing up. This is their story. Tomorrow belongs to them.

‘This is the book which opens up the electronic frontier to those still left out in the cold, the one McLuhan would have written were he to be still surfing the Nineties’ Arena. ‘At once a romance, a cultural commentary, and a piece of travel writing which adds the virtual world to its itinerary as though it were a new place on the map. ‘ Sadie Plant, The Times

Not another book about youth culture, nor cyberpunks, hackers and VR; not a computing manual; not the history of technology; but a book about the first generation of people to take the information age for granted.

A personal portrait of the Wired Generation, exploring the dreams, ambitions, aesthetics and assumptions of all the kids growing up digital, worldwide.

In these days of video games, PCs, multimedia and personal stereos, it’s all too easy for the sensitive kids to disappear into worlds of their own, and it happens so quickly — one birthday they’re chirpy and sociable, the next they stay home to watch Robocop for the thirty-seventh time or play Mortal Kombat yet again.

About the author

Melanie McGrath is the author of the highly acclaimed Motel Nirvana, which won the 1996 John Llewellyn Rhys/Mail on Sunday prize for the best new British writer under 35.
‘A brilliant writer’ — Dervla Murphy
‘McGrath is a cool-eyed chronicler of a dispossessed generation’ — Deborah Bosley, Literary Review