Fiction selling fiction

How publishers are using fake websites to sell novels, by Vauhini Vara in The Wall Street Journal.

The top results in a Google search for "Jayne Dennis" are a Web page with a photo of the B-list actress posing on a red carpet, and a fan site full of snapshots and gossip about Ms. Dennis's relationship with actor Keanu Reeves.

The twist: Jayne Dennis doesn't exist -- not in the real world, at least. She is a figment of writer Bret Easton Ellis's imagination and a character in his upcoming novel, "Lunar Park." The woman pictured on JayneDennis.com is actually a model, and readers who click around on the site can eventually find a link to the publisher's official site for the book.