"I idealize the transmission of intellectual property materials," Jonathan Lethem says (explaining why his novels read like mashups of cultural references, borrowings and outright plagiarisms). "Maybe that's why my books are full of pop music," he muses, naming some of the bands who've inspired him: Pavement, Camper Van Beethoven, stuff that's on the hard side of college rock.

With his salt-and-pepper mane, baseball T-shirt and engineer's glasses, Lethem could be just another music nerd enthusing about obscure '90s rock in a quiet Berkeley cafe. But Lethem is the author of literary sensation Fortress of Solitude, winner of a MacArthur genius grant and is about to author a new version of the cult comic book Omega the Unknown for Marvel.

Over his two-decade career as a novelist, he's written about women who fall in love with black holes, alien abductions, sentient transsexual kangaroos and Tourette sufferers. Known for blending science fiction and comic book themes with precise, literary prose, Lethem is the kind of guy who goes -- at least in his imagination -- where few have gone before.