Applying an electric current and getting a muscle to jump is easy. (Alessandro Volta jolted a frog's legs 218 years ago.) Peckham is harvesting the body's own electrical signals to control muscles that have been cut off from the nervous system, a process called functional electrical stimulation, or FES. Peckham runs a group called the Cleveland FES Center, a collaboration among Case Western Reserve and two Cleveland hospitals.
The viability of a self-published Not The Booker is clearly dependent on finding a system for submissions that marries the delightful chaos of the existing process with some genuine quality control.