Amazon (AMZN) may have acquired exclusive rights to the latest thriller from best-selling writer Stephen King.

The book may be available only in electronic form on Amazon's e-book reader, Kindle - at least for a time, the Wall Street Journal reports.

The rumored deal could take a bite out of traditional publishers and booksellers such as Barnes & Noble (BKS). But King's book is likely to be published in hard-copy format at a later date by Scribner, part of CBS' (CBS) Simon & Schuster. Last November, Scribner published King's new book, Just After Sunset: Stories.

Last October, Oprah Winfrey, the undisputed Queen of All Media, called the Kindle "my new favorite thing in the world." Amazon sold out of the device in November, having misjudged post-Oprah demand.

The Kindle retails for about $359. Amazon can sell as many devices as it can manufacture, but production kinks have limited sales. It's working with a Taiwanese company, Prime View International, to crank up production.

Amazon declines to discuss the Kindle in detail, but last week announced that it plans to make titles available on cell phones. Kindle is designed by Lab 126, a California company that includes many former top executives from Apple and Palm.

The cost savings in publishing and distributing books electronically are clear, but if the new sector guts book publishing the way the Internet has hammered newspapers, we'll miss one of the great pleasures in life: Browsing in a bookstore.

Thought: Collections of dead-tree editions -- you know, libraries -- are great places. What will they be replaced by, again?