Will there be a sequel to one of the government's best sellers? The Car Book, despite more than 1.5 million requests for it this year, will no longer be available when current stocks run out. Transportation Secretary Drew Lewis has decided not to print a 1982 edition. Auto-industry officials and some "neutral" analysts have been critical of the book's interpretation of auto crash-test results and some factual errors in the text.

But one high-ranking official in the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, which prepared the book, says this doesn't mean there won't be a 1983 book, if the data can be repackaged in a more acceptable way.

Meanwhile, anyone wanting a copy of the book can get one free by writing The Car Book, Pueblo, Colo. 81009 -- while they last.m