The Double-Edged Paper Cut of E-Books
Asking a reader about e-books can be a risky business. The topic is almost as touchy as asking someone about sports or politics. Worse even, its like asking a sixteenth century Christian how many fingers one uses to cross himself. I have a writer friend who makes absolutely no bones about her disdain for ebooks. Another writer friend thinks they're great since that is where most folks are buying his books.
I fall somewhere between these two extremes. I far prefer reading a tangible book (further, I prefer hardcover to paperback, but paperback to e-book) since to me reading is far more than an exercise for the brain. It's a physical thing, too. I like how different books feel, Vonnegut books are light as a feather, for example, but a John Irving novel is heavy. Older books have rough pages that have turned tan with age and flipping, but new books are fresh and slick. And each book has a different scent to it that can have the ability to evoke powerful, long forgotten memories in an instant and without warning. (I recently discovered while creating a test for my English grammar course, for example, that our textbook, Understanding English Grammar, smells exactly like sixth grade. Exactly.)
All ebooks, whether Kurt Vonnegut, John Irving, Anne Sexton, or Kate Chopin, look, weigh, and smell exactly like the same ebook reader.
However, this is not to say I hate e-books; I don't. In fact, I love them, despite the fact that some have accused me of playing both sides in the literacy wars. Apparently, if I don't choose one format over the other and forever shun the less worthy, some consider me a kind of traitor to All That Is Good And Holy About Literacy. My preference for hard-copy books coupled with my love of e-books is not hypocritical. I prefer crème brûlée to chocolate cake, but I still love chocolate cake.
Even Sony got into the e-reader wars by fielding its own reader named, originally enough, the Sony Reader:
For the most part, I have not regretted either decision: to try the ebook format or to buy the iPad.
E-books have at least one distinct advantage over hard-copy books:They are tiny. I have literally hundreds of books on my iPad including all fifteen books of Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series, all eight books in Stephen King's Dark Tower series, as well as his The Shining and Doctor Sleep, all six parts of Douglas Adams' The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy trilogy, every single Star Wars novel up to last October, and every selection for my Ancient World Literature, American Literature, and fairy tales courses (about 25 to thirty books and essays). And I still have room to have the first season of Farscape loaded into my video ap and three or four computer games.
No matter what I want to read, it's there waiting for me. When I was in high school and college, I used to carry around a copy of Richard Monaco's Parsival in my satchel just in case I wanted to read it suddenly. Now I have all of Monaco's work (at least all that has been converted to electronic format), as well as Catch-22, All the King's Men, and nearly countless others with me. Just in case. It's like having a public library in my satchel:
However, e-books also have one distinct disadvantage over hardcopy books, too:
They are tiny. I have literally hundreds of books on my iPad including all fifteen books of Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series, all eight books in Stephen King's Dark Tower series, as well as his The Shining and Doctor Sleep, all six parts of Douglas Adams' The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy trilogy, every single Star Wars novel up to last October, and every
selection for my Ancient World Literature, American Literature, and
fairy tales courses (about 25 to thirty books and essays). And I still
have room to have the first season of Farscape loaded into my video ap and three or four computer games.
Now I never know what to read because it's all there waiting for me. I have been known to read two or three hard-copy books at a time (usually something for school or work and a couple of novels). With hard-copies, you are limited by what you can carry conveniently. I couldn't read a Wheel of Time novel and The Brothers Karamazov while I was reading Gone With the Wind, for instance because I'm just not physically strong enough to carry those books everywhere. My reading practices were able to remain fairly focused because of this.
Now, though, I'm like an ADHD kid in a popcorn factory.
I am literally reading about fourteen books right now, and I had to stop myself from starting a fifteenth and sixteenth earlier when I came across a collection of Mary Hood stories in my iBooks library and a Neil Gaiman graphic novel in my kindle library while writing the paragraph discussing all the cool shit I have in my e-book libraries.
A few months ago, Reb MacRath sent me a complimentary copy of his re-worked 1980's horror story The Suiting. It's in my Kindle library, and I've been reading it ever since he gave it to me. As you all know, I'm a big proponent of reviewing books when you're given free copies, and I fully intend to, but then I got Doctor Sleep for my birthday, and before I read that, I have to re-read The Shining, so I've been reading it, too, and before all of this I had started on Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series since his estate had finally released the very last book last October (about twenty plus years after he started the series), so every now and then I sneak in a few pages of it.
And so on and so forth, until it seems like I never really read anything, I just start a bunch of books, throw them into a battle royale of sorts, and see which ones emerge from the fray completely read.
Reb, you will be glad to know that The Suiting is holding its own better than any of the other books. It's closest rival is The Shining, which is holding a firm second place. That your book is holding firm and besting Stephen King's arguably finest early novel, will hopefully serve as positive review for now until I can finally turn the last virtual page and write something more official.
I fall somewhere between these two extremes. I far prefer reading a tangible book (further, I prefer hardcover to paperback, but paperback to e-book) since to me reading is far more than an exercise for the brain. It's a physical thing, too. I like how different books feel, Vonnegut books are light as a feather, for example, but a John Irving novel is heavy. Older books have rough pages that have turned tan with age and flipping, but new books are fresh and slick. And each book has a different scent to it that can have the ability to evoke powerful, long forgotten memories in an instant and without warning. (I recently discovered while creating a test for my English grammar course, for example, that our textbook, Understanding English Grammar, smells exactly like sixth grade. Exactly.)
My name is Lev Butts, and I am a book sniffer. |
However, this is not to say I hate e-books; I don't. In fact, I love them, despite the fact that some have accused me of playing both sides in the literacy wars. Apparently, if I don't choose one format over the other and forever shun the less worthy, some consider me a kind of traitor to All That Is Good And Holy About Literacy. My preference for hard-copy books coupled with my love of e-books is not hypocritical. I prefer crème brûlée to chocolate cake, but I still love chocolate cake.
So when I first thought about tryng the electronic book format, it seemed as though every bookstore from Barnes & Noble to Hastings to the local mom-and-pop indie store was pushing its own version of ebook reader, so I had plenty of platforms to choose from.
Amazon had arguably the most popular platform: the Kindle available in several formats:
Ranging from their ever-popular Kindle Fire tablet (right) to their slightly less useful "door-stop" model (left & center). |
Barnes & Noble also had their Nook e-reader and tablet:
Complete with handy side loop so it attaches easily to your keyring
(a dubious feature at best since the reader will not fit in your pocket).
|
Even Sony got into the e-reader wars by fielding its own reader named, originally enough, the Sony Reader:
The 8-track cassette player of e-readers |
Hell, even Borders joined the fray by backing the Kobo Reader (perhaps the final coffin nail in Borders' business strategy):
Ultimately, I decided to go with Apple's iPad since it not only came with its own e-reader, iBooks, but it also allowed you to download other e-reader programs as well. Admittedly, the iPad cost about twice what a Kindle or a Nook cost, but since I was able to put the Kindle, Nook, and two other ebook readers as well as a couple of comic e-readers on it, I felt it was like getting six readers for the price of two.
For the most part, I have not regretted either decision: to try the ebook format or to buy the iPad.
E-books have at least one distinct advantage over hard-copy books:They are tiny. I have literally hundreds of books on my iPad including all fifteen books of Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series, all eight books in Stephen King's Dark Tower series, as well as his The Shining and Doctor Sleep, all six parts of Douglas Adams' The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy trilogy, every single Star Wars novel up to last October, and every selection for my Ancient World Literature, American Literature, and fairy tales courses (about 25 to thirty books and essays). And I still have room to have the first season of Farscape loaded into my video ap and three or four computer games.
No matter what I want to read, it's there waiting for me. When I was in high school and college, I used to carry around a copy of Richard Monaco's Parsival in my satchel just in case I wanted to read it suddenly. Now I have all of Monaco's work (at least all that has been converted to electronic format), as well as Catch-22, All the King's Men, and nearly countless others with me. Just in case. It's like having a public library in my satchel:
Yay! Look at all my choices! |
Holy fartballs! Look at all my choices. |
Now I never know what to read because it's all there waiting for me. I have been known to read two or three hard-copy books at a time (usually something for school or work and a couple of novels). With hard-copies, you are limited by what you can carry conveniently. I couldn't read a Wheel of Time novel and The Brothers Karamazov while I was reading Gone With the Wind, for instance because I'm just not physically strong enough to carry those books everywhere. My reading practices were able to remain fairly focused because of this.
Now, though, I'm like an ADHD kid in a popcorn factory.
Like this but with more popcorn. |
I am literally reading about fourteen books right now, and I had to stop myself from starting a fifteenth and sixteenth earlier when I came across a collection of Mary Hood stories in my iBooks library and a Neil Gaiman graphic novel in my kindle library while writing the paragraph discussing all the cool shit I have in my e-book libraries.
A few months ago, Reb MacRath sent me a complimentary copy of his re-worked 1980's horror story The Suiting. It's in my Kindle library, and I've been reading it ever since he gave it to me. As you all know, I'm a big proponent of reviewing books when you're given free copies, and I fully intend to, but then I got Doctor Sleep for my birthday, and before I read that, I have to re-read The Shining, so I've been reading it, too, and before all of this I had started on Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series since his estate had finally released the very last book last October (about twenty plus years after he started the series), so every now and then I sneak in a few pages of it.
And so on and so forth, until it seems like I never really read anything, I just start a bunch of books, throw them into a battle royale of sorts, and see which ones emerge from the fray completely read.
Reb, you will be glad to know that The Suiting is holding its own better than any of the other books. It's closest rival is The Shining, which is holding a firm second place. That your book is holding firm and besting Stephen King's arguably finest early novel, will hopefully serve as positive review for now until I can finally turn the last virtual page and write something more official.
The first rule of eBook Club is no one talks about eBook Club. |
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