I read a lot. And I go through a lot of books. I even reread my books over and over again- especially the ones I like. I could spend hours in a book store or library, and want to take most of the shelf contents home with me. But what do you do with those books once their home and your done reading them... and think of all the trees that gave up their lives for my pages... and, come on, can the publishers make these first run, hardbacks any heavier (yes, Harry Potter #4-7, I'm talking to you).
My answer came in the mail last week, the electronic book reader, and I'm having a hard time putting it down.
The e-reader like Amazon's Kindle is the future of all books IMO. It's light weight, easily portable and fairly straight forward to use. And it's WAY too easy to buy books on - some of which are free, like the classics. You can buy them from Amazon's website or on the device's 'store' and the book is downloaded to the machine in less than a minute - it accesses the Sprint network for no extra charge to get it to you. It's battery lasts for days and it holds about 1,500 books at a time. But you can remove a book from the reader and Amazon keeps track of everything you've purchased and lets you re-download back to the device.
I know, I know, I sound like a commercial for the thing, but I've really been enjoying it and just had to share. Click the picture below to go to Amazon's site and find out more.
The only downside I've found is the cost of the thing and the books. While the books are cheaper than if you bought them new from the store (except the free ones), one could argue that the library is even cheaper. Oh well, I think the benies out way that downside by a long shot - no paper killing trees, no more bookshelves to buy, no driving from one store to the other looking for the titles they're out of, no more heavy books falling on my face as I fall asleep in bed reading.
The only other e-ready I know of at the moment is Sony's. I looked into that one too, it's pretty slick, but costs more and there aren't as many books available. And Amazon just makes it so easy to manage the Kindle, so I went with it and highly recommend.
It is a good thing for an uneducated man to read books of quotations. - Sir Winston Churchill
Outside of a dog, a book is man's best friend. Inside of a dog it's too dark to read. - Groucho Marx
A classic is something that everybody wants to have read and nobody wants to read. - Mark Twain
