Shorts & E-Publishing

I drafted this post a couple of months ago, and then promptly forgot about it.  I stumbled upon it earlier this month, but figured it was slightly out-of-date as both the serials I talk about have finished.  And then John Scalzi posted today that the two extra short stories in the hardcover of THE HUMAN DIVISION was now available for free on Tor.com, which kind of makes this post relevant again.

So with some minor edits, here are my thoughts on serials – or rather, e-publishing experiments, because that’s what they really are – and some updates below on my current position now that both the John Scalzi and Eloisa James serials have been completed.

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I’m a sucker for short stories and anthologies.  The number of themed anthologies I have is well into double digits (I blame the editors for coming up with amazing ideas and tossing in a few must-read contributors – they know me so well), and yet, the “theme-iness” of anthologies sometimes doesn’t work for me. I’m still halfway through Jonathan Strachan’s UNDER MY HAT anthology because I can’t read too many witch stories at one go without thinking “oh no, not another witch”.

With the advent of e-publishing, it gets a lot easier to release single short stories, but yet I don’t find myself hitting that Buy button for very many standalone shorts.  I’ve been pondering the reasons, and here are some rather rambly thoughts on what short stories work for me, pricing, and whether the serial format would work in any other genre.

On the first, you may have seen some of my mentions of John Scalzi‘s THE HUMAN DIVISION serialisation – we’re now up to week 7 (update: the last episode was released April 9) and I’m still eagerly turning on my Kindle every Tuesday evening to get the latest episode.  Reasons why this set of shorts is working well (and specifically) for me:

• Each episode is self-contained enough for me to feel entertained and satisfied when I turn off my Kindle.  There aren’t any cliffhangers – sure, there are points to speculate about in each episode, but there is no “To Be Continued…” kind of ending.   
• The weekly gap between episodes feels right.  I’ll caveat that by saying this may be due to the fact I’m not invested enough in the overall story or characters to the extent that I feel I *must* know what happens next. I do like the recurring characters, especially Harry Wilson and Hart Schmidt, but I don’t feel short-changed if they don’t show up in an episode.
• The time commitment works.  They’re not ultra-short stories (though the length varies), but I know I don’t have to find a spare hour in my day to finish the story.  
• Most importantly, the price feels right – £0.63 (or £0.64 for the latter ones (I’ve no idea why the 1p increase but I’m guessing the exchange rate, boo). 

Which brings me to the price point question. The good old “coffee v an ebook” price debate made its rounds a couple of months ago, but we won’t go into that.  I think the not-very-helpful answer is that the “right” price point for me as a reader is the point at which I feel I get value for money, which in turn is tied to how much enjoyment I get out from the story (and I have some thoughts on that and recent self-pubbed releases by auto-buy authors… but that would be another post).  That’s a rather vague answer – talking specifics, why am I happy to pay £0.63 for each Scalzi episode?

I can’t help comparing the price of a short story to that of an anthology – take John Joseph Adams’ THE MAD SCIENTIST’S GUIDE TO WORLD DOMINATION anthology for example.  It retails on Amazon UK for £7.20 and has 22 short stories in it – I make that 33p each.  Jonathan Strachan’s UNDER MY HAT, which I mentioned above, is £7 for 18 stories, so again approximately 38p each.  So each story is half the price of the Scalzi series, but on the other hand, I know I’ll have hits and misses with an anthology. I’m not going to love every story in this book; heck, I may not even like any of them.

With the Scalzi shorts, I know I like his writing and he’s been consistent.  For 13 episodes, I’m paying around £8.30* – that’s more expensive than a mass-market paperback, but probably what I would pay for a hardcover (including discounts).  And THE HUMAN DIVISION is being released as a hardcover at the end of the serial run, so I don’t feel short-changed, even for the shorter episodes.  If it was £0.99 an episode, I think I would hesitate because of cost – that’s 3x the cost of a short story in an anthology.

The other point I was thinking about was if an SF serial works for me, would it would work for another genre, such as romance? 

I find it hard to imagine a romance novel published serially in such a way that would leave me feeling satisfied after each installment, yet with a HEA that I would believe in.   I did notice Eloisa James is doing an online serial for her new novella(?) WITH THIS KISS – it looks as though it’s £0.99 for each installment (three in total) or £4.49 for the entire book AS YOU WISH, which will also include a previously-published e-short.  I’m hesitating – partly because I’m not sure if the length will be right for £0.99, but also because I’m thinking cliffhanger-type endings based on the descriptions.  I’m looking forward to seeing how successful it is, though.

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Update 28 May:

• I still haven’t bought Eloisa James’ serialised story, and that’s really due to pricing.  As much as I love her writing,  I’m balking at the price for three short stories, which (based on Goodreads reviews) aren’t complete stories in themselves – it sounds like one story split into three, which is slightly different to the Scalzi serialisation. I’m not saying never – I may feel like an EJ fix one day, and decide to splash out on it, but it’d be a special occasion kind of purchase.
• I finished THE HUMAN DIVISION and liked it well enough (I rated the majority of the shorts 3 stars on GRs, with a couple of 4s, IIRC) – would I buy the second “season”?  It’s interesting, because I don’t think I would have bought the hardcover of THD (John Scalzi’s more of a wait-for-the-paperback-release kind of author for me), but that’s essentially what I ended up doing by signing up to the serialised version.  I probably would buy the next serialisation, just because I thought it was good value for money.  However, I would have answered differently if you had asked me the same question back in April – see next (and final) point.  
• I was annoyed when it was announced that the hardback version of THE HUMAN DIVISION would have exclusive extras not available to the purchasers of the online serial, but held my peace.  Obviously I didn’t feel strongly enough about THD to blog about it, though I have posted previously about my feelings when “extras” are only available in either hardcover or mass market paperback (hint: it really annoys me).  However, the fact that Tor is now offering the additional shorts for free a couple of months after the hardcover release makes me a lot happier – I would have voted with my cash otherwise (as I’ve done when publishers have offered exclusive content specific to certain formats) and not bought the sequel.

So, your thoughts – do serialised releases work for you or not?  Did you buy either (or both) of the John Scalzi or Eloisa James serials?  

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*One could also argue we get 13 pieces of cover art for the serialised version. Or that editing 20 short stories written by 20 different authors is more overhead than editing 20 short stories by a single author. I don’t know.

One SF, One (Almost) Fantasy

I posted a while back about my plan to start talking about free (or bargain-priced) ebooks.  And then that kind of fell by the wayside, as many of my grand(-ish) blogging plans do.  But new year, new start, so here are a couple.

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Firstly, you may have heard about John Scalzi‘s THE HUMAN DIVISION, which is a serialised novel being released in 13 parts on a weekly basis from around now onwards. Once all installments have been released, it’ll also go on sale as a single book (both hardcover and e), but at a price point comparable to buying each individual short.  I like John Scalzi’s writing – I’ve read his debut novel, OLD MAN’S WAR, and its immediate sequel, and I have ZOE’S TALE sitting in my TBR pile somewhere.  He writes accessible and entertaining SF – and while that may sound like damning with faint praise, it’s not.  It may not be ground-breaking SF, but it’s good storytelling of the sort that keeps you turning the pages.  And I like his blog – which counts for quite a bit too!

So I pre-ordered the first installment, THE B-TEAM - my thinking being that if I liked the story, I would order the next in the series.  If not, well, £0.63 (or $0.99, I believe) wasn’t going to break the bank.  And then last week, I had an email come through from Tor – apparently, I had signed up on some sort of mailing list, and as a result, I got a free copy of THE B-TEAM a week in advance of the on-sale date.  Win.

And I really enjoyed THE B-TEAM.  I liked that it was a standalone short with quite a bit of story packed in (Scalzi does note that it is one of the longer stories in this serial). I also liked that I was caught somewhat off-guard after the first chapter – I thought the story was going to go one direction, but it ended up going down another route, and that certainly caught my attention.  I didn’t find the setting confusing, though having said that, it is set in the OMW universe, so I do have the benefit of having read previous books set in the same world.  All in all, it’s a great introduction to a bigger story and I’m looking forward to following the characters on their next adventure (or at least, I’m assuming it’s the same cast of characters), and if you’re in the mood for some SF, I’d certainly suggest you give the first story a go.

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Hilcia @ Impressions of an Reader is taking part in the 2013 Science Fiction Experience and she’s been reviewing a few Andre Nortons.  While I’ve read a few Nortons, they’ve not been a big part of my SFF reading past.  So inspired by Hils, I “dusted off” an Andre Norton that was in my e-TBR – THE PRINCE COMMANDS was offered as a freebie a while back and so I had it sitting on my Kindle.

So first off, this is not an SF.  In fact, it barely qualifies as a fantasy – the only fantastical element being the setting, it being one of those made-up Eastern European kingdoms.  I did some research (i.e. Googling) when I finished the novel, and it turns out that this is actually Andre Norton’s first book.  I know – fail on the SFF history front.

Anyway, once I figured out what I was getting into, this turned out to be a very fun, very Ruritanian adventure.  Michael Karl, the young protagonist, finds out that he is the heir to the kingdom of Morvania, and reluctantly sets out to be crowned king.  But it’s obviously not going to be smooth sailing, and well, hi-jinks ensue with escapes and near-escapes, conspiracies, hidden identities, secret passages, passwords… It has some unexpectedly touching moments, and ended up being slightly more than just a straightforward adventure.

While I enjoyed the story, something struck me as being slightly off, and it was only after I finished reading THE PRINCE COMMANDS that I pinpointed what was missing.  And it was that there was no women or POC playing any significant parts in this novel – from memory, the only female character with a couple of cameos played a vaguely mother-ish capacity.  This made me realise how far we have come in around eight decades (THE PRINCE COMMANDS was published in 1934), and the diversity that I tend to take for granted in the YA fantasy books on the market nowadays.  So yes, this book came with an unexpected social history realisation.

My Latest Toy (and Other Links)

I got a Kindle Paperwhite!

I was going to wait on a new ereader until the Nook made an appearance in the UK, especially as I wasn’t that keen on the Kindle Fire.  But when Amazon announced that they were also launching the Paperwhite this month, I couldn’t resist.  I was pretty happy with my Kindle, but the screen contrast meant that I struggled to use it in not-so-well-lit conditions, and the Paperwhite with its improved display sounded like an ideal option.  Of course, after I placed my order, I checked the online forums and found some complaints on the screen quality…

Fast-forward a couple of weeks or so, and the Amazon package arrived on my doorstep.  The excitement!  Quick thoughts:

• I’ve no issues with the screen – the display is definitely an improvement over the previous version.  Some people have reported a degradation over time, so that may change, but for now, I’m really happy.
• I’m having some minor issues adjusting to the touch screen – I’m more used to pressing a button to change pages instead of tapping or swiping.  I wish there was an option to switch the tap zones around (I think that’s what you call them?).  Also, there’s no quick way to skip to the next chapter apart from going via the menu (unless I haven’t found that feature yet).
• It helps having had a Kindle before, because I found it pretty easy to navigate and figure out how to do things.
• I don’t think it’s significantly heavier than the previous version, but I find it a bit more difficult to hold in one hand (I think it’s to do with the taps/swipes than the actual weight actually).
• I still need to figure out how I’m going to transfer all my old books and collections across from my old Kindle (any tips, anyone?) – in the meantime, I’ve been downloading the ones I want to read from the Amazon cloud.

So initial verdict is a definite yes.  That may change once I see the Nook IRL…

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Possibly tied in to the new Kindle launches – Amazon UK is having an Autumn Book Harvest sale until Nov 7.  Probably only for UK readers, but there are some good bargains.  I snapped up e-versions of the first four Amelia Peabody books for £1.19 (for the set!).  Other bargains that caught my eye (but I refrained from buying):

• Nora Roberts‘ TAMING NATASHA – £1.09 (Estara and I were just discussing the Stanislaskis family books the other day)
• Ree Drummond‘s PIONEER WOMAN - £0.99 (I like the Pioneer Woman blog, so was tempted)
• Jim Butcher‘s STORM FRONT – £1.99 (first in his Dresden Files series – not his best, IMO, but introduces the whole series)
• HOME IMPROVEMENT edited by Charlaine Harris and Toni Kelner – £1.69 (UF anthology with contributors including Patricia Briggs – I borrowed this from the library as I was only interested in a couple of stories, IIRC, but it’s probably worth buying at that price)

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And a couple of links:

• Jacqueline Carey blogs about her inspiration for DARK CURRENTS , her new urban fantasy (I haven’t posted about it yet but I quite liked the story – promising start for a UF series, though I did have a couple of reservations)
• Sherwood Smith posts about how much she enjoyed Andrea K Höst’s books (and Estara gets a shout out for book-pushing!)

The Flood of Free Ebooks

I’ve been slightly alarmed at how the number of ebooks on my Kindle appears to be growing exponentially over time.  And because I swear I’ve been keeping to a book budget (ahem), the cause is probably the number of free (or bargain-priced) ebooks that are available nowadays.

Remember those days when freebies (especially if you were in a country outside the US) were a rarity?  That’s no longer the case – instead of grabbing every single free ebook on offer, I find myself being rather selective about the books I actually download.  But despite this new-found selectiveness, I still find my virtual TBR pile increasing by leaps and bounds.

It’s not just free ebooks though.  If it’s priced low enough, I have a bad habit of clicking that Buy Now button. My tipping point for impulse purchases (usually new-to-me indie authors) tends to be £1.50 or below.

Part of me is feeling slightly guilty that you know, I download all these freebies and never post about them* when I’m guessing the author/publisher views the promotion as, well, promotion spend.  So I’ve been pondering whether I should start a sporadic feature here where I actually Review a Free Ebook now and again (technically Review a Free (or Cheap) Ebook, I suppose).

And because I was bored (and this post lacked pictures), I made a little button**.

I thought the best way to kick this feature off was to share where I get my free*** and/or cheap ebooks.  So that your TBR piles can also spiral out of control.  You’re welcome.

Starting with the obvious – there’s always public domain books, i.e. books out of copyright, though be aware that copyright laws vary depending on where you live, and what may be legal in one country may not be in another. Project Gutenberg is probably the primary source for PD ebooks, but I like ManyBooks.net (who use the Project Gutenberg texts) because of their ebook formatting.  MobileRead is also a great source of beautifully-formatted ebooks. Public domain books I love:

• DADDY-LONG-LEGS by Jean Webster: I have a soft spot for this charming epistolary-style novel about an orphan whose college education is made possible by a mysterious benefactor.  And I really liked her JUST PATTY and WHEN PATTY WENT TO COLLEGE books too.
• Anything by LM Montgomery: Everyone’s heard of Anne of Green Gables, but I have a personal preference for LM Montgomery’s Emily trilogy (which doesn’t appear to be PD, alas). As much as I liked Anne-with-an-e, there is something about Emily Starr’s vivid imagination and quiet pride that spoke to me when I first read these books.

Not one for the classics?  There are various places where you can find new(er) releases on offer:

• I’ve found some bargains (free or otherwise) via the Daily Deals posted by Dear Author.  I like that these are targeted towards the genres I read, and also the quick commentary offered on the books.
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• Back at MobileRead, they also have a pretty active Deals, Freebies & Resources forum where people post offers (including audiobooks, if that’s your thing).  The posters also sometimes comment on the books in question, so you know they’re not duds.
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• Willing to pay a bit more?  Fictionwise, which is mostly used by small publishers nowadays, has weekly codes that offer x% off their books and this can be pretty good deals – last week’s was 55% off and this week is 45%. The MobileRead forum tends to have the most recent code, else you can make a guess – it’s normally the date of the Friday (mmddyy American-style).  I like the fact that E-Reads and Belgrave House (author backlist re-releases generally) books are available there – I probably wouldn’t pay full list price for these books, but they’re worth it if there’s a good coupon code.
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• The Amazon Kindle forums usually have a daily thread (or at least the Amazon UK website has) where people post free Kindle ebooks.  It’s a bit more of a slush pile and covers all genres, but worth flicking through if you’ve a spare few minutes.
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• Mills & Boon has free ebooks on Everyone’s Reading – they refresh these periodically.  Needless to say, I recommend the Kelly Hunter that’s currently available – MISBEHAVING WITH THE MAGNATE (I know, ignore the title).

So those are my main sources for free/cheap ebooks – do you have others? What’s your e-TBR pile like – do you succumb to cheap ebooks too?

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*Though to be fair, (a) I don’t post that often and (b) there are some books that you really don’t need to know about.

**My very first attempt at some sort of button in five-plus years of blogging.  The pretty font is Clipper Script courtesy of mawn.com.

***I hate the fact that I feel I have to state this, but just to be totally clear – I don’t condone ebook piracy.  Can’t afford books?  See above for sources for free AND legal ebooks.  Need to read a recent release?  Use your local library.

Feeding the Kindle

I’ve spent a couple of days transferring books onto my Kindle and I (still!) have not finished.  It’s partly due to the fact I just have too many books, but also, well, let’s just say I’ve not been too organised and have no single comprehensive list of what’s on my ereader (except of course, by actually going through the books on my ereader).  This is probably the last time I’m changing my ereader.  It’s just too much hassle (until, of course, the next latest ereader comes out and I cave).

But this inspired me to think about my ebook shopping habits, specifically now I have my Kindle – beware, random musings ahead:

I’ve spent so much more at Amazon than before I bought my Kindle.  I can’t swear to it, but I think the selection of books for UK customers has expanded over the past few months.  I was looking up the January releases I wanted to get and all – okay, both – of them were available on the Kindle, which made me very happy (and yes, I’ve pre-ordered them).

The one publisher that really needs to get its books onto Amazon UK would be Tor – the number of Tor books I’ve passed on because they’re not available in e-format…

ETA: I’ve recently signed up to jungle-search.com’s free Kindle books alert (via Teleread) and am finding it very useful.  The link is to Amazon UK, but they also have Kindle alerts for the other Amazon sites Amazon US.

I like that epublishers are releasing their books for Kindle on Amazon UK as it makes it so much easier for me to purchase their books.  The main ones I’ve noticed are Carina Press, Samhain, and Loose ID.  I think the first two do simultaneous releases on their own sites and Amazon, but I’m not sure about Loose ID.

I also love the fact that authors are starting to self-publish their backlists on Amazon – I’ve bought Sherwood Smith and Julie Hyzy‘s out-of-print backlist books at very reasonable prices.

The Amazon shopping experience is scarily user-friendly – I find myself sending samples to my Kindle all the time, using this functionality partly as a wishlist and partly to remind myself that I’m interested in a book.  And then using one-click to purchase directly from the Kindle… I sometimes think I should disable that functionality.

And what price convenience?  That actually isn’t a rhetorical question as I’ve discovered it’s probably around 30p for me – if the price difference between Amazon and other sites (be it publishers’ own sites or Smashwords in the case of self-published backlists) is around that, I just buy from Amazon.  More than that, I become a bit of a cheapskate and spend time pondering whether I should buy from a different site and email the file to my Kindle…

It’s not all Amazon though – I still buy at other ebookstores and the ones I frequent:

Baen’s Webscriptions: Baen makes it almost as easy as shopping on Amazon – you can enter your Kindle email address on their site, and they’ll email the book to your Kindle.  And I am in love with their pricing policy.

Fictionwise: Although their selection has decreased massively and they only have the latest releases in eReader format, I still get ebooks from smaller publishers there when they offer discounts (which are usually publicised on Mobileread).

Kobo: The main drawback is that they only sell books in epub format.  However, I’ve discovered they sometimes sell ebooks not available elsewhere, so it remains on my list and they do offer discounts on non-agency books pretty regularly.

I used to shop at WH Smiths, Waterstones, and BooksonBoard as well – not so much now because I can usually get the same books on Amazon…

Any other ebookstores I should add to my list?

Second Impressions…

So, I may have done a mini-squee over my new Kindle when it arrived a couple of weeks ago.  Now that I’ve actually read some books on it, here are my thoughts (obviously with comparison to my Sony Reader, which is the second-generation PRS-505).

 

The Good

Refresh rate

I know I went on and on about this in my first post, but the novelty hasn’t worn off.  And when I adjust the font size and spacing?  Pretty much instantaneous refresh.  My Sony would think about it for a minute or so before actually updating, so this is excellent.  And yes, I’m still loving the screen and the contrast as well. 

 

That wireless thing

Umm.  I’ve previously said that wireless connectivity was an optional when it came to ebook readers.  And I still hold that view.  But.  It is just so convenient NOT to have to hook your reader up to the PC when you want to transfer a book.  The sheer ease of emailing a book to your Kindle account and watching it pop up automatically.  Very nice.

 

The “experimental” features

Okay, this falls under what I’ve previously considered optional as well.  I tried out the web browser the other day and it was actually pretty good (see Refresh Rate).  I was expecting something really slow, but it was decent.  I’m never going to use my Kindle as my main internet device, but I like that I have it.  Fickle = me.

 

The Bad

Navigation within a book

With my Sony, I can hold down the page turn buttons, and jump forwards or backwards 10 pages at a time.  There’s no way of doing so with the Kindle (if I’m wrong, please tell me!).  So I either tap the page turn button multiple times or key in the location (see below for my next gripe) until I reach the passage I want, or just pass on the whole thing. 

I never noticed how much I re-read passages until I started reading ebooks.  My Sony Reader changed my habits somewhat, but I could still flip back and forth.  With the Kindle, it’s almost impossible.

And maybe a hangover from the Sony Reader, but I have found myself accidentally using the 5-way controller to turn pages.  Except it doesn’t work that way on the Kindle – that brings you to the next chapter break.  If you’re not reading a document with no chapter breaks.  Because if you are, you go straight to the end, and this leads me to…

 

Locations!

Arrghh.  Okay, I get that ordinary page numbering doesn’t work for ebooks if you change font size etc, but I am having so much trouble figuring out what 10627 locations mean in actual book length.  And if you’re on location 10346-10355, how many more pages do you have until you hit the end of the story???

Also, it’s not easy to remember you’re on location 6782-6791 in a book.  And if you – ahem – accidentally lose your place in a book (i.e. see above), I’ve found it massively difficult to get back.  The Sony kept the last 100 pages or so in history, so I could always get back eventually, but it’s a lot harder on the Kindle.

 

Organising your books

The Sony wasn’t perfect, but neither is the Kindle.  You have Collections, but it’s a bit of a faff adding books to a collection using the 5-way controller.  I’ve figured out the easiest way is to select the book and add the collection from there, as opposed to selecting the collection and adding the book.  I’m slightly obsessed with ensuring every book is in a collection at present, which means painfully tagging every newly-acquired book.

 

The dictionary

Well, this isn’t a Bad really.  It’s more of a “what’s the point”.  But then, I very rarely ever consult a dictionary when I read – if I do come across an unknown word, I make a guess based on context.  Which has led to some interesting interpretations – for ages, I thought laconic meant sort of lazy and drawling, hence all the heroes speaking laconically in historicals.  When I realised it meant terse, I had to do a mental readjustment.

But I digress.  The dictionary isn’t something I use and because definitions flash up automatically when you use the 5-way controller, it’s sort of distracting. 

 

So that’s it – my current thoughts on my Kindle.  Even though I’ve gone on a bit about the downsides, I’m still liking it very much and planning on moving all my ebooks to it at some point, but it’s not the perfect ebook reader.  Yet.

 

Oh, and before I forget, Jane @ Dear Author did an excellent post about converting PDFs so that they’re legible on ebook readers.  I don’t get why PDF is even sold as a ebook format, but I’m going to give her tutorial a go and see if it works.

Breaking Radio Silence… (and Something New!)

You would not believe the week I have had.  I was planning on taking part in the BBAW festivities, but the work events of this week completely put paid to that.  Probably my previous worst-ever week multiplied by ten.  Gah.

BUT.

I have a KINDLE 3!!!

Yeah, I caved and ordered one a few weeks back.  It was meant to arrive next week, so it landing on my doorstep this morning was a pleasant surprise.

It almost makes up for the week I have had.  Almost. 

Anyway, my first impressions of the Kindle (bear in mind my current ereader is a Sony PRS505 and is one I’ve had since January 2008 and is responsible for turning me into an ebook convert):

• It’s slim.  Slightly tapered sides, so it looks a lot slimmer than my Sony (just done a side-by-side comparison and the Kindle is actually slimmer).
   
• I like the colour (graphite, i.e. grey) a lot.  There wasn’t an option to get the white version (maybe that’s a US-only colour), but I think I would have chosen graphite anyway.  It’s also a matt plastic, which makes it prettier IMO.
   
• It’s light.  I may get a cover for it.  Not sure if I should go for the official Kindle covers they’re selling on Amazon or something else.  Anyone have recs?
   
• The refresh rate is so much faster than my Sony (which, admittedly, is two generations behind the current model).  But when I flip pages, or type, the refresh rate is pretty amazing.  Or have I just been stuck in the dark ages?
   
• I said type.  Yes, the mini keyboard.  The Kindle is actually only ever so slightly longer than my Sony (which doesn’t have a keyboard), because the Sony has all the space under the screen for buttons.  I’ve logged on to my home wifi network and had no problems using the keyboard.  But then, I’m used to a Blackberry keyboard as well.
   
• Good user experience.  Packaging very easy to open and tells you exactly what to do first, i.e. plug it into your PC (or wall outlet) and charge.  I was slightly taken aback when the instructions disappeared after I plugged it into my USB port, before realising that they were actually displayed on the eink screen – I thought they were on a plastic insert over the screen!
   
• Which brings me to the excellent screen quality.  Very crisp and clear, and I’m sitting in a sunlit room at the moment.  Though I haven’t read a book yet nor done a direct comparison to my Sony, it all looks good. 
   
• Very intuitive design.  I haven’t had to refer to the user guide for anything (though I did flip through because I’m obsessive like that).  So far, I’ve synced it up to my Amazon Kindle account, downloaded a free book, and connected to my home wifi without having to use the guide.  Though I am fairly techie and obviously have a ereader already.

So there you have it – my immediate thoughts on my oh-so-pretty Kindle. 

I’m slightly worried at the moment, as the Kindle appears to be going through an update and start-up cycle.  For the second time.  In the time it’s taken me to write this post.  If it heads into a third cycle, I may panic.

But I’m very pleased with it.

Now I need some good Kindle blogs – does anyone have any recs?

Not At All Obsessed

Continuing with the “I must mention LMB in every single post” theme I seem to be going for recently, here is the link to Lois McMaster Bujold’s first Miles book “The Warrior’s Apprentice” in the Baen Free Library.  I’ve added the link to my post below, but thought it deserved a shout out of its own!

Slightly worried that it wouldn’t be as good as I remembered, I dusted off my copy of “Young Miles” (the omnibus version with TWA and its sequel) on my keeper shelf last night, winced my way through the first few pages (oh Miles!), and promptly sunk into Ms Bujold’s world.  Yep, definitely a keeper.

 

PS The other obsession I currently have, by the way, is the new Kindle 3.  I am very very close to hitting the pre-order button.

I’m Still Here, Really…

Even though it’s almost been three weeks since I last posted. 

I’ve been away on work-related matters for the past week or so, and although I was planning on sticking up a “Gone Away” post, I was my usual disorganised last-minute self and ended up running out of time. 

Anyway, am back, slightly jetlagged, and to my joy, Sharon Lee & Steve Miller’s “Mouse & Dragon” is available online at Webscriptions.  I sneaked a peek because Baen does release e-versions early (it’s hitting the shelves June 1), and yay!  I believe M&D is the direct sequel to “Scout’s Progress”, one of the earlier books in their Liaden universe.

I didn’t actually read that much while travelling.  Actually, I ended up not bringing my e-reader with me. 

I know.

I debated this for quite a while, because I have so many ebooks I am yet to read (seriously, we’re talking a lot), and hey, isn’t one of the key selling points of an ereader is that it’s easy to carry around?

But I finally ended up setting it to one side, because I knew I wouldn’t have that much time to read, hence there being no point in bringing a wide selection of books.  And I was lugging so much work stuff in my carry-on that I really didn’t want to chuck a not-so-sturdy ereader in the mix.

So I decided it was an excellent opportunity to tackle my physical TBR pile and selected the following:

• Robin McKinley’s “Sunshine” (urban fantasy): I have been meaning to read this forever.  Seriously.  I mean, everyone seems to love it.  And Angie did a recent post on its various covers, so it was in the forefront of my mind.
• Susanna Kearsley’s “The Shadowy Horses” (romance): I picked this up a while back, err actually seven months back, looking at the date of that post, and have never quite felt in the right mood for it.  But I figured this would cover any romance cravings I had.
• George Mann’s “The Osiris Ritual” (steampunk fantasy/mystery): Added to my TBR piles at the same time as the Kearsley, and yes, again it was never quite the right time.  So I added this to my travelling pile to deliver a mystery fix if I wanted one.

And I was really rather pleased with my selections because I had pretty much all bases covered and three books I’ve been meaning to finish for a while.  Yes, I probably put more thought into this than the rest of my packing.

Well, best-laid plans and all that… guess how many of the above I read? Three-quarters of one.  Wait, I can explain!

The day before I left, I had one of my library requests come in – Richelle Mead’s “Succubus Shadows”, the latest in her Georgina Kincaid series.  Now, I’m trying to make more use of my local library.  And Mead is one of those authors whose books I do like, but not love.  So I thought it would be a good library candidate and added my name to the reservations list, not expecting it to come in so soon, but arrive it did and I collected it the morning before I left.

And guess what?  Obviously I started flipping through it on the way home from the library, obviously I decided that since I had started, I needed to finish it, and obviously it ended up being the one book I did finish on the trip.  So much for tackling my TBR pile.

The three-quarters book is “Sunshine”, and I am determined to get through the rest of it this weekend.  I am liking it, but – and maybe it’s because I’ve been reading it at spare intervals throughout the week – I’m not that deeply invested in the characters.  It is very good writing, like the other McKinley stories I’ve read, but I’m missing that magic spark that makes me flip pages frantically until I hit “The End”.

And I may be distracted by that “Mouse & Dragon”.

Ebooks – Another Model?

Not another ebook post, I hear you groan.  I am aware many people out there don’t care about ebooks, but ebooks are now such a big part of my reading life that I can’t not blog about them.  And hey, Ebook Week!

Unless you’ve been steadfastly ignoring all things ebook-related for the past few months (in which case, you’ve probably not reading this, having quickly glanced at the title), you’ve probably aware that pricing and distribution models for ebooks have been causing some controversy recently.  And I think we’re still some way off in gaining consensus as to what the future state model will end up being.  But anyway…

I’m on a few reader panel-type email lists for some publishers and bookstores – the kind where they send out questionnaires now and again to gauge public opinion on various topics, ranging from cover designs to newsletter content.  Recent ones have been focusing on ebooks (and yes, I suspect I probably skewed their results a bit and ended up as a bit of an outlier).  While I wasn’t going to blog about the first one, I had a similar questionnaire from a second organisation, so it sounds as though the major publishers and booksellers are thinking along the same lines and it’s not a super-secret experiment (I know – sending out email questionnaires to hundreds of people does not equal super-secret, but still, I thought I would practise some discretion).

Err… get to the point already, you say?  Basically, the questionnaires were around a subscription model for ebooks – you pay x amount each month and can borrow x number of books – and they were trying to figure out where the right price points would be.  There were some variations, for instance, what if you were also allowed to keep a certain number of books from the population you borrowed, or more interestingly, what if they tossed in a free ebook reader which you could then keep at the end of your subscription?

Now the latter interested me more, because I can quite easily see me buying that as a gift for someone.  But I was still a bit meh on the idea of subscribing to some sort of ebook borrowing service, and having thought about it a bit more, it comes down to me committing that I would (1) read a certain number of books a month (2) selected from a population of books I have no control over.

I struggle enough with getting through the books I borrow from the library within the library loan timeframes, and I hate feeling pressured to finish a specific book by a certain date (oh look, a clue as to why I’ve pretty much given up on reading challenges).  And with geographical restrictions and the like, I’m not convinced that the selection of books provided would actually be books I’d be interested in reading.  So overall, I’m not convinced I would go for the above – although it may be a cheaper way to trying a new ebook reader.

What about you?  If you’re an ebook reader, would any of the above appeal to you?  And if you’re not an ebook reader, do you think an ebook subscription service would convert you?