Kindle: Fire It Up!

Today I got a Kindle. It was delivered to me by a wonderful elf (a fellow American expat who bought it for me in the U.S. and hand-carried it all the way to Shanghai). As you can imagine, I am wildly grateful because while we do have a number of bookstores that carry books in English, the books are not necessarily the ones I want to read.

So…

Minutes after my friend the elf handed me my new toy and went home to nurse her jet lag, I met another friend for coffee. “I got my Kindle!” I said.

This friend (who had been away for a month or so) was confused. For a long time, I had been vehemently anti-Kindle (well, not really anti-Kindle, but anti-reading device). “A Kindle? I thought you hated those things,” she said.

“I did,” I said, “but I’ve changed my mind.”

Then I started to think about why. After all, I’m a writer and a voracious reader. I love books. I love paper. I love bookstores. I love libraries (to see just how much, click “Because of a Book”). In fact, an important part of my writing process happens while I’m reading. Believe it or not, I actually write IN books…my own stuff in books...hardback and paperback…whenever I get inspired by what I’m reading. (Shock…horror…I know…but I write all over my books. In the margins. Between sections. On the title page. On the covers. Heck, I write right over text if I’m on a roll.) Without the ability to write by hand while I read, what will happen to my writing process?

Great question.

And how will I “browse” for new books…the way I do at a library or in a bookstore?

Another great question

AND...if I have such concerns, why am I suddenly so gung-ho about my Kindle?

Because…

1. The publishing world is changing and I’m choosing to change with it. While I love books and hope they stick around for a long, long time, I have big doubts. Besides, I’m good at change (heck, I got married and moved to China in fewer than six weeks)...change is my middle name.
2. I want to give reading devices a chance. Sure, they are in their Jurassic Period, and sure, they are guaranteed to change a great deal in the coming years (probably in the coming months), but so what? It’s cool to be starting out with an (somewhat) early version of a device that will inevitably alter how we take in stories. (And how we write them…)
3. Since moving to China, I haven’t done a whole lot of traditional bookstore browsing…and I’ve been fine. I choose most of the books I read via referrals from my husband’s cousin Mary in Ireland, Twitter, friends, Goodreads, various email newsletters from publishers, and other sources.
4. I’m desperate for books in China.
5. I believe words have possibilities we still know nothing about, and if we limit ourselves to a traditional book, we’ll never discover those possibilities. I’m an explorer. I want to explore.
6. I’m just gosh-darn curious.

So as we enter 2010, picture me here in Shanghai, powering up my Kindle, deciding which book I’ll download first. And second. And third. And 1,336th.

And guess what?

I’m not the only one talking about this. Seth Godin (the Godfather of What Comes Next) and The Christian Science Monitor are talking, too. See what they have to say.

Comments

[Jennifer Hudock]

I got my fiance a Sony Reader as a gift, and we are both diehard booklovers. But you're right, the publishing industry is evolving and changing. You can get just about anything digitally now, which is exciting, and a little scary. It also has great environmental implications. I hope you continue to enjoy your Kindle. Happy Reading!

[Le Bas Bleu]

Good for you ! I think your reasons are rock solid. And, when you travel, you'll be carrying a much lighter load ! Also, most people downloading are doing all the free ebooks :-) Enjoy !

Kristine

[Greg L.]

I'm fascinated by this idea of de-separating the author from the intellectual property. if we don't have a physical object (paper) to sell, what happens to literature?

Obviously we sell a new medium as if it really existed, and we continue living in metaphor without realizing it. One more reason the ISPs will eventually take over everything. If entertainment is data, and communication is data, and art is data, then in some way life and humanness is data. And how is it right to commoditize that?

I guess it is right. But I feel like if we are going to reduce art to its primary definition, a specific ordering of electrons, then we should pay in an economy of scale, and not some mythical $10 overhead to Amazon and $0.02 to the author, when in fact, Amazon's costs have to be something closer to the $0.02 per download.

I dunno. It feels like electronic books are part of a scheme to royally screw the author while generating huge amounts of cash for the distributor. Even more disproportionally than with paper books, I mean. The author should get a good piece of that massive reward.

And are we getting closer to a platonic vision of literature by separating the art from a physical medium?

[1334th in an infinite series of half-baked ideas while occupied with ten other things at work.]

[Spencer L Casey]

Kristin. I love the pic of just opening the box. Feels so good. Here's the thing. I am a lover of all things books as well. And I still purchase books. But I also enjoy them as audiobooks and through my Kindle. That's got to be OK. Enjoy it. No justification necessary. I mean, just show it to them. What word lover wouldn't melt? :)

Cheers,

Spencer Casey

[Spencer L Casey]

I forgot to mention that you can highlight text in a novel and make notes to your heart's content. I use it when I want to look something up later.

[Carla]

I love my first gen Kindle, too, but I still borrow from the library, buy books, trade books with friends and read a make-your-hands-filthy NYT daily. Variety is the spice of life and no one should be above electronic reading. As a secondary teacher, it's important for me to experience pop culture and emerging trends! Read that Kindle, K!

[globalgal]

As a fellow expat in a small city in China, I am suffering from the worst kind of book withdrawal. And I'm a librarian, which makes this all much worse. I crave physical books, but I make due with audiobooks and e-books. I don't have a Kindle, but I am drooling over your new one! For now I just have to download e-books and read them on my laptop. I'll do whatever it takes to indulge my reading habits! E-Readers are a godsend for expats.