Vaginal Fantasy Book Club discussion

Kamil wrote: "another good side of paper book is thatthey don't break if you accidentally drop them"
True but then you can get rips, yellow pages, mold smell, bent corners/pages and I just hate that but I'm like this with comics as well..Though not as fussy as some.

Laura wrote: "Kamil wrote: "another good side of paper book is thatthey don't break if you accidentally drop them"
True but then you can get rips, yellow pages, mold smell, bent corners/pages and I just hate tha..."

ypu don't get rips and yellow pages if you take care of your books

Kamil wrote: "Laura wrote: "Kamil wrote: "another good side of paper book is thatthey don't break if you accidentally drop them"
True but then you can get rips, yellow pages, mold smell, bent corners/pages and I..."

Yeep..But accidents happen just like what you mention about the e-reader! :)

Laura wrote: "Kamil wrote: "Laura wrote: "Kamil wrote: "another good side of paper book is thatthey don't break if you accidentally drop them"
True but then you can get rips, yellow pages, mold smell, bent corne..."

ok, i got convinced that e-reading is not that bad, but still i don't like the idea of a portable reading device other than paper book

I think the problem is that people look at them as mutually exclusive. Buying an ereader doesn't mean you have to commit to never reading a paper book again.

Caitlin wrote: "I think the problem is that people look at them as mutually exclusive. Buying an ereader doesn't mean you have to commit to never reading a paper book again."

i'm not saying it's exclusive, just didn't like the idea of an ereader

Kamil wrote: "i'm not saying it's exclusive, just didn't like the idea of an ereader"

I thought the same thing until I went on vacation and carried 4 books around with me for a week. E-readers are just so convenient!

Don't knock it 'til you try it!

while reading a distopia novel by sm stirling about a world without electricity on my kindle & thinking about amazon's friday kindle special(in honor of hunger games) which was a set of distopia novels, i wondered if that was an example of irony

My reading went up 200% when I got an ebook. Suddenly I had my book with me EVERYWHERE no matter what it was or how long the text. It was easy to hold while I ate lunch, easy to pack and if I needed to put on book down for the moment I had a huge library of alternatives I could switch to.

You know people go on about the smell of books, the look of books, the feel of books all which are very nice but are pure indulgence. Books, especially novels are about the content, the ideas, the story and that's what I love about reading...the reading part.

I'm on a computer sometimes about 16 hours a day and I profess my undying love and gratitude to whoever came up with e-ink and saved my eyes from typical screen time while letting me read on a screen.

For non-fiction things, things with pictures and diagrams and stuff I want to flip through rather than read cover to cover I still prefer actual books though, that's where the book format makes sense.

I agonized about getting a kindle for a very long time. My parents got me a kindle touch for Christmas and I have been reading much more than I was before. I love that I can have all of my books with me in one place. Sometimes I like to read multiple books and having them all with me is VERY convenient!

The kindle is very easy to hold, the best part is that I discovered I can read and knit at the same time with the kindle which is great because sometimes I had a good book I wanted to read but knitting to do so I had to pick one. Now I can do both!

I'll get a hard copy of the book if I want to revisit it over and over again, but e-books for most others. They're cheaper (by-and-large) and they jive well with my preference for a more minimal lifestyle.

Reading wise, I don't have a preference. Physical books have a lovely smell, and it's nice to feel your progress in you hand. E-books don't cause any worry over creasing the page, not being able to read inside the binding area (for crappy paperbacks), or the awkwardness of holding a book above you as you lay and read.

I definitely read more with a kindle. Any time I want a new book - and often when I otherwise wouldn't - I just have to click to Amazon (or to the cloud if I have some saved, which is generally the case) and get whatever I want. Instant gratification.

I only read from my Kindle now. Since I have a short attention span I really like having so many books available at my finger tips where I can switch between them or buy a new one whenever I want.

I read a lot more now that I have a Kindle. But I've always read a LOT. I read ebooks on my computer (easier to flip back to actual work) in .pdf form through Fictionwise.com since about 2003. But I didn't get a carry around with me reader until my parents gave me my Kindle. Now I have my Kindle, any of my PCs act as an ereader (Kindle App or PDF for many sellers), my iPhone & iPad (which have for work) are also ereaders. I'm NEVER without a book and the books are in better shape than when I had a paperback knocking around in my purse.

Part of the move to ebooks for me was also weight of paper books. I have moved roughly 12 times in the last 20 years. The hardest, most time consuming, and heaviest part was my books. It added hours to each move. I was already getting ready to declutter my life and once I got the Kindle I was much more willing to give away (to libraries mostly) my book collection and transition to Kindle. Almost all my friends/family gift me eBooks (or gift certificates which they already did) and it rare that I buy a physical version anymore.

For fact checking:
-Most eBook sellers (not just Amazon) keep a record of your purchases and you can redownload multiple times.
-You can back up your ereaders (Nook, Sony & Kindle) to your computer and you can further backup your Computer to the Cloud (Dropbox or other service) for free or a small fee.
-I charge my Kindle (w/o wifi running 90% of the time) roughly once a month. I've never had it go dead on a trip. I have run out of physical books on a Plane/Trip due to weight.
-I charge my iPhone daily because it is my phone and so I have that as a reading device almost always.
-You can highlight passages of books on a Kindle (not sure on Sony or Nook) and that highlight is saved and uploaded to amazon.
-You can write personal notes on Kindle (not sure on Sony or Nook) for 'in the margins' without defacing your book.
-You can lend ebooks through Kindle or Nook to others who have the reader or App. Limited # of times and you can't be reading at the same time but lending has come a long ways.
-You can borrow ebooks from many libraries and read them on your eReader or the Kindle for PC application.

No audio choice? My first choice is always audio. I have a pretty busy life and with an audio book I can listen 8-10 hours a day. Next choice would be ebook. I worked in bookstores thru my 20s but after having ebooks I find they are easier to read, hold and travel with. I like to be able to enlarge print and carry most of my books with me in my pocketbook. I do still get certain books for my shelves but usually I reserve that for books I get signed.

Sadly, I've never had the chance to use an e-reader but I love the feel of paper.

I've been regularly reading in electronic form since the mid-90's, initially on PDAs and more recently a Kindle.

Electronic display of content is absolutely the way
forward.

I've always been a pretty voracious reader, and eBooks have only fuelled that fire.

As a regular reader of 500+page tomes, I love the lack of weight, and equally that even though I'm carrying 300 books in my pocket (all of which have remembered exactly which page I'm at), if none of them take my fancy I can just get another, any time of the day or night, pretty much anywhere in the world.

It also has all the content for my part-time university course, so I can study wherever I happen to be, too.

I'm highly impressed with Amazon's service for Kindle owners, which is generally pretty amazing, and you don't even have to pay for the phone call.

Finally, a little plug. I've collected together a selection of useful information for Kindle owners on my website: http://personal.geah.org/kindle.html

Dawn wrote: "-You can highlight passages of books on a Kindle (not sure on Sony or Nook) and that highlight is saved and uploaded to amazon.
-You can write personal notes on Kindle (not sure on Sony or Nook) for 'in the margins' without defacing your book."
You can highlight and leave notes in the margins for Nook as well. I especially like the feature of looking up words and phrases. I don't know if other brands have the same feature.

i'm actually looking for an ereader

Vinity wrote: "No audio choice? My first choice is always audio. I have a pretty busy life and with an audio book I can listen 8-10 hours a day. Next choice would be ebook. I worked in bookstores thru my 20s but ..."

I used the kindle audio feature on a long drive for the first time this winter. At first I was put of by the mechanical speaking, but I guess after a while I got used to it. I think if this feature was more like an audio book (like voiced by someone) it would be much better. Over all it was useful and I'll probably do it again on a long drive.

I read books on my iPad, although I do prefer paper.
It's just so convenient to download a book in a heartbeat and they are much cheaper, too.
Also I read a lot on trains and this way, it's not too embarrassing. On a side not: I don't get why a lot of romance books have to have half naked people on them. Is it a warning for people who don't like this genre? Because I'm surly not reading them because of the covers.

Honestly I'm a die hard paper book fan. Hard backs are particularly my favorite, but I do enjoy paper backs as well. There's just something about the smell and feel of paper, of turning the page, the softness of the page. My favorite way to read is curled up in my recliner chair with a giant blanket. Sometimes if the weathers nice outside sitting in the sunshine and fresh air. However recently I've been thinking of making the switch. Mostly because I hate have to do this to the cover of my romance books lol :P (I ended up putting post it notes on the front of Iron Duke so my family wouldn't make fun of me for reading romance novels >.<)

I love paper. I love the way my books look on my bookshelves, I love the cover art, I love the way books that you really love and read over and over show it. I also find that I'm much more likely to actually read a paper page properly - I think the internet's majorly reduced my screen attention span; I find it difficult to concentrate properly for any length of time when reading something off a screen. (It's the same even for things like journal articles, if I want to properly absorb the information I need to print it and read it off paper.)

While I can see the appeal in the portability of an e-reader I don't think I'd ever want one for anything except reference books like bulky encyclopedias.

Before I had an e-reader, I would have said that I prefer paper because it lets me forget the world. Now I realise that I can do exactly the same thing with a Kindle. While reading, I don't notice the lack of paper smell or any of the other things which people always bring up before they've actually tried a Kindle. I still love to pick up my paper books and take a deep breath in their pages but I never smelled my books -while- reading them; those are two separate experiences.

I don't think the two formats are mutually exclusive -- having an ereader has enabled me to read a lot more because my books are always with me. I haven't stopped reading paper books - I still buy secondhand ones - but having digital copies of everything means I'll be able to whittle down my paper collection to just the very good books, instead of keeping everything I've ever read just in case I need to read it again.

I also prefer to read more than one book at a time, and having my Kindle means that I don't need to carry more than one book when I'm travelling.

Plus I love being able to read fanfiction on a paper-like display without wasting an entire forest by printing it all out! xD

I tend to be more of a paper lover myself, both because of the feel of reading a physical book and a probably paranoid need to own my media. Which isn't to say that I don't read plenty of books on my i-pad. Both bargains and e-only releases are a HUGE perk of having an e-device, plus something I haven't heard mentioned here (tho I'll admit I didn't go back and read all comments) is the space saving of an e-reader, not just when on the go, but in your home environment as well. I will add that the "perk" that many have mentioned of having so much of your library with you to choose from has also backfired on me...it can take me forever to decide what to read when I travel with my i-pad as my only reading material.
I did a b log post on this idea, if anyone is interested :P http://masquerader.harshmage.com/2012...

Whatever is cheaper and more convenient. I'll buy hardbacks if they are bargain bin priced. I spend a lot of time at the used book store, and will bargain shop for good prices on DRM-free books at various indy/small press sites.

I don't care about anything other than the content, so paper, e-ink, audio, it's all great and fantastic. MOAR WORDS NAO!!

I love both, but I use ebooks more often because of the price factor and ease of the actual reading process. Reading in the dark,(I use kindle app on my touchpad) I can set it up someplace so I don't even have to hold it.

but when it comes to nostalgia you can never beat the feel and smell of a paperback or a hardcover. Sometimes books just beg to be groped and fondled.

When reading at home I prefer paper just feels right to be sitting with everything set up for environment. But for hols or travel I prefer kindle.

I really prefer paper books - I like the way they feel, I like the way they smell, I decorate with them and I don't have to worry about batteries running out, the sun being too bright to see, or dropping them in the bathtub.

I can't see handing a small child a flat tablet and saying "Enjoy the pictures" either. What would they scribble on? In later years, how would they look back at old favorites?

I also loan and give books to people all the time. I rely on credits from used books stores. I make notes in margins, highlight passages, and leave stickies with long comments between the pages. Years later, when I revisit the book I see my then-thoughts. Can't do any of that with a screen.

I've downloaded cookbooks and craft books and magazines e-book format and found myself having to print out portions. That's inconvenient and costly.

A flat screen book is handy for traveling, though. I wish that when you bought a paper book, you also had the rights to e-book format. For me, I'll just keep using my laptop for books that only come in e-book format, keep shopping a real book stores, and building book shelves.

I'll read either.

I do aim to read a lot of self-published & indie novels, so my Kindle works well for those. But when I'm reading something that's not indie, it feels weird to use an ereader for that so I'd rather read the physical book.

I only got my current e-reader (B&N Nook Simple touch), after buying one for my Mom at Christmas. I had so much fun setting it up and playing with it that I had to have one. So far, it's awesome! I can carry around hundreds of books and read any of them at any time as long as it's charged. My nook lasts for a month or two on a charge, depending on how much I use it.

I had a hard time warming up to the idea of an e-reader until I tried the kindle version of Catching Fire. I read that thing on my iphone! All 400+ pages of it. Once Mom got her Nook, I had decided I wanted one too. I love paper books for the reasons everyone notes -- the smell, feel, etc. But I have limited space for books in my small apartment, and buying more paper books is not an option for me. Most of the time, the ebook/kindle versions are also cheaper, so that is also a reason for me to use the Nook. Plus, I love my e-reader for its instant ability to look up words via its dictionary tool from the device. I don't have to get up and grab a dictionary.

I mostly use my ebook reader for three things:

a) I travel a lot, carrying around 7-10 books for a week or mores worth of reading is just painful. Its so much lighter to carry my Kobo.
b)Books in Australia are relatively expensive (especially on a student budget). I prefer to download where I can and then save up for the paper versions of the ones I absolutely love.
c) It is a way to hide the smut. I don't want my mother knowing about some of the things I read.

I say that I prefer paper, but I'm more available to read ebooks.

I love paper, but I am thinking about getting a kindle. Particularly if I can get one that you can read and listen to audiobook from.
It's partly because I can be a bit impatient and downloading from the internet is so easy and quick. And also I doubt I can find all the books I want here(small town in Sweden). Buying the book from abroad takes time and cost a lot in shipping.

I like both. To me, Traditional books have the same meaning that die hard LP fans have. The smell and the feel of the paper take me back to when I might have first read the book. Also there is more meaning behind a gift of a book than a gift card to amazon,barnes and noble etc. I can remember being sick during xmas when I was a kid and my parents got me the entire Mallorean series by David Eddings. Ask me about when I was given the ebook of Storm Rising by Jim Butcher and I really can't tell you much.

But ereaders DO give us guys a chance to read at work or while with friends without catching hell from them. :)

My workplace is about 100 miles from where I live. When I leave for work, I have, in addidtion to my (rather large) purse, a backpack that carries my lunch (because all there is is a cafeteria and vending machines) and some other Just In Case items. What I don't have room for--or the strength to carry-- is a couple of books.
And that having been said, I LOVE books.
LOVE them. Reading, touching, smelling, making (yes, I do a bit of hand-binding!) books.
I don't love lugging them around.
I also LOVE tech.
Enter the e-reader.
I have a 1st Gen Nook, and recently got an 8G Nook Tablet...which I rooted, and is now also a sweet sweet little tablet also rocks apps for Kindle, Kobo and Google Play Books.
So, though I love conventional books, I totally love being able to carry around a bunch of books and magazines (and .docs and. pdfs, etc) around in a nice tablet.
And there's the "I'm reading GirlyPorn, and that's why I'm smilin' on this bus at O-dark-thirty in the morning" thing.

Gwen wrote: "And there's the "I'm reading GirlyPorn, and that's why I'm smilin' on this bus at O-dark-thirty in the morning" thing."

quote of the day

I go both ways. I also mix in some audio selections.

Paper.
If we could get a list of the next possible books my Amazon account would appreciate it. I need to buy in bulk. They currently have a good selection of Romance novels on their 4 for 3 list. Here's a link.

http://tinyurl.com/759lvc5

I prefer paperbacks because they are easier on my eyes, but ebooks are easier and cheaper to get.

Save a tree! Read an e-book :). Actually I never thought I'd like reading on my iPad. I've never had a kindle. But now I can'timagine reading without it.

I love the nook reader cause I can change the colors of the page and font. Yes yes I sat and played with that for a loooong time :). I use the kindle reader more often simply because it's the one my husband prefers and so we have a lot of books on it.

I also love to listen to audible books in the car. So I guess I've become a techie :)

For those who read on an iPad or another sort of tablet..What do you do to combat the glare when outside or in a very sunny place? I've got iPads (gen 1 and 2) which I can sync with my Kindle but that glare when I'm outside just kills it.

@Kristen- Audios can be really great!! Bossypants was great as an audio cause Tina Fey actually read it so I found it more interesting. However I also find if you get someone who just seems dull when doing an audio book it can totally be an off put even if the book was good in general. What are some of the enjoyable audios you've listened too? I want to get into them more but I just never know where to start.

@Laura- I really liked the Naomi Novik Temeraire novels on audio. I've also been listening to the Robin Hobb Liveship Trader books, which I have been enjoying.

I love both.
Ebooks are much, much cheaper and I read a lot of books by Indie authors and not all Indie authors have printed versions of their books. Not to mention, I freaking love my Kindle.
I absolutely love- LOVE- the smell of paper books. I love holding them and I love having them.
I do slightly prefer the Kindle because it does allow for privacy in what I'm reading.

I used to be an advid reader (200 to 300 a year), but after 10 years in the service and carting thousands of books around from home to home, I gave them all away. I kinda lost interest after awhile, you know life happened, the computer age came along and all that.

I recently purchased a kindle, and I am once again addicted to reading and I am so very greatful that the thousand books I used to cart around can now fit on my kindle, probably not the same books, but you know what I mean, lol.

Save a tree, buy an electronic device to do your reading and not have to worry about breaking some movers poor back, or your own. haha

My two cents

DJ

For me, paperback! Hardcovers are heavy and sometimes awkward for reading in bed (especially with my wrist problems).

I enjoy eBooks too (it's nice to be able to have 80 books in my purse)... but I have a really old model (the Sony PRS-500) which is both heavier (I think some of the weight is due to the leather cover that came with it - 'twas a nice hand-me-down) than most paperbacks, and also it's fairly slow to load the page(s). I can turn a REAL page much faster than I have to wait for this thing... especially since it has lame sizes (only three) and seems to forget what size I was reading at when I turn the page so I have to re-load it twice everytime... Still, it's handy for PDFs and all those lovely free eBooks that are around (woot Gutenberg project!).

While I would love to upgrade to a new model, I don't have the cash for it right now, as wonderfully awesome and handy as it would be... and even if I did have a newer, faster, lighter one, I would still prefer paperback. There's something wonderful about the SMELL of books... And the feel of older paper under your fingers...

Whenever I read with my eReader, I feel like I'm in the future. (Star Trek, esp. Voyager for sure, had eReaders/PDAs/Tablets all the time.) Anyone else feel like they're in the future when they read on their Kindles/Kobos/Sonys/Tablets?

I love my ereader-despite having worked in a bookstore for the past 8 years, and a library before that for 5 years. I just don't have the space to physically have that many books anymore! Every time I move, I'm lugging like 20 boxes of books. Why? For sentimental reasons? I hardly ever re-read them.

There are certain books that I will buy in hardcover format-but I try to stick mostly with e copies now. I also love traveling with an e-reader! No more debating on what books to bring and adding extra weight.

With having bad arthritis in both hands, I switched to ebooks. Originally on my Kindle, then moved over to the iPad. But have to admit that the iPad is just a touch too heavy for long reads, so back to the Kindle. I still love paper books, and still collect them for my shelves, but most of my reading these days is on my 1st gen Kindle.

Some books are fine on e-readers. I have a Sony and appreciated being able to take 10 books with me when I went on vacation recently. But some novels need to be read in print. I want to have the heft of it, to know where I am in the story and I want to be able to easily go back to check something, re-read a section or page forward to see when the end of a chapter will be.

Well I still prefer paperback, reading on my Ipad has grown on me. Simply being able to carry around several books in one device is a big plus. What I really love about it is being able to read at night in bed, without a light. It used to drive my husband mad, not being able to sleep with a light on. Now I can read to my hearts content with the night settings on Ipad and kindle apps. Plus many books are a bit cheaper, and who can't resist saving money?

Ah, that is another discussion. I won't buy books from Amazon and I buy most of my print books from independents & yes, I pay more for them when I do.
Luckily, there is the library for both print & ebooks!