Tuesday, August 31, 2010

Kobo

I just acquired a Kobo and am unreasonably excited about what really amounts to a small piece of plastic. But, a small piece of plastic that can contain 1000 books - how good is that? It comes preloaded with 100 books - all out of copyright, mostly Gutenberg Press titles - which is also very exciting. Finally, my chance to come to grips with Dickens and others. It doesn't work with Amazon but any e-book or magazine in the ePUB format will work with it which is one reason why I got it. And, it is relatively cheap, very simple and looks pretty good to me - although I would not say I was an expert on e-readers. We are preparing for a family trip to Japan in a few weeks and I am hoping to take most of my reading material (and Chet's) on the Kobo. This should lighten our luggage load considerably - I usually travel with at least three books and get edgy if I don't know where my next reading fix is going to come from. I have spent hours in cities in non-English speaking countries looking for bookshops with books in English, much to the frustration of my travelling companions. Now, I just have to download interesting reading material before I go and need panic no longer. It won't stop me from going to bookshops though - I just can't help it.

And, it looks as though Chet is also in danger of becoming a bookshop fanatic. When I pick him up from day-care he says to me "book shoff" in the hope that I will take him to Gleebooks around the corner from his day-care. He loves running in there, shrieking and searching for all the Thomas books. He often grabs a book, and lies down on the floor of the shop, in the aisle, and says "reading". How can I resist?

2 comments:

  1. How do you go reading from a screen? I do plenty of screen-reading, I suppose, but I do like my books to have pages I can turn, and there's something about the smell of a book... I have to agree, it does sound like the answer when travelling, though. I also travel with a heavy load of books, carefully rationing my reading lest I run out! Hmmm, perhaps there is room in my life for an e-reader after all.

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  2. I have to say I don't mind reading from a screen. It isn't backlit so is quite easy on the eye. I have read one and a half books on it so far, relatively easily. One thing I have noticed is that I am actually reading more closely on the Kobo than I would a book - it isn't as easy to speed read and flick through pages so it is forcing me to slow down and be more considered in my reading, which is quite a good thing I think as I can often power through a book quite quickly. I too love the smell of a book and some books I would rather have in a beautiful hardback edition, but others I wouldn't be too fussed if I didn't own as a book.

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