Digital Beach, Aruba

While taking an early morning walk on the beach this past weekend, I noticed plenty of electronic devices. This person had the complete rig with the iPod player and digital reader.

Nothing like making yourself at home on Palm Beach, Aruba. Of course, the electronic readers make it easier to tote around dozens of books without the weight and bulk. Have to love that. And the prices are usually a little less than print versions. As for music, well, you have to have your tunes. Just keep it low so you don’t disturb the rest of us chilling out under the Caribbean sun.

Bon dia.

Published in: on December 20, 2010 at 5:08 pm  Comments (2)  
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Getting Spacey

I ambled through several bookstores last evening. My how things have changed. Over the past couple of years I did notice a thinning of the ranks of books on the shelves, an increase in general merchandise, and the ever present smell of coffee. However, last night the point hit home hard. There are fewer books than ever in some of the major chain stores I visited. More space is dedicated to presenting electronic readers to the typically paper-book-buying public. In one location, fully 20% of the floor space was occupied by long counters with only two or three of the devices on display. That’s a lot of real estate that used to be filled with examples of the printed word.

Electronic readers are on the march, and rightly so. They offer instant purchases on the fly, without having to spend time going to and from the bookstore. They have the ability to increase the size of the text, contain an internal dictionary, and are lighter than traditionally published works. Furthermore, the ability to tote many large volumes within a single unit is wonderful for people who are reading several different tomes at one time.

At the same time, I’m sad to see bookstores waning. I’ve always thought of a trip to the bookstore as an adventure, a mission to find treasure or discover a secret. Searching with an electronic unit is more akin to checking airline fares than spelunking through the cave of the book master. But these are romantic notions from a previous age. Todays new readers seem unaffected by such quaint ideas. Price and selection count above all and the bricks and mortar stores can’t compete with digital inventory in the sky.

Long live the book! In whatever form. Read, it’s good for you.

Published in: on October 12, 2010 at 10:55 am  Leave a Comment  
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The Brass Verdict, by Michael Connelly

The Brass Verdict by Michael Connelly is only the second book of his that I’ve read. I actually downloaded it to my Kindle and read it here in Aruba. It was a pleasure and my review follows.

Connelly starts the book with, “Everybody lies.” And he’s right, especially from the perspective of a defense attorney. In this case, Mickey Haller is a criminal defense attorney who knows the truth about his clients, that they and everyone in the system lies. He’s recovering from being gut shot in a previous Connelly book when he inherits the cases of a former rival who was murdered. Taking the bull by the horns, Haller sorts the cases and quickly latches on to the most profitable one, that of a Hollywood Studio tycoon named Walter Elliot who is accused of killing his wife and her lover. Enter Detective Harry Bosch, another of Connelly’s characters, although in a somewhat lesser role. Still, the chemistry is good, if volatile, and the plot never slows down.

What I enjoyed most about this book was the honesty of Haller. So many bad things have been written about lawyers and their motivations that it was interesting to hear their side of the story. And it made me think, which is one of the things I look for in every book I read.

Thus, Connelly had me from the first page to the last, in and out of court as well as on the street. Justice is served in this book, though not always from the bench, which is a reflection of the world in which we live.

Published in: on November 20, 2008 at 12:40 pm  Leave a Comment  
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Kindle Reading Device

Amazon’s Kindle has turned out to be a great device, at least for me. Let me say from the beginning, I love paper books. All shapes, configurations, sizes, types, etc. are welcome. At the same time, I travel constantly and toting books is not the easiest thing to do.

Hence, the Kindle. I’ve been using it for several months now and find reading from it to be easier than a paper book because it is possible to turn the page and hold it with the same hand. You simply press the paddle on whichever side is right for your style. Rarely do I experience glare on the screen. Enlarging and reducing the type is a feature I don’t use much, but it is there for people who strain with smaller type.

I’ve downloaded numerous books to the device using the “whisper net” service that functions just about flawlessly. My Amazon account was charged and the books arrived in about 30 seconds each. Switching from one book to the other is easy using the interface. When you turn the device off it remembers where you were. So, if you fall asleep with it in your lap, you don’t have to worry about losing your place. When I get on an airplane, I know I have a large selection of reading material all packed into the form of one lightweight device.

What about all those paper books? I’m not giving them up. I use the Kindle for my entertainment reading. That is books I enjoy for leisure. The ones I expect to refer back to time and again will be purchased in solid form and placed upon a noble shelf where they belong. In a worst case, I may have to buy a book twice. Or, I might just buy several more memory cards and keep them loaded with the books I like. Takes the romance out of a grand old library, but the price of Kindle books is about 2/3’s to 1/2 the price of paper books. Some classics can be had for $1. Something to be said for that. Frees up cash for those great books and fine woodwork to contain them.

Published in: on August 18, 2008 at 11:18 am  Comments (1)  
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