E-READERS AND THE RUMORED DEATH OF PAPER
For some time, the doom and death of paper books–hardcovers, paperbacks–have been predicted with the arrival of e-readers and e-books. However on my recent trip to Stockholm, when I deliberately observed passengers reading in airports and on the plane to get a sense of how many Kindles and other e-readers were in evidence, I was underwhelmed. On none of the flights or airports did I see people with e-readers, but there were plenty of paperbacks and hardcover books in evidence. In addition, I was happy to see a few men reading novels. When it comes to reading fiction, men fare badly in comparison to their female counterparts.
It should be said that although e-readers don’t seem as popular in Europe and Scandinavia as they are in the USA, their use may be on the rise. On the Stockholm buses and subway trains I rode however, I didn’t see Kindles in evidence. In the UK recently, Tim Waterstone of the successful Waterstones book retailer has predicted that the physical paper book is not going anywhere anytime soon, and in fact seems to be suggesting that it is the e-book that’s on the way out.
Look, I like things with screens and buttons and keyboards and the like, but the recent joy of the senses I experienced when my carton of personal copies of MURDER AT CAPE THREE POINTS first arrived and I took one out and relished the sensation of the glossy cover, the almost 3D quality of the jacket cover image, the incomparable smell of new paper and the sound of pages turning cannot ever be reproduced by a Kindle.
A solid, satisfactorily heavy carton of 24
The e-reader definitely has its uses–lightening the weight of your backpack or luggage, for example.
TRUE: A TABLET CAN HOLD A MULTITUDE OF BOOKS FOR A FRACTION OF THE SPACE AND WEIGHT
(Stock photo, Shutterstock)
But so too does a microwave oven have its benefits, but who’s predicting that conventional stovetop cooking is going away anytime soon?
