Random Musings: e-Books vs. 'Tree-Books'

Recently, Julie did a post about the Urban Dictionary's addition of the term 'tree-book' as a way to distinguish a book from it's electronic counterpart, an eBook. It's a clever distinction that is becoming more necessary in this digital age. Julie is a tree-book girl and so am I. When Amazon introduced their Kindles, I wasn't even interested ~ and I love new gadgets!


I did make an effort. I read my first eBook a while back, but still wasn't a fan. I attempted to read it on my nice big 18" computer screen, but even that didn't seem to help. I ended up printing it out to read it off a page (*hanging head in shame*). Quite frankly, I spend enough time staring at a computer screen... I'd rather tax my eyes in a new way by squinting over the printed page. Also, there's something about the feel of a book and (don't laugh) the smell of paper. I love seeing my books all lined up waiting for me on my shelves, like old friends.


Although, as Bethanne Patrick, better known as The Book Maven from Book Maven Media, tweeted not so long ago, "Thinking more and more about fact that it's not all about ebooks; it's about reading, keeping reading alive no matter the 'mechanism'." I think this gets to the heart of the matter. If eBooks create more readers, how can that be bad? Even if they aren't for me, I'm glad they're enticing people to read.

Who knows, it took me a long time to switch to mp3s too (picture me clinging to my CD cases) and I'm still not a total convert. Would I be willing to try eBooks again, say on a shiny new iPad? You, bet! But until then, I'll stick to my personal library...

Confessions of a Shopaholic on the "Big Screen"

Well, it's here, the official movie trailer for Sophie Kinsella's Confessions of a Shopaholic .

The movie stars Isla Fisher as Becky Bloomwood and Hugh Dancy as Luke Brandon. I'm quite glad they decided on non-American actors for the leading roles (Except they're all speaking with American accents!) ~ the rest of the casting made me do a double take. Becky's parents are being played by Joan Cusack and John Goodman!!! Krysten Ritter is cast as Becky's faithful friend Suze (anyone else have trouble seeing her as anything but Gia from Veronica Mars or Lucy on Gilmore Girls???).

A little out there as casting goes? What do you think?

The movie is currently scheduled to release in February.

Personally, I prefer Kinsella's NON-shopaholic stuff, but I won't mind taking a gander at the film... maybe when it comes out on DVD.

Thoughts from Trashionista: http://www.trashionista.com/2008/12/more-anti-becky.html

Beedle the Bard Contest at Amazon

Amazon is sponsoring an amazing writing contest open to anyone 13 and over... with a grand prize of sending you and a friend to London, England to spend a weekend with the rare handwritten book of fairy tales by J.K. Rowling.

Answer one of three questions in 100 words or less:

• What songs do wizards use to celebrate birthdays?
• What sports do wizards play besides Quidditch?
• What have you learned from the Harry Potter series that you use in everyday life?

The contest runs from April 9th through the 22nd so start scribling my friends!

To read more about the rules and to make submissions click here.

My Judgment Must Be Off...

Over the past 3 or so months, I've read one really good book. What's that about? So, I won't be reviewing The Almost Moon right now, because it's honestly going nowhere fast. I've been reading it since last Sunday and I am still 107 pages in. The most I can say about these 100 pages is simply that's it's really tedious and partly disturbing. I haven't yet read The Lovely Bones, because I am holding out for the movie and I expect that I will read it anyway, because I've had a lot of recommendations for it.

But back to the fact that I can't find a good book to read... is it simply bad judgment? I am extremely frustrated that I haven't been able to fully escape into a good book lately, because boy do I need it!

Julie's Non Review: Songs of a Humpback Whale

I'm not even going to post the summary and all that jazz because well I'm not doing a review of this book...right now. I'll probably come back to it in a couple months but I wasn't feeling it.

I know I'm not into it when I've been reading it for a week and am only on page 50. Yes the new fall season of tv doesn't help but I've always found time for my reading before when tv has been this invovled.

So I'm going to reserve the right to call it back from the depths of my bookshelf and read at a later date.